casual
interloper would have no trouble deciding the art of the salsa is more highly
developed among us than the art of painting. (A certain
velvety-smoky one i tasted in New Mexico, of a miraculous poignancy, still
brings
tears to my eyes just to think of it. It took three civilizations to
make that salsa.)
Nevertheless it was paintings and not salsa i was seeking when i wandered industrial desolate lanes, in the “Design District,” on a steamy weekday afternoon. Twice before i’d gone looking. This time i found them.
Just emerging into luxurious interior space after
heat and dust and neglect is frisson enough (needs a name; call it “frabjous”) — though familiar
also (whole cities are constructed on the idea) — that i wanted not
to pretend i belonged or could remain here, contained within four corners
of meaningfulness at a time. But nothing i saw addressed that particular velleity.
John Hathorn - Letter to Rubens (detail)
New Texas Talent XII (at Craighead-Green) is a pretty innocuous show, though diverse and at times engaging. I paused by the twin, mostly Prussian blue miniatures by Carolyn Zacharias McAdams. Their pert melancholy lingered on into the next room.
