Its GONZO247 coming straight to you from Aerosol Warfare Gallery! Looking forward to the next Grandalism with PILOT(FX), to show off his exquisite and eye pleasing graff art! You will not want to miss him! If you'd like to get a sneak peek at what PILOT, myself and other local graffiti artists are doing with their skills catch the opening reception for "Graffiti Art Foundation" at Aerosol Warfare Gallery, Oct. 2nd, 2010 from 7p - 11p. The image included is only a taste of what you'll see!
This Oct. 2nd event is merely a kick-off to a much bigger and much anticipated event, Graffiti Gala Houston (GGHTX), planned for sometime in 2011. Our friends here at DiverseWorks have committed with a full force of support! Come out, enjoy the art, learn more about GGHTX and schmooze.
See you all at the next Grandalism opening, Nov. 5th! - GONZO
Come As You Are: HOUSTON! opens at DiverseWorks this weekend! Jonatan Lopez gives us a preview of his work, Latin Lover Conservation, in the performance showcase.
The Latin Lover Conservation is a performance art piece and a social experiment. LLC, globally supports the efforts to better the lives of Latin Lovers and preserve their culture by auctioning their romantic services to our community at selected art events.The funds collected would be used primarily to provide them with affordable living and ease college tuition costs. These young Latinos are a talented and passionate kind. Their place in my performance as conceptual/commercial art does not only objectify them but it dignifies them too. They are sculptures to me. The world must enjoy them as the enjoy the world. Please feel free to interact with them and set the highest bid to win “A Date with a Latin Lover” as you help us preserve this peculiar species. Because without Latin Lovers , there would be no True Passion.
Come As You Are: HOUSTON! September 17 & 18, 2010, 7:30pm DiverseWorks ArtSpace Tickets are $5.00 and a reception and discussion will follow the performance.
Howdy party people! GONZO247 in the DW House! I'm excited to partner up with DiverseWorks this coming season for GRANDALISM, an 8-week long art exhibiton series.
Starting this September, DiverseWorks dock will be the backdrop for a rotating series of large-scale works by some of Houston’s most accomplished and sought after street artists. Every 8 weeks, a new artist reveals Grandalism, showcasing the raw talent and innovation of the city’s freshest and most prolific urban artists, selected by GONZO247, one of Houston’s most notable street art legends.
Grandalism explores the combination of street art’s traditional large scale format, its “grand” reaction from the public, and sometimes its unappreciated label of vandalism.
Attention all Texas-based artists: The time has come to bring on the ideas! The Idea Fund is gearing up for its third round.
Just in case you don't know, The Idea Fund is a re-granting program administered through Aurora Picture Show, DiverseWorks ArtSpace and Project Row Houses, and funded by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, that provides cash awards to Texas-based, artist-generated or artist-centered projects that exemplify the unconventional, interventionist, conceptual, entrepreneurial, participatory, or guerrilla artistic practices that occur outside of the traditional frameworks of support. Each round, TIF awards 10 projects $4,000 ($3,500 for the awarded project, plus $500 seed money for future work) and this year one of the grants could be yours.
To learn more about the grant, including where to get an application and how to apply, please visit The Idea Fund's Web page or attend one of the following information sessions:
Wednesday, August 25 at 6:30p.m. DiverseWorks ArtSpace, 1117 East Freeway, 77002
Wednesday, September 8 at 1p.m. Aurora Picture Show, 1524 Sul Ross, 77006
Wednesday, September 15 at 1p.m. Project Row Houses, 2521 Holman, 77004
Thursday, September 30 at 4p.m. Information session webinar
Last week, Blake Smith, one of the coordinators for Come As You Are: HOUSTON, told you about the performance showcase coming up on September 17 & 18 at DiverseWorks. This week we have a video performance sketch from one of the artists in the show, Daaimah Mubashshir.
Daaimah's work combines spoken narratives, experimental sound, video images and culturally based movement rituals. She is passionate about telling stories that use humor and characters to explore culture and customs. Her own story as a young woman raised in a Sunni Muslim home and her subsequent coming out as a member of the queer community deeply inform the stories she feels need to be told. This artistic inquiry, utilized for Come As You Are: HOUSTON! deals with the movement of Salah (Islamic prayer) as Queer action (Queer as a verb) and the act of being Queer (adjective) as reaching towards spiritual purity or holiness..
Make sure to follow Daaimah's blog The Fixed Eye to see what she's up to and to learn more about her performance at DiverseWorks.
Hi! I'm Blake and I have had the awesome experience of working as a production intern at DiverseWorks since September '09. Currently, I am working as Coordinator for the upcoming performing arts show, Come As You Are: HOUSTON!
Come As You Are was a show originally created and produced by The Theater Offensive in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Inspired by the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, Come As You Are aims to investigate and celebrate queer sex, the diverse range of queer sexuality and the moral values underneath. The movement is not just about gay rights, but about inspiring queer people to express themselves and come together as a diverse community. Come As You Are is now a national project that gives grants to theaters so that they may create their own local, original production about queer sex.
Sixto and I talked about goals for Come As You Are: HOUSTON! He knew that he wanted to showcase short original works about queer sex and identity by Houston artists. He also wanted the show to be representative of our diverse queer community, particularly for it to be multi-gendered and multi-generational. With these goals in mind, Curators Chuck Jackson, Grayson Jacobs, and myself began searching for artists. Chuck, an English professor at University of Houston downtown, wrote an awesome open call to artists and we did our best to get the word out. We were so thrilled to find that we had an overwhelming response from Houston artists!
Check out the Come As You Are: HOUSTON! artists:
Chicago's Daaimah Mubashshir and Brooklyn's Michael Harren, both highly involved in Houston's queer community in the '90s, return now as established artists for Come As You Are: HOUSTON! Mubashshir utilizes traditional Muslim movement to identify queer sex as a holy experience; Harren couples Brahms on keyboard with a stories of how sex changes as he matures. Together, Daniel-Kayne and Michael Clay also take on highly-contrasting themes, placing the subject of queer sex with war and the country music medium.
The young Gendermyn utilize acrobatics and comedy to delve deep into the rarely spoken of sex lives within the genderqueer community, while Joe Watts of the pre-AIDS generation wrote a heart-felt traditional monologue about the unique experience of one transsexual woman.
The works of Julia Wallace and Jonatan Lopez are highly interactive, allowing the audience to actively participate as part of their performances.
Nancy Douthey as well as DumpTruck explore brief moments that highlight the quirkiness and fun within queer sex.
It has been so cool to be a part of this project from the very beginning and have the chance to work so closely with the DiverseWorks staff. As a transgendered person who has not lived in Houston very long, DiverseWorks has been a fantastic place to work! After working with the artists and Curators in this show, as well as Houston community organizations like the Transgender Foundation of America and HATCH youth, I feel more and more like I am finding my place in Houston and becoming part of an amazing community. I hope that everyone that comes to this show leaves with that same feeling!
Join us for a provocative exploration of queer sex through performance art! Each performance will be followed by a Q & A with the artists and a reception.
