4 minute read
Art Around Town: Texas Edition
Art Around Town: Texas Edition
Derek Frazier
Curator of Collection & Preparator
When the Longview Economic Development Corporation (LEDCO) invited us to install art in their new building, we knew we wanted to include work that celebrated our great Texas heritage. In a hallway, right across from the glass walls of a conference room, are three heavy hitters from a special year in Texas history.
In 1986, Texas celebrated its 150th year of independence, or Sesquicentennial. I graduated high school that year and started college majoring in, what else, visual art. I remember going to the Fort Worth Museum of Art at its old, small location near the Natural History Museum. That’s where I first encountered art by David Bates.
Several of the paintings were massive, taller than me, and were done in Bates’ awkward, angular style; one featured a snake zig-zagging up a crooked tree to be repelled by a mother heron protecting her chicks. Amazing stuff to a young art student. At the time there was no way that I could have known that someday I would install a quirky work by my new favorite artist- in this case, an iconic, whimsical lithograph titled Corny Dog.
Made in 1986, Corny Dog celebrates one of the most recognizable faces in the entire state- Big Tex, who presides over the Texas State Fair in Dallas in a red western shirt and the largest pair of jeans on the planet Looking at Bates’ lithograph, you can hear that slow drawl saying, “Howdy…folks. Welcome… to the… State… Fair… of Texas!” Up close, taking up nearly half of the composition, is another true Texan in a plaid shirt and enormous cowboy hat, happily contemplating his next bite of a corny dog, one of the ubiquitous symbols of contemporary Texas. The chaotic scene is done primarily in red, white, and blue, the colors of the Lone Star State’s flag. It just doesn’t get any more Texan than this.
Not to say that our next artist doesn’t try. Also made in 1986, Rodeo, a lithograph by Derek Boshier, is a wonderful example of hybridized British and American Pop art, two related by different occurrences in the 20th century. Boshier was born and educated in England, but by the Sesquicentennial he had moved to Texas, where he was a professor at the University of Houston.
Rodeo combines the kitschy qualities of British Pop art with the use of iconography found in the American brand of the same movement. I don’t know if Boshier ever went to a rodeo, but he reduces the experience down to a single moment when a bronc buster is, well, bustin’ a bronc. Conchos, popularly used in western wear of the 80s, are scattered across the composition, a not-so-subtle identifier of the western culture of the time. And just to make sure we know where we are, the artist includes a big Texas branding iron, with a concho marking the location of the state’s capital.
Finally, we have Dallas artist Nic Nicosia’s 1986 Bobby Dixon and The Texas Stars. Created just a few short years after Nicosia was included in exhibitions at the Whitney Museum and the Guggenheim, this 10-color screenprint is a fantastic example of the artist’s staged scenes. Simply through the placement of three costumed people and a cheesy backdrop, Nicosia captures the kind of ultra-low budget show that commonly played early mornings and late nights in the 80s. Thanks to Andy Warhol, the screenprint is the ultimate Pop art medium, one that Nicosia combines with over-thetop Texas iconography to create a masterpiece.
Good stuff.
