City Images
The Artists of Central Texas
Robert Wilson and his fellow countrymen:
Wynona Alexander
Dottie Allen
John Chatmas
Charles Evans
Barney Fitzpatrick
Harriet Hayward
Karl Umlaf
Joseph Kagle
The exhibition is prepared in the collaboration of the Archa Theatre, The American Center for culture and business in Prague and The Art Centre by McLennan Community College Waco, Texas, USA.
Images of Texan City Reflections
American artist Georgia O'Keefe was hired to teach school in the small Texas town of Canyon after travelling from New York City. One night, she drove out across the open fields, outside Canyon and looked back. From the horizon, the outline of the city had disappeared, but in the broad, free, black Texas sky, the reflection the city's lights could be found. An image of open spaces, Texas cities, reflections and artists who were born, or decided to live, in Central Texas is the theme of this exhibition. It is a theme similar to the night sky reflecting the city that Gorgia O'Keefe saw one night so many yeas ago.
Waco is in the "Heart of Texas". It is a city of 103 000 citizens. Central Texas has a population of several million Texans. The history of this special region is one of great pride and independent thought. Some of the artists represented here were born in or near Waco, while others from different parts of America now call it home.
Six of the nine artists (Karl Umlauf, John Chatmas, Dottie Allen, Barney Fitzpatrick, Wynona Alexander and Joseph Kagle) are working artists who teach art in Central Texas colleges. Harriet Hayward is artist in the residence at The Art Center in Waco. Charles Evans lives and work in Waco. Robert Wilson visits Waco but is a citizen of the world.
Robert Wilson was born in Waco in 1941. He studied theatre with Kitty and Paul Baker and dance with the Hoffmann Sisters. Byrd Hoffmann was a special teacher, as she taught him the worth of being an artist and cured him of his stuttering. He has named his New York City Foundation The Byrd Hoffmann Foundation. In 1976, the French government gave Wilson 225 U.S. Dollars to present "Einstein On The Beach". Wilson has worked with the giants of late 20th century art: Merce Cunningham, John Cage, Paolo Soleti, and Philip Glass, to name but a few. Wilson is better known in Europe than on the streets in his home town of Waco. Even so, his images have the space, freedom and light of Texas. Robert Wilson states that art begins with the idea of light. His images reflect the spatial wonder, freedom of expression and subtle light of his early beginnings in Waco.
Joe Kagle, John Chatmas and Barney Fitzpatrick are practicing artists who also teach at McLennan Community College in Waco. Each have been exhibited nationally and internationally. Joe Kagle uses the technology of the city to reflect its inner life. He takes images from magazines, television, Internet, etc. and combines them into collages of our time. Then, he color xeroxes the collages, cuts the colored prints apart and recombines them into new images which reflects American life in 1995. John Chatmas has much in common with the work of Wynona Alexander. He takes the small wonders in city life and makes them huge in our consciousness. Barney Fitzpatrick also takes part of reality and turn it into a new vision in the city - a new reflection of the city in which he lives and work. Fitzpatrick, who trained as a photographer and painter, combines his skills into images that impress and surprise the viewer. These three artists take genre objects and give them wonder.
Karl Umlauf, artist in residence at Baylor University, Waco, sees the city as an archaeologist or geologist. His images of vacant industrial buildings are like memorial cathedrals to time long gone. The space is no longer filled with people. All that is left is the form and openness of the deserted factory, yet the feeling of work is not desolation but wonder. Harriet Hayward, artist in residence at The Art Center, Waco, creates an aerial geological reflection of the city and the land. The gesture of the paint, numbers and maps of the region combine to give the viewer a glimpse of the world and its cities from the sky. Wynona Alexander, who teaches at the University of Central Texas, explores the city and the Texas landscape, discovering the essence of small objects and natural patterns which she transforms into jewelled wall sculptures. Her precious images are remembrances of carefully considered minute wonders, which she stops to examine, hold and internalize.
Two photographers, Dottie Allen, who teaches at Hill College near Waco, and Charles Evans, who runs Master classes for other photographers in Waco, document and transform the city and its region into the faces of Texans and their dwellings. Their works portray the independence, stuggle and special pride of Texas. Evans Anniversary, St. Francis on the Brazos depicts and elderly couple in front of one of Waco's old churches. Dottie Allen portrays the life and words of the people of Central Texas.
Each of nine artists in this exhibition takes a reflection of Waco as microcosm of the world. I would like thank my co-curator Věra Jirousová from Prague, Dr. Dennis Michelis, President of McLannan Community College in Waco, Draha Blahová from the Masaryk University in Brno, the staff at The Art Center, Waco, Hiram Buttler Gallery, Houston and all the artists who takes a part in this exhibition "city Images - Images of Texas City Reflections".
Joseph Kagle
(Joseph Kagle is an artist, writer and art critic who has lived in Waco, Texas since 1987. He is a Lecturer in art history at McLennan Community College and Director-Curator at The Art Center in Waco.)