Ever heard of Houston’s finest Art Car engineer Mark Bradford?
I just found this cool little documentary about his 2005 entries. I’m sure most of you have seen at least one of his creations roaming around the streets of Houston.

Apparently Give Up has been posting away on a fairly new Blog site that I randomly stumbled upon while surfing the net. There’s a lot of great action shots and now you can follow this talented Houston artist as he journey’s the earth and holds it down.

INGIVINGUP.BLOGSPOT.COM

Here’s one more really great opportunity currently being offered by Lawndale Art Center which any artist living in Houston should be submitting work to. The deadline is approaching fast so start creating now!

Deadline: Jun 27 & 28, 2007

The Big Show is Lawndale Art Center’s annual open-call, juried exhibition. It has been an important venue through which emerging and under-represented Houston area artists gain exposure since the show’s conception in 1984. The Big Show was formerly the East End Show, sponsored by the East End Progress Association, at Lawndale’s original location. The Big Show 2006 drew in 889 artwork submissions from 375 Houston area artists. The selected show – curated by Dominic Molon, the Pamela Alper Associate Curator for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago – consisted of 106 works from 90 Houston Artists.

Get all the juicy details and entry forms at the LAC Website.

I know there’s a lot of artists out there who are not on the Lawndale Art Center’s mailing list so I wanted to post this really great opportunity for you all to check out. I’ll be trying to get in on the goods myself (so step your game up! ;-)

Deadline: July 11, 2007

Lawndale is pleased to announce the second year of the Lawndale Artist Studio Program for Gulf Coast area artists. The program is part of Lawndale’s ongoing commitment to support the creation of contemporary art by regional artists. With an emphasis on emerging practices, the program will provide three artists with non-residential studio space on the third floor of the Lawndale Art Center at 4912 Main Street in the heart of Houston’s Museum District…
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The Art Car Parade was cool this year. As always, the crowd was quite diverse and there was no shortage of shows. For example, I picked up a flyer from a guy advertising a senior citizens food fight – awesome. I’ll do a separate post on that.
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Picture from the film Leila Khaled, Hijacker

I love how Houston’s been catering to so many diverse film festivals lately! The next two weekends will see Houston’s First Palestine Film Festival, brought to town by the fine folks at Voices Breaking Boundaries. This festival will include film screenings and discussions with three female directors: Lina Makboul, Nida Sinnokrot and Elle Flanders. The festival will run from May 11-13 and May 18-20, 2007, 7:00 pm each night; see here for detailed film schedules.

“The first annual Houston Palestine Film Festival brings an honest and independent view of Palestine and its diaspora’s society, culture, and political travails through the art of film. This group of groundbreaking cinematic texts rise above the degrading stereotypes or reductively politicized depictions that are so familiar to Houstonians.”

Kandace Simmons, Someone´s Laundry Dryer, 2005

The Museum of Fine Arts is hosting Eye on Third Ward , “a twelve-year collaboration between the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the Magnet School of Communication at Jack Yates High School. Each year, select photographs taken by students present a new look at one of Houston´s oldest communities. Dating to 1840, Third Ward is one of the four original ‘wards’ of the city of Houston, precursors of today´s city council districts.”
The exhibit runs until June 24, 2007.

A thorough history of the six wards of Houston can be found here. Fascinating stuff….

Saturday (today?) is the 8th Annual Midtown Visions Cultural Arts Tour, an art walk including studios and galleries along Main Street and adjacent streets just south of downtown Houston. I will be upstairs from Art Supply on Main, 2711 Main Street, in studio 215 from noon to 5 with about 30 of my photos for show and sale, probably keeping myself entertained by reading some Jim Steinmeyer and listening to my iPod, but if you’re in the neighborhood, or heading to the Houston International Festival, drop by and say hi!

Our Mayor, Bill White

I must say, I was surprised to see so many people attend this opening considering it was during lunch time on a thursday. Nonetheless, after seeing the artwork I knew why. The mayor started it off by making a great speech and I was shocked to see his enthusiasm for the arts. Hopefully someone caught it on tape and will put it on YouTube. The first 4 floors of the building had artwork along the main hallways and was a collection of some of Houston’s most talented new artists. There were all types of styles and I guarantee you’d find something you like. Unfortunately I think that viewing these pieces any other time than the opening might be a little akward since it’s in a government office setting. You also have to go through an x-ray machine and sign in just to get through the front door… and downtown parking during business hours!

I just came across a nice little video on YouTube. It’s an interview with Houston Graffiti artist Article. I lost a bit of respect for him after the MFAH thing but this make up for that crap…

In case you don’t remember, Article was the one who got arrested at the Westheimer Block Party a year ago…