Bernbaum/Magadini Architects & Rick Rozas Design Pair Up
Plus: Allison McAfee’s Textured Lifestyle Game, Set, Match: Banner House at T Bar M
HUMA BHABHA
JONATHAN BOROFSKY
ANTHONY CARO
TONY CRAGG
MICHAEL CRAIG-MARTIN
MARK DI SUVERO
LEONARDO DREW
JEAN DUBUFFET
BARRY FLANAGAN
LIAM GILLICK
KATHARINA GROSSE
KAWS
YAYOI KUSAMA
ROY LICHTENSTEIN
JOAN MIRÓ
HENRY MOORE
IVÁN NAVARRO
PAMELA NELSON AND
ROBERT A. WILSON
JEAN-MICHEL OTHONIEL
BEVERLY PEPPER
JOEL SHAPIRO
FRANK STELLA
LEO VILLAREAL
URSULA VON RYDINGSVARD
ANDY WARHOL
HE XIANGYU
A MUSEUM UNLIKE ANY OTHER. THE ART OF SHOPPING.
Photography: Neil Landino
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EDITOR’S NOTE
August / September 2025
TERRI PROVENCAL Publisher / Editor in Chief terri@patronmagazine.com Instagram terri_provencal and patronmag
Each August, our Art & Design issue arrives likes a jolt of aesthetic electricity, as bold ideas collide with space, form, and feeling. It’s a curated surge of inspiration, tracing the pulse of creativity across unexpected places.
On the cover, a gorgeous home by Bernbaum/Magadini Architects makes visible the equally stunning interiors by Rick Rozas Design, with one of Deborah Ballard’s Celebration sculptures lit in the foreground. Add to that an art collection, and you have a compelling yet Peaceful Paradise, as written about by Nancy Cohen Israel.
In our next feature, interior designer Allison McAfee, founder of Park Interiors, took us inside her family home, a space she personally designed. Collaborating with art advisor Temple Shipley brought arresting interest with works by Wanda Koop, Jessica Drenk, Travis Boyer, and Aaron Morse. Rob Brinkley guides us through the residence.
Situated in North Dallas and designed by Lake Flato, Megan and Brady Wood’s Banner House at T Bar M, a project by WoodHouse, has enhanced the racket club with a cleverly conceived new clubhouse. Interiors by Commune and art advisory by Jessica Nowitzki add compelling depth throughout. Rob serves up the details.
Hooked on the expressive tapestries in Dallas Contemporary’s You Stretched Diagonally Across It, we pulled together the season’s most striking crochet and knitwear pieces curated with some our favorites from the exhibition. Photographed by Luis Martinez and styled by Wendy Mulas, Thread Count channels the raw, tactile energy where runway meets the loom.
From the visual art front, Brandon Kennedy checks in with Dallas artist Sean Cairns, who will present a solo booth at 12.26 at the inaugural Untitled Art, Houston. Known for his commanding presence and nuanced practice, Sean’s work is highlighted in Trickster Runs the Game. He joins a strong Dallas contingent heading to the fair this September, including Erin Cluley Gallery, Colector, Keijsers Koning, Galleri Urbane, and Meliksetian|Briggs. In Dallas, Colector will release a new book by sculptor Adeline de Monseignat, who draws on symbolism and the uncanny. Get to know her in Sculpting the Tender Tensions of Being
Ben Lima meets the Nasher Sculpture Center’s new director, Carlos Basualdo, celebrated not only for his curatorial dexterity but also his approachability and signature fedora. Between Verse and Form offers a deeper exploration of his journey, shaped in part by his early life as a poet. Elsewhere, in Frames & Facades, Chris Byrne interviews Helen A. Harrison, one of the founding figures of the Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
In Space , Rob uncovers his admiration for the bespoke Assemblage wallcoverings at Holly Hunt meticulously handcrafted by Christian Batteau and his wife, Heidi, in a restored Arkansas seed mill. His design tour continues at Avenue Road, a handsome new showroom on Monitor Street that redefines spatial elegance. From Florence with Fire turns to the artistry of the Renaissanceinspired kitchens by Officine Gullo, where old-world technique meets contemporary sensibilities.
Building on the creative spirit found throughout the issue, Sara Hignite sits down with close friend and designer Elizabeth Hooper O’Mahony to explore her sculptural jewelry line in Forged with Intention
Finally, Francisco Moreno invites us over to discuss his mural populated with people from the neighborhood and those who inspire him including former instructors Sedrick Huckaby, Benito Huerta, and Marilyn Jolly a commission by the Lofts at Expo Park. Angels, Squirrels, and Cosmic Imaginings covers the artist’s baroque, surreal, sci-fi visual language and previews his upcoming solo show at Col Gallery in San Francisco, as well as his participation in Soy de Tejas, a traveling exhibition making its way to The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture in Riverside, California.
–Terri Provencal
Portrait
Tim Boole, Styling Jeanna Doyle, Stanley Korshak
60 PEACEFUL PARADISE
Bernbaum Magadini Architects and Rick Rozas Design create a Preston Hollow idyll. By Nancy
Cohen Israel
68 A FEEL FOR TEXTURE
Inside the sensational world of Allison McAfee. By Rob Brinkley
76 GAME ON
A legendary racket club gets a bold new spin, blending top-tier, striking architecture and clubby cool. By Rob Brinkley
82 THREAD COUNT
Spinning fashion into the fine art loom at Dallas Contemporary. Photographs by Luis Martinez; Styling by Wendy Mulas
On the cover: Lisa and Ira Kravitz enlisted the expertise of Bernbaum/Magadini Architects, Rick Rozas Design, and landscape architect studioOutside to bring their elegant home to life. Photograph by Charles Davis Smith.
HOUS T ON • DALLA S • A TLANT A
DEPARTMENTS
06 Editor’s Note
12 Contributors
22 Noted
Fair Trade
38 MATERIAL INSTINCTS
Rachel Mica Weiss weaves between vision and structure. Interview by Jennifer Carvalho
Openings
40 SCULPTING THE TENDER TENSIONS OF BEING
Adeline de Monseignat mines the fragility of life through form and material. By Terri Provencal
Contemporaries
42 BETWEEN VERSE AND FORM
Carlos Basualdo’s poetic vision for the Nasher Sculpture Center. By Ben Lima
44 HOUSTON GETS A FRESH CANVAS
Untitled Art stakes its claim. By Terri Provencal
48 FRAMES & FACADES
The homes that shaped art history. Interview by Chris Byrne
Studio
50 TRICKSTER RUNS THE GAME
The atmospheric, changing boundaries of Sean Cairns. By Brandon Kennedy
Space
52 WALLPAPER WORTH ITS WEIGHT IN GOLD LEAF
The Arkansas talent behind the most sophisticated wallcoverings at Holly Hunt. By Rob Brinkley
54 FROM FLORENCE WITH FIRE
With centuries-old techniques, Matteo Gullo introduces Dallas to the artisanal prowess of Officine Gullo. By Terri Provencal
56 DESIGN IN A DIFFERENT KEY
Avenue Road’s quiet path to elevated living. By Rob Brinkley
Atelier
58 FORGED WITH INTENTION
Elizabeth Hooper O’Mahony is sculpting jewelry with a soul. By Sara Hignite
There
90 CAMERAS COVERING CULTURAL EVENTS.
Furthermore
96 ANGELS, SQUIRRELS, AND COSMIC IMAGININGS
Welcome to Francisco Moreno’s baroque sci-fi dream. By Terri Provencal
CONTRIBUTORS
ROB BRINKLEY
is a writer, editor, and creative director in the worlds of magazines, social media, short films, and books. He has written about design for national shelter publications and is the co-author of the Assouline book Domestic Art: Curated Interiors. For Patron ’s annual Design Issue, Rob covered artisan wallpapers at Holly Hunt, the new showroom Avenue Road, the home of interior designer Allison McAfee with art advisory by Temple Shipley, and Banner House at T Bar M.
CHRIS BYRNE
is the founder of the Elaine de Kooning House in East Hampton, NY, host to exhibitions and residencies for Laurie Anderson, Joe Bradley, Keith Mayerson, Mary Weatherford, and others. Placed on the National Register of Historic Places by the US Department of the Interior in 2022, the residence is also an affiliate member of Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. This summer, the Elaine de Kooning and PollockKrasner houses launched a joint artist-in-residence initiative.
LAUREN CHRISTENSEN
has over two decades of experience in advertising and marketing. As a principal with L+S Creative Group, she consults with nonprofit organizations and businesses in many sectors, including retail, real estate, and hospitality. Lauren is a Dallas native and a graduate of SMU with a BA in advertising. Her clean, contemporary aesthetic and generous spirit make Lauren the perfect choice to art direct Patron
NANCY COHEN ISRAEL
is an art historian trained in Northern Renaissance and Baroque art while also rooted in the local contemporary art scene. For the current issue, she enjoyed covering the symbiotic relationship between architecture, design, and nature seen in Peaceful Paradise with architecture by Bernbaum Magadini and design by Rick Rozas. An arts writer and educator at the Meadows Museum, she eagerly anticipates the beginning of the new art season’s fall programming.
JOHN SMITH is a photographer whose architectural background lends a sculptural sensibility to his work. With an eye trained in form and space, he captures homes and spaces as living expressions. He collaborates with artists, designers, and architects to craft light, shadow, and detail. See his work in the home of interior designer Allison McAfee; the dynamic spaces of T Bar M’s new club, Banner House; a portrait of Elizabeth Hooper O’Mahoney; and Francisco Moreno’s striking mural.
SARA HIGNITE
has over 20 years of art experience at institutions including the DMA, Meadows Museum, GossMichael Foundation, and Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum. Sara oversaw the Karpidas Collection for two years, curating Texas’ first Richard Prince exhibition and editing the accompanying catalogue. Hignite Projects supports artists through curatorial initiatives, development, and agency representation. In Forged With Intention, she writes about Elizabeth Hooper O’Mahony’s sculptural jewelry.
BRANDON KENNEDY
is a Dallas-based artist, book scout/collector, and freelance curator/writer. He is the proprietor of 00ps b00ks, a project charting the margins and overlaps of used/rare/collectible art/books/culture and the persistent demands of commerce. In Trickster Runs the Game, Brandon investigates the studio practice of Sean Cairns, a Dallas-based artist who will be represented in a solo booth at 12.26 for the inaugural Untitled Art, Houston.
BEN LIMA
is the founding editor of Athenaeum Review, the UT Dallas journal of arts and ideas. Born and raised in the Bay Area of California, he studied art history at Harvard and Yale, and has previously lived and worked in Los Angeles, Berlin, and New York. For the fall issue of Patron, Between Verse and Form sees Ben’s visit with Carlos Basualdo, the new director of the Nasher Sculpture Center formerly with the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
LUIS MARTINEZ
is a Kim Dawson model and actor discovery from San Antonio currently based in Dallas whose creative vision extends behind the lens—excelling as a fashion, beauty, and portrait photographer as well as an evocative videographer. For Patron, Luis immersed himself in the exhibition You Stretched Diagonally Across It: Contemporary Tapestries at Dallas Contemporary, weaving the spirit of fall’s knit and crochet trend into a tactile visual narrative.
WENDY MULAS
was born and raised in Spain. She made her way to Dallas as an au pair but seized the opportunity to work with renowned fashion brands like Chanel, Fendi, and Dolce & Gabbana. Transitioning her passion into a career as a stylist, Wendy is dedicated to empowering women, helping them shine and believe in themselves through the cultivation of their personal style. In Thread Count, Wendy combines knit and crochet looks with the tapestries on view at Dallas Contemporary.
PUBLISHER | EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Terri Provencal terri@patronmagazine.com
ART DIRECTION
Lauren Christensen
DIGITAL MANAGER/PUBLISHING COORDINATOR
Anthony Falcon
COPY EDITOR
Sophia Dembling
PRODUCTION
Michele Rodriguez
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
Rob Brinkley
Chris Byrne
Jennifer Carvalho
Nancy Cohen Israel
Sara Hignite
Brandon Kennedy
Ben Lima
CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS
Jay Baumgardner
James Brooks
Tamytha Cameron
Julieta Cervantes
Bob Coscarelli
Charles Davis Smith
Lorenzo De Masi
Walter Esner
Thomas Garza
Zach Huggins
Conner Key
Sergio López
Luis Martinez
Priscila Mier
Peyton Mixon
Nigel Perry
Alejandra Ramirez
Orozco
Nate Rehlander
Adam Reich
John Smith
Joe Thomas
Kevin Todora
Steven Visneau
CONTRIBUTING STYLISTS
Bélene
Wendy Mulas
ADVERTISING
info@patronmagazine.com or by calling (214) 642-1124
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On View Now
Experience Yayoi Kusama’s Iconic Pumpkin Infinity Room from the DMA’s Collection!
The only one of its kind in a North American collection, Yayoi Kusama’s immersive Infinity Mirror Room is on view through January 18, 2026. The boundary-pushing experiential work from the Dallas Museum of Art’s collection incorporates the pumpkin—one of the artist’s quintessential symbols, which she has described as a form of self-portraiture—and draws on several of Kusama’s characteristic themes, including infinity, the sublime, and obsessive repetition.
Return to Infinity: Yayoi Kusama will require a $20 special exhibition ticket, with discounts for seniors, students, and military. DMA Members and children 11 and under are free. Tickets will be released on the third Monday of every month for the upcoming month. All visitors and DMA Members must have a timed ticket and are encouraged to reserve their tickets online at dma.org.
Return to Infinity: Yayoi Kusama is organized by the Dallas Museum of Art. This exhibition is presented by PNC Bank. The Dallas Museum of Art is supported, in part, by generous DMA Members and donors, the Texas Commission on the Arts, and the citizens of Dallas through the City of Dallas Office of Arts and Culture. PRESENTED BY MAJOR SPONSOR LOCAL SUPPORT COMMUNITY PARTNERS
ROAMING MEXICO
On View September 14, 2025–January 11, 2026
LAURA WILSON
These exhibitions have been organized by the Meadows Museum and are funded by a generous gift from The Meadows Foundation.
Through summer, Facing the Rising Sun: Freedman’s Cemetery and Imagination and Materiality: The Power of Memory and Storytelling in Black Art will remain on view. aamdallas.org
02 AMON CARTER MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART
Celebrating 40 years of Richard Avedon’s In the American West, the Carter presents 40 works from the series accompanied by behindthe-scenes archival material of Avedon’s acclaimed portraits through Aug. 10. East of the Pacific: Making Histories of Asian American Art explores the continuing artistic impact of the migration of people across the Pacific Ocean and their indispensable role in shaping American art and culture, through Nov. 30. Seven Days: The Still Lifes of Chuck Ramirez presents the evocative series highlighting community-centered celebrations in Texas. On view through Jan. 4. A new look at the Carter permanent collection, Re/Framed continues through Oct. 2025. American Modernism from the Charles Butt Collection, organized by the Carter, is the first exhibition dedicated to the collection of the businessman, philanthropist, and Texas native. This exhibition includes paintings and works on paper from the turn of the 20th century through the 1970s and features works by American modernist icons, many of which have never been on public view. Sep. 7–Jan. 25. Image: George Bellows (1882–1925), Evening Blue (Tending the Lobster Traps, Early Morning), 1916, oil on panel. Collection of Charles Butt. cartermuseum.org
03 CROW MUSEUM OF ASIAN ART OF THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT DALLAS
The Dallas Arts District museum is currently featuring several exhibitions: Ceramic Highlights from the Montgomery Collection and Anila Quayyum Agha: Let One Bird Sing are on view through Sep. 29; The Shogun’s World: Japanese Maps from the MacLean Collection runs through October 6; and Cecilia Chiang: Don’t Tell Me What To Do remains on view through Mar. 10, 2026. The Crow Museum at UT Dallas offers Saya Woolfalk: Floating World of the Cloud Quilt through Sep. 8. Indigo Threads, and Un/Popular Art, are both on view through Sep. 1. In Fine Feather: New Works by Carolyn Brown runs through Sep. 22, while Mountain Jade with Lam Tung Pang and Echoes of the Earth are open through Jun. 28, 2026. Also on view is Ancient Echoes, Modern Voices: The Crow Collection Goes Beyond, continuing through Aug. 26. crowmuseum.org
04
DALLAS CONTEMPORARY
Velvet Faith, featuring artists EJ Hill and Martin Gonzales, showcases site-specific installations created during a monthlong residency at
THE LATEST CULTURAL NEWS COVERING ALL ASPECTS OF THE ARTS IN NORTH TEXAS: NEW EXHIBITS, NEW PERFORMANCES, GALLERY OPENINGS, AND MORE.
the museum, along with new and previous sculptures and paintings through Aug. 31. You Stretched Diagonally Across It: Contemporary Tapestry presents 29 artists and designers curated by Su Wu. The exhibition highlights the nuanced interplay between art and craft, delving into the complexities of narrative, mythology, and memory in textile art, and affirming tapestry’s role in contemporary art narratives. Through Oct. 12. Masahiro LaMarsh: Anticlastic, features custom-made grillz by LaMarsh, a New York–based jeweler who uses traditional metalworking techniques to render highly intricate, often bejeweled pieces worn over the teeth. Through Aug. 31. Additionally, the DC Staff Show will also be on view through Aug. 31. dallascontemporary.org
05 DALLAS HOLOCAUST AND HUMAN RIGHTS MUSEUM
A Better Life for Their Children: Julius Rosenwald, Booker T. Washington, and the 4,978 Schools that Changed America delves into one of the most transformative initiatives in American history forged by Booker T. Washington, a Black educator, author, and reformer, and Julius Rosenwald, a Jewish businessman and philanthropist. Between 1912 and 1937, their ambitious program partnered with local communities to build thousands of schools for Black children across the segregated South and Southwest. On view through Aug. 17. dhhrm.org
06 DALLAS MUSEUM OF ART
The Dallas Museum of Art presents cutting-edge 20th- and 21stcentury art from the DMA’s collection in the Quadrant and Barrel Vault galleries, spanning works from 1945 to today. Works will be rotated quarterly. Backs in Fashion: Mangbetu Women’s Egbe exploring the art of the egbe, a back apron garment , remains on view through Aug. 17. Return to Infinity: Yayoi Kusama continues through Jan. 18 , an immersive experience for all ages. Creatures and Captives: Painted Textiles of the Ancient Andes presents examples from the DMA’s collection highlighting this lesser-known Andean textile tradition and features exciting new research carried out through institutional collaborations. On view Sep. 21–Feb. 22. Image: Fernando Laposse, Pink Agave Cabinet, 2021, birch plywood, sisal, steel mesh, kilndried Canadian Maple, cochineal dye. Dallas Museum of Art, Discretionary Decorative Arts Fund. dma.org
07 GEORGE W. BUSH
PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY AND MUSEUM
Through Oct. 19, experience Scenes from SMU and the Bush Center by President George W. Bush, a special exhibit featuring neverbefore-seen paintings by President George W. Bush capturing life
across the Bush Center and SMU’s campus. Thirty-five paintings celebrate the spirit of the people, including scenes of visitors to the Bush Center, neighbors enjoying the Laura W. Bush Native Texas Park, fans cheering on the SMU Mustangs, student life on SMU’s campus, and more bushcenter.org
A solo exhibition for conceptual research artist Veronica Ibargu engoitia will open on Aug. 2–Sep. 15. A juried exhibition of works by Dallas artists, Hecho en Dallas, opens Sep. 20. lcc.dallasculture.org
The Modern presents David-Jeremiah: The Fire This Time, organized by guest curator Christopher Blay. The installation on view from the Dallas-based artist is a group of vertical assemblages of black and other polychromatic paintings on shaped wood. The twentyeight works stand over ten-feet tall in a configuration that surrounds viewers completely Aug. 16–Nov. 2. themodern.org
12 MUSEUM OF BIBLICAL ART
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse an exhibition of work by Rolando
Diaz will remain on view through Aug. 17. biblicalarts.org
Moody Family Children’s Museum is reopened and includes an expanded Toddler Area for safe, age-appropriate play; Creative Makery for design and engineering exploration; Immersive Imaginarium offering multisensory discovery; an enhanced outdoor space with natural elements and a programmable waterfall; and an iconic climbing structure by Toshiko MacAdam blending art and physical play. The recently opened, Bug Lab explores the remarkable genius of insects, offering an opportunity to experience the world from a bug’s perspective. Created by New Zealand's Te Papa and the Wētā Workshop, this exhibit uses giant models and interactive stations to transform how visitors perceive insects. Through Jan. 4. Image: Bug Lab. Photograph by John Smith. perotmuseum.org
15 SIXTH FLOOR MUSEUM
Colorful Memories, November 22 Through a Child’s Eyes continues through Jan. 4. Filmmaker and writer Richard Snodgrass embarked on a project to document how young children perceived and processed the historic event. Partnering with Sacred Heart School in Prescott, Arizona, Snodgrass worked with a diverse class of first-grade students, capturing their verbal responses and their illustrated memories. jfk.org
16 TYLER MUSEUM OF ART
Unearthing Big Bend explores the Big Bend National Park and surrounding area through two distinct photographic bodies of work. For over ten years, Terry Cockerham and Sarah Wilson made regular visits to the region, recording observations and documenting environmental changes. The resulting projects provide a look at the area’s natural splendor along with its rich history. On view through Sep. 7. tylermuseum.org
ARTURA
01 AMPHIBIAN
Thanksgiving, 1973: Jane and Luna are new to America and a bit lost when they meet by chance, and a simple grocery-store run turns into instant connection. From a botched frozen turkey to dreams of Disneyland, The Heart Sellers beautifully captures the highs and lows of new beginnings; through Aug. 17. National Theatre Live returns with Inter Alia, a drama by Suzie Miller that follows Jessica, a Crown Court judge navigating the emotional fallout of personal trauma while holding firm in a courtroom that demands constant authority. With Rosamund Pike in the lead role and direction by Justin Martin, this broadcast production offers a powerful meditation on the unseen cost of holding it all together. One night only: Sep. 25. amphibianstage.com
02 AT&T PERFORMING ARTS CENTER
August kicks off with One Night of Queen, Aug. 1, a tribute to the band’s legendary Works Tour on its 40th anniversary. Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass returns Aug. 2 for a horn-filled evening of timeless hits. Hear Southern-inflected rock with Ozark Mountain Daredevils and Pure Prairie League, Aug. 22. Brian Kilmeade brings his History, Liberty & Laughs Tour to the stage Aug. 23, and on Aug. 24, see two distinct acts: the immersive Australian Pink Floyd Show and the soul-stirring HENOSIS: Unity Concert featuring operatic and spiritual vocals. On Aug. 30, For The 99 & 2000’s blends Southern hip hop with live symphonic arrangements. See The Witcher in Concert Sep. 3, marking a decade of the video game with orchestral renditions and a performance by Polish folk-metal band Percival. Brains On Live! on Sep. 13 brings the kids’ science podcast to life, followed by actor-musician Jeff Goldblum and the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra later that night. Lea Salonga on Sep. 14 shares her powerful vocals, and Mariachi Herencia with Leonardo Aguilar on Sep. 19 honors Mexican musical traditions. Image: One Night of Queen. Photograph by Jay Baumgardner. attpac.org
03 BASS PERFORMANCE HALL
The corn-fed comedy Shucked brings its irreverent Broadway charm to Bass Hall Aug. 1–3, with five performances that mix heartland humor, toe-tapping tunes, and a kernel of romance. From Aug. 8–10, The Book of Mormon returns, delivering outrageous laughs and unforgettable melodies from the creators of South Park . In September, the stage transforms again for the visually stunning Life of Pi, Sep. 23–28, a theatrical adaptation of the bestselling novel featuring cutting-edge puppetry and a story of survival, belief, and storytelling itself. Image: Diego Enrico, Keke Nesbitt, and Sam McLellan in The Book Of Mormon North American tour. Photograph by Julieta Cervantes. basshall.com
04 BROADWAY DALLAS
August opens with vocalist Alicia Villarreal on Aug. 1, bringing her Donde Todo Comenzó 2.0 tour to the Music Hall at Fair Park. Saxophone legend Dave Koz headlines Summer Horns 2025 on Aug. 2, joined by a lineup of jazz greats. From Aug. 5–17, the stage adaptation of Life of Pi docks at the Winspear Opera House, blending spectacle, puppetry, and survival storytelling in a theatrical feat. Jeezy reimagines his debut album with TM:101 LIVE on Aug. 28, backed by the genre-bending Color of Noize Orchestra. The Broadway classic The Wiz struts onto the Music Hall stage Sep. 9–21 with a dazzling new production. broadwaydallas.org
05 CASA MAÑANA
The Lightning Thief: The Percy Jackson Musical, running Aug. 1–3, sees a rock-driven score and a heroic quest to stop a war among the Greek gods. This production by the Apprentice Program is perfect for demigods of all ages. On Aug. 23, The Music of Laurel Canyon returns, celebrating the iconic sounds of Joni Mitchell, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, and others. From Aug. 26–Sep. 21, The Music of Neil Diamond transforms the Reid Cabaret Theatre with timeless singalongs performed live. casamanana.org
06 DALLAS CHILDREN’S THEATER
The Adventures of Flat Stanley arrives on Sep. 27–Oct. 19. dct.org
07 THE DALLAS OPERA
Carmen opens The Dallas Opera’s season on Oct. 17. dallasopera.org
08 DALLAS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
September begins with magic in the air as Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in Concert returns to the Meyerson Sep. 4–7. Watch the film in high definition while the DSO performs Nicholas Hooper’s score live From Sep. 12–14, piano legend Emanuel Ax joins the orchestra for Beethoven’s bold and brilliant Third Piano Concerto, delivering depth, drama, and virtuosic flair. Gravity takes a back seat as Troupe Vertigo: Cirque Noir blends aerial acrobatics and symphonic sound in a noir-themed spectacle Sep. 26–28. Image: Emanuel Ax. Photograph by Nigel Parry. mydso.com
09 DALLAS THEATER CENTER
Mark your calendars for Noises Off, a play within a play, opening on Oct. 3. dallastheatercenter.org
10 DALLAS WIND SYMPHONY
The Music of John Williams takes the stage on Oct. 22. dallaswinds.org
AWESTRUCK
For 125 years, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra has been inspiring awe, igniting emotions and bringing the power of live music to the community.
Enjoy concerts from world renowned conductors, GRAMMY® Award-winning artists and world class musicians. Join us at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center as we celebrate 125 years of music that moves you.
EXPLORE THE LINEUP AT DALLASSYMPHONY.ORG DOLLY PARTON’S THREADS: MY SONGS IN SYMPHONY OCT 24-26 EMANUEL AX PLAYS BEETHOVEN
20-22 JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER ORCHESTRA WITH WYNTON MARSALIS NOV 12
This concert will feature the music of Dolly Parton performed by the DSO. The artist Dolly Parton will not be in attendance.
11
EISEMANN CENTER
Eisemann Center sees Benise: 25 Years of Passion on Aug. 16. Waterloo: A Celebration of ABBA arrives Aug. 30. Boogie the night away with Disco Inferno on Sep. 6. Next, Sixtiesmania performs A Journey Through the Sixties on Sep. 13. eisemanncenter.com
12
FORT WORTH SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
On Aug. 20 see the Stars of the Symphony, where orchestra members step into the spotlight with stunning solo performances. On Aug. 22–23, Star Wars: The Force Awakens in Concert features John Williams’ soaring score performed live to film. Aug. 29–30, Windborne’s The Music of Queen brings Freddie Mercury’s legendary vocals to life with symphonic force. Sep. 5–7 marks the classical season with Grieg’s beloved Piano Concerto, Brahms’ Fourth Symphony, and Sibelius’ triumphant Finlandia . Symphonic Stories: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Sep. 19–21, invites listeners down the rabbit hole with Talbot’s whimsical suite and Mozart’s Prague Symphony. A chamber performance at the Kimbell Art Museum on Sep. 28, brings works by Brahms, Poulenc, and Ravel fwsymphony.org
13 KITCHEN DOG THEATER
Coming this fall , The Happiness Gym is an experiential event based on the science of well-being. Participants take part in a curated theatrical experience meant to boost their sense of happiness, joy, and feelings of connection, marking the soft opening of Kitchen Dog’s new theater. kitchendogtheater.org
14 LYRIC STAGE
Guys & Dolls, Aug. 15–17, is the final show of season 31. Lyric Stage produced Guys & Dolls with artists from Turtle Creek Chorale. Presented at the Moody Performance Hall with a full orchestra and large cast. lyricstage.org
15 MAJESTIC THEATRE
Aug. begins with Regina Spektor on Aug. 6 for her Midsummer Daydream Tour, blending piano-driven pop with poetic flair. On Aug. 14, Chris Botti returns for an elegant evening of jazz, followed by Drew and Ellie Holcomb on Aug. 15 with heartfelt Americana in their Memory Bank Tour. Gillian Welch and David Rawlings take the stage Aug. 16 for a night of folk storytelling presented by KXT. Marcello Hernandez, Aug. 21 and Kurtis Conner on Aug. 24 bring fresh comedy, while rock icons Bachman-Turner Overdrive rev up the stage Aug. 26. The Swell Season reunites on Sep. 12, as Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová revisit generation-defining songs. On Sep. 13, John Cleese hosts Not Dead Yet! after a screening of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. British comedian Jimmy Carr brings two performances of Laughs Funny to town on Sep. 21, and I’m With Her, the indie-folk supergroup, performs Sep. 26. Michelle Buteau’s Surviving and Thriving Tour takes the stage on Sep. 27. Image: Chris Botti performs. dallasculture.org
16 TACA
TACA is dedicated to making the Dallas arts community one of the strongest in the nation by investing in the arts community. taca–arts.org
17 TEXAS BALLET THEATER
Soar to Neverland as Texas Ballet Theater presents Peter Pan, performed at both the Bass Performance Hall and the Winspear Opera House. Choreographed by Trey McIntyre with new sets and edgy costumes by Emma Bailey, this two-act ballet invites audiences into a world of mischievous fairies, daring pirates, and flying children across land and sea. Peter Pan runs Sep. 19–21 in Dallas and Oct. 3–5 in Fort Worth. Image: Rieko Hatato and Andre Silva in Peter Pan. Photograph by Steven Visneau. texasballettheater.org
18 THEATRE THREE
In The Niceties by Eleanor Burgess, a charged conversation between a brilliant young Black student and her white professor erupts into a clash of perspectives on race, history, and power. Directed by Sasha Maya Ada, this gripping two-hander invites audiences into an uncomfortable but necessary dialogue. Runs Sep. 18–Oct. 12. theatre3dallas.com
19 TITAS/DANCE UNBOUND
TITAS kicks off its season with Ronald K. Brown / EVIDENCE on Sep. 12. Known for its powerful blend of modern dance, African traditions, and spiritual storytelling, this performance is a mustsee Image: Ronald K. Brown / EVIDENCE Courtesy of TITAS/ DANCE UNBOUND. titas.org
20 TURTLE CREEK CHORALE
Turtle Creek Chorale teams up with Lyric Stage for Guys & Dolls, running Aug. 15–17 at Moody Performance Hall. This coproduction brings the Broadway classic to life with golden-era flair.
On Sep. 17, Groundless Ground offers a powerful night featuring the Women’s Chorus of Dallas and a 30-piece orchestra; this onenight-only concert marks the 25th anniversary of Sing for the Cure and includes selections from Unbreakable , celebrating the voices of women, immigrants, people of color, and the LGBTQ+ community. Then , on Sep. 20, TCC hosts Rhapsody 2025, its annual black-tie gala at the Statler, an evening of performance and community support. turtlecreekchorale.com
21 UNDERMAIN THEATRE
In Athena by Gracie Gardner, sparring partners Mary Wallace and Athena train for the Junior Olympics, caught between rivalry and reluctant connection. Directed by Bruce DuBose, this regional premiere—from Sep. 5–29—mixes sharp wit with gripping physicality. undermain.org
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01 12.26
A new solo exhibition by Lee Maxey opens Sep. 6 and remains on view through Oct. 18. Maxey’s paintings delve into the extraordinary urge of the mind to find meaning in the mundane. gallery1226.com
02 AKIM MONET FINE ARTS
Myths Reimagined: Rodin and the Art of Transformation marks ten years of collaboration with the Musée Rodin, pairing Rodin’s iconic works with modern and contemporary pieces. akimmonetfinearts.com
03 ALAN BARNES FINE ART
Through Sep. 3, Summer Exhibition of Fine 19th & 20th Century American and European Paintings features original oils and watercolors, from the Trans-Pecos to the Gulf Coast, by artists including Winslow Homer, John Singer Sargent, Daniel Ridgway Knight, Montague Dawson, Marcel Dyf, and more. Image: Winslow Homer, Portrait of Elizabeth Lorin Grant, 1866, gouache and pencil on paper. alanbarnesfineart.com
04 ARTSPACE111
The 12th Annual Texas Juried Exhibition will be on view through Aug. 23. artspace111.com
05 BARRY WHISTLER GALLERY
Opening Sep. 13, Terrell James / New Paintings displays 10 large-scale works by the Houston-based artist. Through Oct. 18, James draws from the terrains of her home state, translating shifting light and atmosphere into luminous layers of acrylic and oil. Image: Terrell James, Coming Home, 2024, acrylic and oil on canvas, 48 x 96 in. barrywhistlergallery.com
06 BEATRICE M. HAGGERTY GALLERY
Through Sep. 5, Memory in Motion: Jack Hein and Jason Thing , an exhibition by current MFA students at the University of Dallas, explores themes of memory, war, and identity through ceramic sculpture. udallas.edu/gallery
07 CADD
CADD hosts gallery days, happy hours, scholarships, and other events supporting artists and galleries in North Texas. caddallas.org
08 CHRISTOPHER MARTIN GALLERY
The gallery displays the reverse-glass paintings of Christopher H. Martin along with 25-plus mid-career artists who work within painting, photography, mixed media, and sculpture. christophermartingallery.com
09 CONDUIT GALLERY
Through Aug. 9, solo exhibitions by Soomin Jung and Jeff Baker continue. Opening Aug. 23, East of the Sun, West of the Moon , marks Denton-based artist Steven J. Miller’s solo show, named after a 19th-century Norwegian fairy tale, features architectural dreamscapes. On view through Oct. 4. Image: Steven J. Miller, Strung , 2024, acrylic on canvas. conduitgallery.com
10 CRAIGHEAD GREEN GALLERY
Through Aug. 13, New Texas Talent 32 remains on view presenting emerging artists in Texas. A group exhibition opens Aug. 30 showcasing recent works by David Crismon, Rebecca Shewmaker, and Jerry Cabrera. On view, through Sep. 30. craigheadgreen.com
11 CRIS WORLEY FINE ARTS
Solo exhibitions for Raychael Stine and Rusty Scruby mount Sep. 6–Oct. 25. Falls and Springs and Stardust Things features new paintings by Stine, while Summer Breeze showcases recent photographic constructions by Scruby. Image: Raychael Stine, Double velvet midnight lovers in Georgia’s petunias, mixed media, 18.5 x 24 in. crisworley.com
12 CVAD, UNT COLLEGE OF ART AND DESIGN GALLERIES
Emergence, on view Aug. 12–Sep. 20 in the Cora Stafford Gallery, showcases work by Foundations students organized by Binod Shrestha. From Sep. 2–Dec. 12, see the Faculty-Teaching Juried Exhibition featuring works juried by Jade Powers, Hugh Kaul Curator of Contemporary Art at the Birmingham Museum of Art. gallery.cvad.unt.edu
13 DAISHA BOARD GALLERY
By appointment only at The Oak Cliff Assembly, DBG enters a new chapter this fall with shows featuring works by mid-career artists and new voices. daishaboardgallery.com
14 DAVID DIKE FINE ART
DDFA specializes in late 19th- and 20th- century American and European paintings with an emphasis on the Texas regionalists, Texas landscape, and mid-century modern painters. daviddike.com
15 ERIN CLULEY GALLERY
Erin Cluley Gallery opens two solo exhibitions on Aug. 23, featuring new work by Zeke Williams and Lovie Olivia. Both shows run through Sep. 27. erincluley.com
16 FERRARI FINE ART GALLERY
Aug. 4–Oct. 4, the Ferrari Gallery Fall Exhibition features works by Eric Breish, Julie Maren, James Ferrari, Cecil Touchon, Mark Russell Jones, Julian Voss-Andreae, Debra Ferrari , and glass artist Carlyn Ray. ferrarigallery.net
17 FWADA
The Fall Gallery Night will take place on Sep. 6. fwada.com
18 GALLERI URBANE
Through Aug. 9, Roll the windows down features Cassie Arnold, Cristina Ayala, Nosheen Iqbal, Heath West, and Marlon Wobst. From Sep. 6–Oct. 25, Gallery 1 features new sculptural works by Jessica Drenk. In Gallery 2, Lorena Lohr debuts a photographic series capturing overlooked landscapes and interiors. Image: Nosheen Iqbal, Botanical Allegory II, 2024, mixed media, 18.50 x 24 in. galleriurbane.com
19 GREEN FAMILY ART FOUNDATION
Robert Peterson renders African American life joyfully, rejecting stereotypes to celebrate the Black experience. Somewhere in America features paintings from Peterson’s existing works as well as over 20 new works. Through Sep. 17. Image: Robert Peterson, Raise Them Up To Be Kings, 2022, oil on canvas, 31.50 x 25.31 in. Edward Little Collection. greenfamilyartfoundation.org
20 HOLLY JOHNSON GALLERY
Holly Johnson showcases contemporary art by emerging and established artists. hollyjohnsongallery.com
21 JAMES COPE GALLERY
James Cope presents a summer exhibition of works by Bruce Nauman, on view through Aug. 23. This fall, the gallery will feature a solo show by Coco Young, from Sep. 27–Nov. 1. jamescope.biz
22 JAMES HARRIS GALLERY
Through Aug. 16, The Present is Dark / The Future is Practice features works by Carmen Menza, Charles Gray, Sophia del Rio, Jose Vazques Ramirez, Sara Dotterer, and Jessica Bell. Sep. 6–Oct. 25, New Paintings showcases Evan Nesbit’s dyedburlap abstractions alongside Brad Winchester’s textured works on dyed linen. Image: Brad Winchester, SEVEN, 2023, oil and dye on handwoven Belgian linen with basswood frame, 18 x 18 x 1.5 in. jamesharrisgallery.com
23 KEIJSERS KONING
In Get me, don’t get me, a solo exhibition on view Aug. 23–Sep. 27, Tamara Johnson explores ambiguity, vulnerability, and miscommunication with her signature wit. keijserskoning.com
24 KIRK HOPPER FINE ART
Arte de Tejas : A Nascent Collection of Mexican American Artists continues through Aug. 23. Lynn Randolph’s solo show, on view Sep. 6–Oct. 11, will showcase new paintings that
Look Again
explore themes of science, spirituality, and the human condition. kirkhopperfineart.com
25 KITTRELL/RIFFKIND ART GLASS
Kittrell/Riffkind exhibits the best of contemporary North American art glass featuring work from 200-some artists. kittrellriffkind.com
26 LAURA RATHE FINE ART
Forever in Bloom presents a solo exhibition of new work by Chinese Dutch artist Zhuang Hong Yi, on view Sep. 13–Oct. 4. Zhuang’s work bridges Eastern tradition and Western technique. laurarathe.com
27 LILIANA BLOCH GALLERY
Through Aug. 8, Liliana Bloch Gallery presents Au-delà des apparences by Laurent Le Bel-Roux and URBANO by Kasey Short. Opening Sep. 6, a group exhibition featuring Simón Vega, Antonio Pichillá, and Kelly Tapia-Chuning, is on view through Oct. 30. lilianablochgallery.com
28 LONE GALLERY
Lone Gallery showcases work by painters Bradley Kerl, Danny Joe Rose III, and Camille Woods, alongside mixedmedia artists such as Cruz Ortiz and Heather Sundquist Hall, and sculptors Aaron Michalovic and Fernando Rojas. lonegallery.com
29 MELIKSETIAN | BRIGGS
Meliksetian|Briggs will participate in the Untitled Art, Houston fair Sep. 19–21 showcasing works by Meg Cranston and Yifan Jiang. meliksetianbriggs.com
30 NATURE OF THINGS
Through Aug. 26, Too Much Ain’t Enough pays tribute to Southern blues and rock ephemera through archival material from Les Blank, posters by Jim Franklin, nods to icons Bob Wade, Kinky Friedman, and the Lone Star Cafe. A group exhibition opening on Sep. 27 features works by Gretta Johnson, Helen Burkhart Mayfield, and Gail Blank. natureofthings.xyz
31 PENCIL ON PAPER
Opening Aug. 9, Transitional Self features new photographic works by Arthur Fields that explore identity, visibility, and transformation. Gallery artists Jessica Vollrath and Nouman Gaafar present new works throughout Aug. and Sep. pencilonpapergallery.com
32 PHOTOGRAPHS DO NOT BEND
Now located in Denton, Texas, PDNB is a photo-based art gallery representing early 20th- century artists to the present. pdnbgallery.com
33 RO2 ART
Through Aug. 30, Ro2 Art features solo shows by Kathryn Gohmert, Alicia Parham, and Minji Kang-Watrous, exploring themes of fear, neuroscience, and Korean tradition. Opening Sep. 6, new exhibitions by Ray-Mel Cornelius, Scott Winterrowd, and Gillian Bradshaw-Smith run through Oct. 11. ro2art.com
34 SAMUEL LYNNE GALLERIES
Samuel Lynne Galleries showcases contemporary artists, including JD Miller, Lea Fisher and Brandon Boyd. samuellynne.com
35 SMINK
A showcase of fine design and furniture, SMINK is a purveyor of quality living products. The showroom also hosts exhibitions featuring Robert Szot, Gary Faye, Richard Hogan, Dara Mark, and Paula Roland. sminkinc.com
36 SOUTHWEST GALLERY
Since 1967, Southwest Gallery provides Dallas with the largest collection of fine 19th- to 21st-century paintings and sculptures. The gallery exhibits hundreds of artists who work in a broad range of styles. The Annual Summer Art Festival will take place on Aug. 30–31. swgallery.com
37 TALLEY DUNN GALLERY
Sedrick Huckaby: Higher Ground runs through Aug. 30, showcasing paintings, drawings, and sculptures that explore themes of faith, family, community, and heritage. Simultaneously, Sarah Williams: Taillight Towns presents atmospheric nightscapes of small-town America, highlighting illuminated windows and roadside scenes that evoke solitude and familiarity. talleydunn.com
38 TUREEN GALLERY
Tureen joins the Independent 20th Century, Sep. 4–7, with early 1990s works by Jacci Den Hartog. From Aug. 30–Oct. 11, Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead —named after a William Blake proverb—features artists addressing power, ecological collapse, and the cycle of destruction and renewal. tureen.info
My Neighborhood sees Trish Nickell’s series of intimate pandemic-era paintings, on view through Aug. 9. Opening Sep. 13, Hot House by Ying Li brings bold, expressive energy to the gallery. valleyhouse.com
40 THE WAREHOUSE
Opening Sep. 27, Natural Mystics, on view through Jan. 31, 2026, draws from The Rachofsky Collection and beyond, exploring cosmic symbolism and the interplay between nature and mysticism in contemporary art. thewarehousedallas.org
41 WILLIAM CAMPBELL GALLERY
Summer Series continues through Sep. 5 with a rotating selection of works. Opening Sep. 6, Ethereal Goats Earthly Pecans features new work by Victoria Gonzales, on view through Oct. 11. Image: Victoria Gonzales, Simone and Coco, 2025, acrylic, thread, and chalk pastels on canvas, 12 x 9 in. williamcampbellgallery.com
AUCTIONS AND EVENTS
01 DALLAS AUCTION GALLERY
Acquired in 2023 by David Lewis, Patrick Jones, and Reyne Hirsch, each bring a wealth of experience in fine and decorative art to the auction world. dallasauctiongallery.com
02
HERITAGE AUCTIONS
Heritage Auctions presents a robust slate of sales beginning with The Art of Disney Signature Auction on Aug. 7, the Urban Art Showcase Auction on Aug. 6, Key Comics Showcase Auction on Aug. 7, The Art of Exposure: Pin-up and Nude Photography on Aug. 13, Fine & Decorative Arts Showcase Auction on Aug. 14, The Art of Nickelodeon, MTV, and Cartoon Network–Volume III on Aug. 16, and The Art of Moose and Squirrel and the Jay Ward Studios Animation Showcase on Aug. 30. September auctions include The Artful Eye: The Collection of the Late Larry Saphire Part 2 on Sep. 9, The William and Joey Ridenour Ethnographic Art Signature Auction on Sep. 13, Contemporary Art Within Reach Showcase Auction on Sep. 18, and American Art Within Reach Showcase Auction on Sep. 29. ha.com
03
LONE STAR ART AUCTION
Taking place on Oct. 31 in Dallas, the Lone Star Art Auction is the largest live art auction in the state of Texas, offering the best American, Western, wildlife, sporting, and Texas fine art. Presented by Phil Berkebile the Great American West, LSAA brings together collectors and sellers of historic and contemporary fine art for a unique and entertaining event. Consignments are now being accepted for original paintings and sculpture. lonestarartauction.com
MATERIAL INSTINCTS
Rachel Mica Weiss weaves between vision and structure.
INTERVIEW BY JENNIFER CARVALHO
Rachel Mica Weiss. Photograph by Walker Esner. Courtesy of CARVALHO, New York
Works by Rachel Mica Weiss made a striking impression at the Dallas Art Fair in April, where they were presented by the New York–based gallery CARVALHO. Known for her sculptural and immersive installations, Weiss explores tension, structure, and materiality in ways that challenge perception. In this conversation, Jennifer Carvalho—founder and director of CARVALHO—sits down with the artist to delve into her practice, process, and the ideas behind her latest pieces.
Jennifer Carvalho (JC): Your textile language speaks to both the landscape and the psyche. How do you draw connections between interior states and external environments? What drives this impulse?
Rachel Mica Weiss (RMC): My practice is rooted in psychology, and I’ve long been interested in how emotional states can be translated into material form. I’m drawn to dualities—strength and fragility, power and vulnerability—and how those tensions can be held within a single object or spatial experience—or human being.
Textiles, with their softness and history as spatial dividers, offer a compelling medium to examine psychological and physical boundaries. I’m interested in the structures we build—architectural, psychological, emotional—and how they might be rendered permeable, flexible, even undone.
I’ve always worked large-scale and found the loom too restrictive. Expanding off the loom allowed me to engage sculpture, installation, and architecture—disciplines that share concerns with the body, space, and perception.
JC: These pursuits are lucidly connected across your various series, whether domestically or architecturally scaled. In your Woven Screens what begins as a linear element builds into a dimensional threshold. In what ways do you conceptualize this sense of passage and the viewer’s role?
RMW: The idea of the portal is central to my work. The woven planes are entry points into ways of perceiving. When approached head-on, the threads dissolve into a color field; viewed obliquely, the underlying geometry emerges. That shift in perception is integral. I want viewers to sense how fluid and contingent our seeing can be. All this is held between the frame, drawing on its historical use as a mediator between reality and image, creating two worlds—one the viewer occupies, and one imagined and seen through the “screen.”
Recent work goes beyond this reference of painting space to piercing the solidity of the picture plane. While previous Woven Screens were atmospheric landscapes viewers felt they could enter, recent
works use brighter, harder-edged blocks or bands of color that seem to emit heat or light. Abrupt, multidimensional transitions suggest vibration, weight, or compression—ways to tap into viewers’ psychic or phenomenological experiences.
JC: The classical arch is so deeply encoded in our built environments that we almost stop seeing it. In Arches you soften, even unmake, this symbol of strength. What possibilities emerge when we take apart a structure we assume to be permanent?
RMW: The Arches installations, like Draped Arches in Gold in Brookfield’s Allen Center in Houston, remake a traditional form in material that’s soft, almost slouching. What’s solid and immutable is made permeable—vulnerable, even. It challenges the authority of the built world and suggests that even our most established structures— physical, psychological, cultural—can be reconfigured. By unmaking the arch, I’m not removing its power, but opening up space to invite more fluid and human-scale interpretations of strength.
JC: Your Topographies installations respond so intuitively to architecture yet evoke the shifting rhythms of the natural world. How do you negotiate that tension between what is shaped by nature and what is shaped by hand?
RMW: Topographies bring the outside landscape in, casting seemingly fixed landforms as diaphanous and permeable. That act is a metaphor, suggesting that barriers may be less solid than we assume. These spaces hold contradiction: stillness and movement, containment and expansiveness, vulnerability and strength. In many ways, Topographies visualize the porous boundaries between our bodies, our environments, and the systems—natural and human-made—that shape us.
JC: Your outdoor installation, Yield , on view at the Al Held Foundation through October 10, brings these inquiries into direct conversation with the landscape. Did it reveal anything to you about the natural world’s own agency?
RMW: Yield marks my first foray into bringing my fiber work outdoors. I bound together 32,000 feet of rope using 66,000 zip ties to create a net that hovers just above the earth, following the slope sculpted by artist Al Held decades ago. The form evokes an earlier topography and gestures toward both control and surrender. I think of it as offering the land a kind of porous veil while allowing it to reassert itself. Grass began growing through the fiber almost immediately. That quiet reclaiming was something I hoped for but couldn’t fully anticipate. It speaks to the tension we hold with the land—our compulsion to shape it, and its enduring capacity to grow back through us. P
Rachel Mica Weiss, Fading Topographies. Photograph by Joe Thomas.
Rachel Mica Weiss, Draped Arches in Gold. Courtesy of the artist and Brookfield’s One Allen Center, Houston, Texas.
Adeline de Monseignat mines the fragility of life through form and material.
BY TERRI PROVENCAL
A SCULPTING THE TENDER TENSIONS OF BEING
deline de Monseignat sculptures—often poetic convergences of bronze, stone, fur, and glass— are shaped as much by emotion as by hand. Whether she’s evoking the warmth of flesh in polished metal or the softness of skin in hard stone, her practice is grounded in a profound awareness of the body, of life’s uncanny contradictions, and of what it means to inhabit vulnerability. For de Monseignat, materials are protagonists.
“Materials come with a history that adds to the narrative of the work,” she explains. “It’s like casting the right actor for the role.” This sensitivity to form and substance is mirrored in her evolving relationship with time, memory, and the physical self, particularly since becoming a mother.
Motherhood, she says, “radically changed” her approach. “Time has become fragmented but more precious. My body has become such a source of inspiration through the strength and resilience needed to create little human beings.” The bruises and tenderness of motherhood are more than passing experiences—they are “little proofs of life” surfacing in her work through emotional honesty and material intuition. “That miraculous mess,” she adds, “has seeped into the work.”
The tension between contradiction and cohesion, hardness and softness, strength and fragility are central to her aesthetic. Her sculptures evoke bodily warmth even when the materiality is unyielding. “I tend to humor contradictions because they often do not contradict at all, but rather complement,” she says. “Polished bronze that mimics flesh, stone that reads like skin, these are emotional paradoxes. They invite viewers to touch, or at least imagine touching, and in that intimacy, vulnerability is activated.”
This duality often pushes her work into the realm of the otherworldliness. De Monseignat is fascinated by that liminal space
Adeline de Monseignat, Skins, 2022, bronze, 16.40 x 59.06 x 59.05 in. Photograph by Alejandro Ramírez Orozco
Installation view, Skin to Skin, Colector, Monterrey, 2023–2024. Photograph by Priscila Mier.
where comfort and discomfort blur, where familiar forms are made strange. “When a form resembles something bodily but isn’t, or hints at motion and life through inanimate matter, or when softness is suggested in something hard, the viewer becomes alert.” she says. “I think that’s where emotion lives—in that strange tension.”
The interplay of these tensions is not confined to individual pieces. Her practice is expansive, mapping across time, place, and memory, like a constellation. “Each work is a response to a prior material, to a past gesture, to a recurring symbol,” she says. “Sometimes the connection is formal, like casting a nipple from a stone sculpture into bronze. Other times it’s emotional, a continuation of a feeling or inquiry.” Her oeuvre, as she describes it, is an ongoing dialogue—an “ever-growing family” of interrelated acts.
This sense of connectedness extends beyond the studio and into the spaces where her work lives. Whether nestled in natural landscapes or integrated into architectural environments, her installations are never static. “Space is never passive,” she says. “I like to think of my forms as living organisms that have found their way into a space as if they were always meant to be there.”
The artist’s cultural perspective is as richly textured as her materials. Having lived and studied in places as diverse as London and Mexico City, her visual language is deeply informed by place. “London gave me criticality and rigor. Mexico City gave me intensity of life, of color, of materiality,” she reflects.
The lineage of feminist artists looms large in her work, too.
Louise Bourgeois—whose psychological and maternal themes resonate deeply with de Monseignat—remains a touchstone. “Her fearless approach to vulnerability and her trust in materials as emotional vessels continue to guide me,” she says. Alongside Bourgeois, artists like Eva Hesse and Lynda Benglis have inspired her embrace of unconventional, bodily, and emotionally charged materials. “They’ve helped me see materials as expressive, unruly, and deeply connected to lived experience.”
Her current inquiries trace themes of rootedness, resilience, and inheritance—especially as they relate to land, identity, and generational memory. And the work, she says, is growing. “I see my work evolving toward larger, more immersive environments...while continuing to honor the intimate scale of the body.”
That balance—between the monumental and the intimate, the soft and the strong—is at the heart of her upcoming projects. This October, she will release Motherhood in Four Acts, a profoundly personal book published by Anomie (London) in collaboration with Colector (Dallas, Monterrey, and Houston)—she will have a show this fall at the Dallas gallery. The project reflects on four major exhibitions that map her journey into matrescence, or the transformation into motherhood.
In a world where sculpture is so often a study in permanence, Adeline de Monseignat sculpts what is fleeting: a bruise, a breath, a moment of touch. Through material, space, and feeling, she gives weight to softness—and in doing so, invites us to feel more fully, more deeply, and more honestly. P
Artist Adeline de Monseignat. Photograph by Aderman.
Adeline de Monseignat, Seedscape, 2021-2024, installation view, travertine, pebbles, variable dimensions. Enciente, Museo de ArteContemporáneo de Monterrey, Mexico, 2024.
Adeline de Monsgient, The Gift I, 2024, onyx, 5.50 x 11.62 x 11.62 in.
Photograph by Sergio López.
BETWEEN VERSE AND FORM
Carlos Basualdo’s poetic vision for the Nasher Sculpture Center.
BY BEN LIMA
Carlos Basualdo arrived in Dallas in May, stepping into his role as the new director of the Nasher Sculpture Center, the third in its history. Previously the deputy director and chief curator of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, where he was based for the last 20 years, Basualdo’s long and acclaimed international career has stretched from his native Argentina to Rome; the Venice Biennale (where he curated Bruce Nauman for the American pavilion in 2009); and Kassel, Germany, where he was co-curator of Documenta 11 in 2002.
Full of enthusiasm for the new job, he praises the Nasher’s collection as “so full of character in so many ways—so unique and so
outstanding, formally so rich and varied” as well as the center’s staff, who, he says, embody the values of “collegiality, community, family, and excellence.” In this, he echoes board president Nancy A.Nasher, who says, “Carlos Basualdo brings the intellectual depth and curatorial vision essential to advancing the legacy my parents, Raymond and Patsy Nasher, so passionately built… This institution is deeply personal to me; it carries their spirit, their values, and their belief in the transformative power of art. I am profoundly grateful that Carlos will carry their vision forward.”
More generally, Basualdo praises the commitment of American collectors as “very unique, a treasure, something that we should
Director Carlos Basualdo stands beside Huma Bhabha’s Chain of Missing Links, 2012, wood, Styrofoam, clay, wire, Plexiglas, acrylic paint, weeds, seedpod, skull, rust, graphite, and oil stick, 101.62 x 38.25 x 29.12 in. Nasher Sculpture Center, gift of Nancy A. Nasher and David J. Haemisegger. Photograph by John Smith.
all care for,” and notes that the high level of professionalism in American art museums is “quite extraordinary in many ways.” These qualities originally brought him to this country as a fellow at the Museum of Modern Art and a participant in the Independent Study Program at the Whitney Museum of American Art, both in New York City.
He singles out two works from the Nasher Collection for special mention, describing Joan Miró’s Moonbird as “so joyful— interestingly grounding, and grounded,” and a “portal into a whole world of forms.” He points out its paradoxical nature: “very concrete in its existence, but also open in terms of a certain imagination and playfulness.” He also praises a recent gift, Radio No.1 by Jean Tinguely, which incorporates elements from earlier artworks, for its “density of histories.” It’s one example of 36 recent gifts from the Nancy A. Nasher and David J. Haemisegger collection.
Having spent his career working on modern and contemporary art, he sees modernity “not as something dissociated from the past, but actually deeply conversant with the past”—evident in the way that Renzo Piano’s Nasher edifice “resonates with the Roman villa.” Similarly, he admires the exhibition designs of Carlo Scarpa and Lina Bo Bardi, two Italians active in the 1960s, for the “ageless quality of their very modern interventions.”
Basualdo began his career as a poet in his hometown of Rosario, Argentina, and still brings a poetic sensibility to his work, alluding to T.S. Eliot’s reflections on time and experience: “Every experience is new, and if you read earlier patterns too much into your current experience, you might be over-interpreting in some ways.”
As a young curator, he forged ties with a group of colleagues from around the world who all converged on New York in the 1990s and have remained close since moving on to other international posts. Among them, he mentions the late Okwui Enwezor, artistic director of Documenta 11; as well as Hans Ulrich Obrist, artistic director of the Serpentine Galleries in London; Italian curator Francesco Bonami; and New York–based Octavio Zaya. Reinforcing this theme, Nasher board chairman David Haemisegger observed that Basualdo “brings a wealth of experience from his leadership at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and his work on major international exhibitions, reflecting a global perspective and a deep understanding of both modern and contemporary art and sculpture.”
Among current trends in the art world, Basualdo closely follows initiatives to “place modernism in its geopolitical context more firmly”—that is, beyond the boundaries of European colonial expansion—and uncover “what was left aside or suppressed by modernism.” Examples include Basualdo’s own curatorial work on Brazilian art, Enwezor’s on African art, and the curator Hou Hanru’s shows of Chinese art. In this and much else he is in dialogue with his wife, Mónica Amor, author of a recent book on the Venezuelan artist Gego (Gertrud Goldschmidt)—“an amazing art historian who is thinking actively about many of these things and who is both a partner and an inspiration to me.”
Through this global perspective, Basualdo values the Nasher’s engagement with the broader community, creating “a certain porosity” across local boundaries in a city “of movement and displacement, but also a city operating as a magnet for people, bringing people from different parts of this country and beyond.” P
Jean Tinguely, Radio No. 1, 1960, metal construction with motor, 29.75 x 26.25 x 13.25 in. Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas. Gift of Nancy A. Nasher and David J. Haemisegger, 2024. Photograph by Adam Reich.
Joan Miró, Moonbird (Oiseau Lunaire) also called The Lunar Bird, 1944-46 (enlargement 1966, cast 1967), bronze, 90 x 80.50 x 57.75 in. Raymond and Patsy Nasher Collection, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas. Photograph by Kevin Todora.
HOUSTON GETS A FRESH CANVAS
Untitled Art stakes its claim.
BY TERRI PROVENCAL
Untitled Art arrives September 19–21 in Houston, a city in flux, layered with contradictions and possibility. One of the fastest-growing urban centers in the country, over 145 languages are spoken here; its identity is shaped by constant movement, exchange, and reinvention.
Perched on the Gulf Coast, Houston resists easy definitions. It is both sprawling and intimate, experimental and institutional. The city’s art world mirrors this complexity: a fluid network of collectors; established artists such as Terrell James, Rachel Hecker, Mark Flood, and Aaron Parazette; emerging artists like Alexis Pye; and galleries, art schools, and spaces that blur boundaries and defy hierarchy.
Houston’s art ecosystem is “strong but hidden,” says Michael Slenske, director of Untitled Art, Houston and a longtime friend of Untitled Art founder Jeff Lawson. Slenske visited Houston for the first time 15 years ago for a friend’s wedding, stopping by the Menil House, where he saw the future. “If you look at the cultural infrastructure
Nic Nicosia, Mailboxes, 1980, type C photo, 20 x 30 in. Courtesy of the artist and Erin Cluley Gallery;
Aaron Morse, Cloud World (Shepherd with Wildflowers #3), 2024, acrylic on canvas, 55 x 44 in. Courtesy of the artist and Philip Martin Gallery.
Veronica Gaona, Untitled, 2025, Ford F-150 body parts, archived prints on aluminum sheets, rivets, and house paint, 33 x 27.25 x 4.0 in. Courtesy of the artist and Keijsers Koning.
in Houston it’s massive—there are so many great curators and institutions,” he enthuses.
As to the inaugural edition of Untitled Art, Houston, Slenske says, “This will be an international fair,” with exhibitors like El Apartamento (Madrid /Havana), Lazy Mike (Riga /Seoul), Cecilia Brunson Projects (London), Revolver Galería (Lima), and TERN (Nassau). Then there are distinguished domestic dealers such as, “Jessica Silverman who has one of the best programs in the world, Michael Kohn Gallery, Spinello Projects, and super-progressive galleries like Megan Mulrooney, Martha’s, Houston’s Seven Sisters, and Laura (the gallery) participating in Nest. We want people working together in different contexts.”
Rooted in its identity as a curatorial platform—not just a marketplace—Untitled Art has expanded Nest, a space carved out for discovery. In a landscape where booth fees often gatekeep who gets seen, Nest cuts against the grain by offering subsidized access to emerging galleries, pushing back on the economics that favor the art world’s usual suspects. Dallas/Los Angeles gallery 12.26 will participate in Nest with a solo booth featuring Sean Cairns. The fair’s main sector will feature a handful of Dallas exhibitors: Meliksetian|Briggs showing Meg Cranston and rising talent Yifan Jiang, whose vividly surreal, conceptually layered work was shown this summer at David Kordansky; along with Erin Cluley Gallery showing Karen Gunderson, Kaleta Doolin, Joyce Scott and
Clockwise from top left: Paul Kremer, Bloom 18 (navy, vermillion, cream, and light blue), 2023. Courtesy of the artist and Library Street Collective; Yifan Jiang, Hansel and Gretel, 2024, oil on canvas, 72 x 72 in. Courtesy of the artist and Meliksetian | Briggs; Nir Hod, 2BW, 2019, oil paint under chromed canvas, diptych, each panel 99 x 67.50 in. Courtesy of Michael Kohn Gallery; Angelbert Metoyer, Revistation, 2025 charcoal, wax pencils, and sandpaper on printed paper, 48”x 72” 2025. Courtesy of the artist and Colector.
Nic Nicosia—all artists over the age of 75. “We are showing a series by Nic from the eighties, and the images were actually made in Houston during that time. Nic has a long history there, so we are excited to show a range of his work to an audience of folks who have known his work for a very long time,” says Cluley. Galleri Urbane will bring works by Anna Kunz and Marlon Wobst, Keijsers Koning will feature Mexican American artist Veronica Gaona, along with work by Eric Sall and Kris Pierce, and Colector—which recently opened in Dallas, adding to its outposts in Houston and Monterrey, Mexico—will mount a solo presentation for Angelbert Metoyer. Drawing on ancestral memory and personal mythology, Metoyer interrogates lineage and selfhood, bridging the physical realm with the metaphysical.
“The mix we are bringing is different,” Slenske says. “We didn’t just go in saying we’re going to drop a fair into the town.” They’ve teamed up with Austin’s Michael Hsu Office of Architecture to design a floor plan as a space that actually considers how people move, look, and linger. “We’re limiting the scope of what’s shown. It’s mainly up to four artists per booth. There are 20 solo presentations, and a lot of two-person shows along with Special Projects,” Slenske says of the highly curated booths.
This initiative amplifies the transformative power of art as a catalyst for social change. Across the fair, visitors can explore a dynamic lineup of Special Projects showcasing Houston’s local talent alongside renowned national artists. Highlights include El Franco Lee II’s multimedia installation on politics and legacy; curated presentations by Rick Lowe, one of Houston’s most profound voices in communityengaged practice; Isabelle Brourman’s blend of personal and political artworks, like courtroom sketches; Mel Chin’s monumental sculpture supported by the PAC Art residency; and Ernesto Restrepo’s Cosecha de papas project, which symbolically reverses colonial narratives at Galería SGR.
Beyond the galleries, Untitled Art is weaving Houston’s broader cultural fabric into the fair itself. They have assembled 22 cultural partners for featured booths, ranging from local fixtures—including the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, Orange Show Center for Visionary Art, and Project Row Houses (Rick Lowe was one of the seven founders from 1993 to 2018)—to institutions like the Asia Society Texas and the Rothko Chapel, which will receive a share of ticket sale proceeds, linking the city’s spiritual and artistic legacies in a tangible way.
The Untitled Art Podcast returns for the Houston edition with a slate of conversations that dig into the city’s layered cultural landscape. This season will spotlight the evolution and significance of Houston’s artist-run spaces, the enduring artistic and cultural ties between Texas and Latin America, and the vital contributions of Houston’s Black arts community in shaping the city’s creative identity. Episodes will also examine how natural disasters have reshaped the cultural sector, along with other urgent topics explored through the voices of artists, curators, and cultural leaders. Slenske says they are striving to set up a dynamic that offers a broader conversation about the Texas scene and what’s possible. “Hopefully we are producing something that feels fresh, and something we can produce from year to year. There’s a larger narrative in Texas; there’s a lot of energy. We think it’s a rising tide—and if we can turn this into a proper art week, we can have a lot of people coming into Houston.” P
Sarah Williams, Grover Road, 2024, oil on board, 16 x 116 in. Courtesy of the artist and Moody Gallery; Sean Cairns, August, 2025, oil, sand, and salt on canvas, 70 x 50 x 1 in. Courtesy of the artist and 12.26; Conner O’Leary, Worship Reveal, 2025, acrylic on canvas over panel, 15 x 12 in. Courtesy of the artist and Martha’s.
FRAMES & FACADES
The homes and studios that shaped art history in the US.
INTERVIEW BY CHRIS BYRNE
To mark the 25th anniversary of the Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios program (HAHS)—an initiative of the National Trust for Historic Preservation—Chris Byrne asked one of the founders, Helen A. Harrison, retired director of the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center in East Hampton, New York, about the group’s history and mission.
Chris Byrne (CB): Can you tell us how the HAHS program began? Is there a European counterpart that served as a model?
Helen Harrison (HH): There is a similar organization in Europe, but the idea for HAHS predates it. In the early 1990s, the National Trust started investigating thematic groupings of historic sites outside its own properties that could benefit from collaboration with the Trust and each other. In 1997, they set up a working group to determine the feasibility of a coalition of artists’ sites, and as the steward of one of them, I was asked to participate.
CB: Why artists’ sites in particular?
HH: One of the Trust’s sites, Chesterwood, is the former home and studio of Daniel Chester French, the sculptor of the Lincoln statue in the Washington, DC, memorial. With that as an anchoring point, the working group identified a number of other preserved studios around the country. What’s so special about them is that they offer unique insights into the creative process. You actually walk in the artists’ footsteps, experience their environments, and learn firsthand—not from books or lectures—what inspired them.
CB: I understand there were just 20 sites when the coalition launched in 2000.
HH: That’s right, though there were others that might have qualified. But it was decided to start with the most established ones, including the Georgia O’Keeffe property in Abiquiu, New Mexico; the Florence Griswold Museum in Old Lyme, Connecticut; the Elisabet Ney Museum in Austin, Texas; Chesterwood of course, which is in Stockbridge, Massachusetts; and the Pollock-Krasner House.
CB: So you participated as a founding member?
HH: Yes. HAHS gave us access to the Trust’s staff of experts in historic site preservation and interpretation, funding opportunities, and contact with similar places facing similar challenges. The Pollock-Krasner House is a National Historic Landmark. HAHS enabled me to meet colleagues who gave me
great advice and practical guidance.
CB: How does HAHS identify and then help these historic sites preserve and document their collections and buildings?
HH: A couple of people in the working group had already done a lot of groundwork, so we knew what was out there, including places that weren’t yet ready to join. The Trust’s guidelines were pretty strict regarding operations and governance. Once HAHS was up and running, we reached out to some of them, guiding them in best practices and offering technical assistance. Along the way other sites either approached us or came to our attention. We now have 55 full members, some representing more than one artist. Although most are clustered in the Northeast, they’re literally all over the map. In recent years, we’ve made a strong push to represent the creative community’s full range. There’s everything from 19th-century landscape painters and academic sculptors to self-taught artists and artist-built environments.
CB: In 2022, HAHS created an Affiliate category to broaden and diversify the existing program’s membership.
HH: There are 25 affiliates, and your site, the Elaine de Kooning House in East Hampton, is among them. They’re properties that don’t fulfill all the membership criteria, like not being open to the public on a regular basis, or not strictly a historic residence or workplace. Or maybe they’ve been re-purposed, like Elaine’s studio, where you now offer artists’ residencies, and the Arts Center at Duck Creek, the former studio of the abstract expressionist painter John Little, not far from the Pollock-Krasner House. It’s now a venue for contemporary art exhibitions, music, and family programs, but the studio is preserved, and Little’s life and work are celebrated. I’m president of the board there. We’re hoping to open his former home, an 18th-century farmhouse, to the public after it’s restored.
CB:What upcoming events and projects can we look forward to?
HH: Led by our director, Valerie Balint, HAHS is busy spreading the word through exposure on the Trust’s media outlets, a guidebook, traveling exhibitions, online tours, and advocacy on behalf of our members. A recent initiative offers funds to develop K-5 STEAM programs centered on female artists represented at our sites. We’re actively searching for potential members among traditionally underrepresented groups, so if you know of a likely candidate, please get in touch. P
The studio at Chesterwood. Photograph by Michael Lavin Flower.
Florence Griswold Museum. Photograph by Joe Standart.
October 18, 2025
Featured Artist: Emmi Whitehorse Auction Sponsor: Sotheby’s
The Collection Gala is a new black-tie benefit and auction in support of the DMA’s mission. Join us for this glamorous evening celebrating art and community!
Trickster Runs the Game I
The Atmospheric, Changing Boundaries of Sean Cairns
BY BRANDON KENNEDY
had eagerly returned to the Shamrock Hotel studio of Sean Cairns for a second visit in a few weeks’ time, bearing witness to what had transpired and shifted since our last conversation. Since then, the Southern Illinois native had completed and moved out a few large canvases to be photographed for his upcoming solo presentation with 12.26 at the inaugural Untitled Art Fair, Houston in mid-September.
A couple of vertical compositions hung kitty-corner from one another in Cairns’ space, each with a somewhat shadowy middle incorporating unresolved figures with relaxed or questioning gestures. Both featured open structures above—quite possibly in ruin or disrepair—each with a demarcated path below for either confrontation or dialogue.
Familiars, a painting featuring a cooler palette of greens and blues, held a pair of figures in the foreground. One was standing holding a feline at the edge of the path, the other reclined opposite with a knee up and a coyote resting just beyond.
During our previous visit, I had brought up the mythology of the coyote as trickster, which Cairns had already been thinking about, unsurprisingly. We had both been reminded of its timely presence by the same podcast, in fact—the coyote’s propensity to change and designate
Sean Cairns in his studio. Photograph by John Smith.
Studio view. Photograph by John Smith.
Studio view. Photograph by John Smith.
boundaries over time in a given place. I couldn’t quite remember if the coyote was even present in the painting the first time I saw it, but that made the same amount of sense.
The other large vertical painting had evolved from a smaller study, Goat’s Dance, with endless blue at the top hemmed in by a pyrrole orange of burning intensity amid a gathering of bargaining characters at the center. A traveler enters at left towards a hatted man with a guitar in his lap at right, with the sharpened silhouette of goat’s head separating their meeting.
In the larger work, the musician and the horned beast vacate the scene, leaving the traveler figure—now equipped with a lantern—using her long walking stick to traverse across the empty path and cautiously peer under a cover that opens to a void below. Just above, where the musician once held his tune, a zigzagging form marks the beat, the time, as if by sigil.
Color alone doesn’t call to form in these ethereal landscapes that hold both tension and beauty. Within a search for resonances both natural and familiar, a haze and grit augment the dive deep within. Added to the pigment is sand, which can render the darker tones earthy and dense while also giving the lighter values a vibrational stutter and flow.
Earlier this year, Cairns had his first New York solo exhibition with Shrine entitled Light Bearer. The canvases of luminous landscapes appear largely uninhabited save for a small animal, a bathing nude or shadowy form, or a chair awaiting a companion.
The titular pink vertical composition features a figure descending from a ghostly structure above, holding a lantern. An undulating stream snakes through the scene while willowy
branches explode and catch light around the solitary subject, capped by a line of silhouetted pines. Reminiscent of the Hermit card in a tarot deck, the figure’s illuminated descent evokes a willed journey into watery unknowable, away from structured knowns and embracing the depths within.
Calling back to his youth, Cairns recounted his ample time spent in nature and the discovery of splendor within the untamed world, both solitary and shared. One such occasion was a birthday in his mid-twenties when he opted to go camping amid his beloved Midwestern wilderness, this particular area pockmarked by a battery of natural caves. Cairns’ birthday was the winter solstice of 2012, and it just so happened to fall on the end date of the Mayan calendar. The cave where they were to camp had its mouth clamped shut by a litany of massive icicles, but luckily his father, brother, uncle, and he were armed to the teeth with various firearms and shot their way inside for the night. Only he and his father remained come morning as the other two sought warmer climes before daybreak.
Piles of stones placed on trails to demarcate paths and borders are sometimes called “herms” (as in Hermes, the god of boundaries, travelers, roads) or perhaps even more often, “cairns.” The trickster coyote lopes about the known periphery doing much the same. Boundaries disappear and are born anew, calling into question and yearning back to the source. This suite of new large-scale paintings by Sean Cairns enacts a similar response, redrawing where we think we’ve been and calling us into a deeper recognition of where we should be, given the courage and the chance to wander within. P
Clockwise from above left: Studio view. Photograph by John Smith; Sean Cairns, Midnight Spiritual, 2025, 70 x 50 in., oil and sand on canvas. Courtesy of the artist and 12.26; Sean Cairns, Green Bean Tree, 2025, 36 x 82 in., oil and sand on canvas. Courtesy of the artist and 12.26.
Wallpaper Worth Its Weight in Gold Leaf
The Arkansas talent behind the most sophisticated wallcoverings at Holly Hunt.
BY ROB BRINKLEY
If you find yourself shopping for a bauble—the good stuff—in the private areas of Tiffany & Co. at NorthPark Center, chances are you’re surrounded by wallpaper as gorgeous as those gleaming rings you’re slipping on and off. If you’re doing the same thing in the fine-jewelry department at Chanel in Highland Park Village, look up: That wallpaper behind the counter is exquisite, too, and made by the very same company. Here’s the part that is harder to compute: Those delicious, dreamy wallcoverings were made in a former seed factory in rural Arkansas by a team led by a husband and wife whose relaxed personalities say denim, not diamonds.
Such is the dichotomy of Assemblage wallpapers, works of rolled art handmade of plaster, mother of pearl, metal powders, gold leaf, ground micas, even abalone—but all unfurling from a workshop that reads more like a tractor barn than a fancy factory. They catch rainwater for wallpaper production, and for washing their trowels and brushes. They joke and jostle all day while dragging glowing plaster into evocative stripes, swirls, and shapes. “When Heidi and I are together,” Christian Batteau says, “we try crazy things. Sometimes, it doesn’t make any economic sense.” But all the while, the rarefied clients keep coming: Louis Vuitton, Cartier, Dior, Axel
Assemblage founders Christian and Holly Batteau unveil their Basho Leaf wallpaper. Photograph by Bob Coscarelli. Courtesy of Holly Hunt.
WALL TO WOW:
Holly Hunt’s New Collection
Jo Annah Kornak knows wallpaper’s place in the design universe: “Wallcovering is one of the most versatile elements in interior design,” says the senior vice president and executive creative director of Holly Hunt. “It can be subtle and atmospheric, providing a quiet backdrop for art and furnishings—or it can be bold and expressive, becoming the focal point of a space.”
In service to that mission, the showroom famous for its quietly chic furnishings is unrolling a new collection of wallpapers this fall that takes inspiration from the human touch—the very craft of making something by hand. No mere ink on paper, the wallcoverings feature everything from intricately cut, starburst-effect wood veneers (the Liora pattern) to hand-applied rope on a sisal ground (the Loop pattern).
The entire collection is called Holly Hunt Walls, and it is rooted in the company’s signature understated luxury. Tactile and expressive, it boasts natural materials, coordinated color palettes, woven textures, luminous finishes, even performance-driven surfaces. But don’t think only about your walls: Kornak says put it on your ceilings, inside your cabinets, or on some of your home’s more architectural details. Through texture, pattern, and scale, she says, “wallcovering offers endless possibilities for storytelling.”
Vervoordt and the A-list of Dallas designers.
The very latest collection from the brains of the Batteaus is called Aeris, inspired by the thing that inspires the Batteaus a lot: nature. In three patterns, the Aeris papers channel air currents and stratiform clouds—the long, layered kinds—by way of shimmering mica, metal leaf, and arguably some magic. Hang it horizontally and it could be those clouds stretching across the sky. Hang it vertically and it could be a waterfall in a forest in a corner of your imagination. “I am super into geometry and deconstructed natural patterns,” Christian says, “and this collection is transportive.”
Aeris joins about 30 other collections by Assemblage, which was founded in 2013. Dallas is a key market for the couple, and one of their most sentimental. When they hauled some early samples to town in a truck, they met with about a dozen local architects and designers. Says Christian: “They were so welcoming, so refreshing, so warm.” They eventually landed representation at Holly Hunt—a showroom known for offering highly refined, clean-lined furnishings—and they haven’t looked back. Today, of all the Holly Hunt outposts nationwide that represent Assemblage, the Dallas location is the only one that can order the Batteaus’ archival patterns, and the one that Heidi Batteau says has the most trained and passionate staff when it comes to the unique wallpapers dreamt up by her husband, herself, and their team of jovial artisans. “We would not be where we are without Dallas,” she says. P
From above: Holly Hunt Liora wallcovering in Storm. Courtesy of Holly Hunt; Holly Hunt Loop in alabaster. Courtesy of Holly Hunt.
Holly Hunt Dallas showroom featuring Assemblage’s Nebula wallcovering from the Aeris Collection. Courtesy of Holly Hunt.
FROM FLORENCE WITH FIRE
With centuries-old techniques, Matteo Gullo introduces Dallas to the artisanal prowess of Officine Gullo.
BY TERRI PROVENCAL
Officine Gullo is renowned for their artisan kitchens. Courtesy of Officine Gullo.
Officine Gullo’s story begins in Florence—a city where the Renaissance never truly ended, where artistry and permanency have long existed side by side. Birthed in a small workshop, the bespoke kitchens sprang from a desire to revive the city’s artisanal tradition through the lens of contemporary kitchen design. “Officine Gullo was born in Florence in the 1980s, founded by my father, Carmelo Gullo,” recounts the brand’s director, Matteo Gullo, one of the founder’s three sons. “Inspired by the city’s artisan tradition, he brought together the best metalworkers, blacksmiths, bronze workers, foundry artisans, and began crafting bespoke kitchens in noble metals.” he says.
“What started as a passion project has grown into an international benchmark of Italian design, yet we remain rooted in our Florentine heritage. Every kitchen that leaves our workshop reflects the harmony of Renaissance aesthetics and the mechanical precision of 19th-century Florence,” Gullo adds.
This foundation has defined the atelier’s distinct design language through the decades. “Our design philosophy is a fusion of timeless elegance and professional performance. Each kitchen is conceived as both a work of art and a fully functional culinary machine—what we proudly call ‘a restaurant at home.’ We create environments where aesthetic refinement and technical excellence coexist, allowing owners to cook at home with the same precision, confidence, and capabilities as professional chefs in their restaurants.”
Balancing ornate design with contemporary functionality is central to the brand’s appeal. “We treat form and function as equals,” Gullo says. “Beneath every elegant exterior lies a full suite of professional-grade equipment, from coup de feu, polished fry-tops, professional fryers, steamers, and pasta cookers to refrigerators in antibacterial stainless steel, multi-temperature wine fridges, blast chillers, and sous vide machines. Every element is thoughtfully integrated and designed for ergonomic ease, ensuring that the kitchen not only meets professional standards but is also intuitive and comfortable for everyday use.”
Fabricated with solid brass, copper, and stainless steel shaped and treated in-house, what elevates these kitchens beyond luxury is the brand’s dedication to enduring quality and artful construction. “We like to say that our kitchens are the antiques of tomorrow. Our kitchens are built with the same ambition and permanence as
heirlooms, objects meant to be handed down through generations.” And perhaps most significantly, Gullo describes, “What distinguishes us is not only the beauty of our materials, but the belief that kitchens can be timeless works of functional art.”
An in-depth, human-centered strategy of discovery starts the design process with each client. “It all begins with a dialogue. Our project managers meet with the client to understand their space, their vision, and their daily habits. Together we choose metals, finishes, colors, even down to a tone inspired by a client’s garden or artwork. Every detail is made-to-measure, not just physically, but emotionally.” This emphasis on personalization is echoed in every step of the design journey. “The client is the co-author of every kitchen.” And now for the first time, this is available to experience firsthand in the recently opened Dallas showroom.
The Renaissance, with its wellspring of art and innovation, remains foundational to the brand’s creative direction. “The Florentine Renaissance is our most significant source of inspiration. It was a period when art, architecture, and craftsmanship reached unparalleled heights, and when metalwork was elevated to a true art form by masters like Cellini, Ghiberti, and Donatello.”
Despite their historical soul, Officine Gullo kitchens are equipped for the future. “We integrate modern technology discreetly, ensuring that appliances and features enhance functionality without detracting from the kitchen’s iconic design.” Sustainability is achieved through a commitment to longevity. “Durability is our sustainability. Our kitchens are designed to last generations, not years. We minimize waste by producing on demand and eliminating overproduction.” Which, Gullo says, “becomes a sustainable act when it replaces disposability with longevity.”
This philosophy has recently taken new form with the brand’s latest innovation. “We continually explore new design languages while remaining true to our artisanal heritage. A recent milestone in this journey has been the launch of our Nautical Collection—a line of bespoke kitchens and cooking appliances specifically designed for luxury yachts and marine environments. We see it as a natural evolution of our mission: offering tailor-made culinary environments to the most demanding clientele, wherever they are in the world.”
Through it all, Officine Gullo remains committed to a singular vision—one that unites artistry and utility, legacy and innovation, history and the future in every kitchen it creates. P
An artisan in Officine Gullo’s workshop. Courtesy of Officine Gullo.
Amid Florence’s Renaissance legacy, Officine Gullo House blends oldworld tradition with contemporary utility. Courtesy of Officine Gullo.
DESIGN IN A DIFFERENT KEY Avenue
Road’s quiet path to elevated living.
BY ROB BRINKLEY
The pop-up experiment clearly went well.
Stephan Weishaupt first tested the waters with a temporary store in Dallas for his Avenue Road, a showroom of global goodies that includes furniture, accessories, and art, plus design services. “We had good clients here already,” Weishaupt says, “and great projects in Texas. It’s a smallish client base, but a very passionate one.”
Now Avenue Road has made it official, with a striking, brick-fronted building at 2282 Monitor Street that reads more contemporary home than furniture store. New York firm Bando x Seidel Meersseman took a nondescript industrial building and reimagined it into a remarkably sleek and simple composition of sandy brick and sheer glass. (It channels the homes of the great Mies van der Rohe, only warmer.) The firm cut a deep, E-shaped void into the formerly solid façade and created a courtyard within for capturing that bright Texas light and sending it flooding into the showroom spaces.
What awaits inside? Avenue Road’s full offering of seating, lighting, rugs, tables, textiles, and more—all leaning to the organic side of things. Curves and muted colors are a theme in the pieces, by both design greats and modern-day upstarts, with design DNA that can be traced to Denmark, Germany, France, Brazil, and beyond. The collection, by various brands, includes sofas and tables of visual solidity mixed with chairs and consoles that are light and leggy. You may never see the same thing twice: Weishaupt loves tinkering and toying. “We’re focusing on telling just a few stories in the Dallas store. We’re still fine-tuning the space. We can keep changing it.”
Weishaupt is based in Toronto and oversees a design empire that includes multiple Avenue Road showrooms, two furnishings showrooms called Man of Parts, and boutique art galleries called 5oz., where works by international artists are presented in immersive contexts, including residences.
Home is a passionate subject for Weishaupt, who was born in Germany, has worked in the worlds of automobiles and fashion, and calls himself a curator. His interior design advice? “Think of the story you want your home to tell, pick a few really strong pieces you love, and the rest can be more toned down.” He couldn’t be happier with the new digs in Dallas, where he has noticed the natives’ passion for their homes and something else: the favorite regional food. “I love going to Mexican restaurants,” he says. “It’s just so exciting to be in Texas.” P
Founder Stephan Weisthaupt leads Weisthaupt Design Group with a visionary approach.
Avenue Road Dallas showroom view.
The Dallas showroom reflects Avenue Road's full range of design and service offerings.
FORGED WITH INTENTION
BY SARA HIGNITE
Elizabeth Hooper O’Mahony is sculpting jewelry with a soul.
PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN SMITH
Elizabeth Hooper O’Mahony.
Elizabeth Hooper O’Mahony leads her eponymous jewelry brand with a strong and considered vision. The designer’s conceptual approach yields sculptural necklaces, bracelets, earrings, and rings in sterling silver and gold vermeil. Her singular aesthetic—coupled with a fierce intentionality—results in distinct and unexpected collections released once or twice a year, augmented regularly with complementary pieces to keep the line fresh.
Each collection tells a story that starts with a deep dive into a topic of interest: tree bark, the human body, forms of connection, even linguistics. “The concept always comes first,” says O’Mahony, who is equally inspired by an undulating shadow spotted on a summer evening stroll, the costumes in a period film, and her growing art collection, which includes thoughtfully selected works by Maja Ruznic, Wanda Koop, Sonya Kelliher-Combs, and DavidJeremiah.
O’Mahony likes a challenge and avoids taking the easy way out to achieve the results she’s looking for. The brand’s most recent drop, The Wax Collection, which incorporates thick, oxidized sterling silver links in a variety of organic textures and amorphous shapes, is fabricated using the cire perdue (lost wax) technique, a first for the designer. “It was very experimental. The motivation behind working with wax was to achieve a certain texture,” she says. “The layers, curves, movement, and organic nature could only be achieved with wax. Wax is quite delicate and malleable and is unforgiving of mistakes. The challenge and beauty of this process ended up being the happy accidents—some things didn’t come out as expected, but that is where the value lies. It really does speak to the core of experimentation. Using lost-wax casting taught me to literally go with the flow.”
O’Mahony came to design later in life, after giving birth to her second daughter. “At that point,” she explains, “I realized that if I wanted to maintain my identity and sanity, I needed to find a way to spend my time that was outside of motherhood.” O’Mahony had always loved fashion and design, so she started researching fashion-related fields and came across metalsmithing. “I knew nothing about it but had a feeling I would enjoy it, so I signed
up for classes at the Craft Guild of Dallas. The learning curve was huge, but I quickly fell in love with it. It became a creative outlet that allowed me to use my mind and hands. In that process I discovered my creative abilities. It was a pivotal moment in my life.”
After nearly a decade of fabrication classes and independent study, O’Mahony launched Elizabeth Hooper Studio in December of 2019, encountering another steep learning curve. “Over the years, I have learned what it really means to run an accessories brand. It isn’t just making cute things and selling them. I always had a vision of doing something that was a little bit more artistic, more elevated, something that would fit into a luxury market because that’s where I came from in terms of being a consumer and appreciating art and design. It’s probably way easier to be somebody who’s just, like, ‘I want everybody to like this,’ as opposed to having a distinct point of view. But I would be compromising my vision. And so I’ve kept myself from doing that, even though it does come with its own challenges.”
In the years since, O’Mahony and the brand have been featured in Vogue, Elle, InStyle, the Wall Street Journal, and WWD. Former first lady Michelle Obama wore the Double Puzzle Wave earrings on her The Light We Carry book tour. Actor Maya Rudolph has sported the Large Petal Hoops, as has Katie Holmes (on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon). Despite these successes, O’Mahony isn’t resting on her laurels. “Once something kind of reaches a static point—that is not built into my personality. I don’t do cruise control.” Driven as much by intellectual curiosity as by aesthetics, O’Mahony keeps moving her designs forward and pushing herself artistically.
Elizabeth Hooper Studio jewelry is available on the brand’s website as well as in brick-and-mortar stores, including Twelve Thirty Four and Forty Five Ten in Dallas and Garment Modern + Vintage in Austin. The Wax Collection was recently picked up by the iconic Maxfield in Los Angeles and will be available in-store and online beginning in August. O’Mahony prioritizes the inperson client experience: “People want to touch the jewelry before they purchase it. They want to hold it. They want to wear it.” P
Ash Collection 14k vermeil large Geo Link chain; Ash Collection 14k vermeil Wax garnet ring.
Ash Collection sterling Eroded Wax necklace.
Ash Collection 14k vermeil Hybrid Wax cuff.
Ash Collection sterling Cobblestone drop earrings.
Lisa and Ira Kravitz enlisted the expertise of Bernbaum/Magadini Architects, Rick Rozas Design, and landscape architect studioOutside to bring their elegant home to life.
PEACEFUL PARADISE
BERNBAUM MAGADINI ARCHITECTS AND RICK ROZAS DESIGN CREATE A PRESTON HOLLOW IDYLL.
BY
NANCY COHEN ISRAEL
PHOTOGRAPHS BY CHARLES DAVIS SMITH
“We built a house for our lifestyle now,” relates Lisa Kravitz. She and her husband, Ira, worked with architect Tricy Magadini of Bernbaum/Magadini Architects, designer Rick Rozas of Rick Rozas Design, and landscape architect Amy Bartell of studioOutside to create an oasis of serenity. With their children grown and grandchildren starting to arrive, Ira says, “We were ready for something new.”
After finding the perfect lot in Preston Hollow, they turned to Magadini, whose first challenge included how to site the home. “The lot was so much deeper than wide. It dictated how the house was laid out,” she offers. She incorporated strong exterior horizontal lines, balancing the verticality of the wooded lot. The park-like setting lent to the flow of the home.
Natural materials are a hallmark of Magadini and Rozas’ approaches. Rozas incorporates as many as possible in his interior design, in large part because of their durability: details such as porcelain floors and oak finishes ensure a home built to last. Architecturally, large picture windows wrap around the house, framing the bucolic setting and forming a perfect balance of gravity and lightness.
At the entrance, for example, a stone walkway is visually cooled by a reflecting pool running parallel alongside it. The solid wood front door, framed by windows, opens into an entry hall in which the exterior stonework continues into the interior. On a perpendicular wall, a large
Behind the screen, a work by David H. Gibson from Valley House Gallery & Sculpture Garden adds a subtle touch, while an artwork passed down through the family hangs below the floating staircase.
Holly Hunt Pampa sofa in Great Plains’ Lush Rocky Beach fabric styled with pillows in Switchback along with Romo pillows in Blue Fox; Holly Hunt Bahia cocktail table in Great Plains’ Eventide Bluff; a commission metal screen panel by James Cinquemani adds artistic drama.
sculpture ripples vertically. The couple first saw the artist’s work, crafted from parts of a shipwreck excavated from the ocean’s floor, while visiting San Miguel. He had just enough material to make this commissioned piece for them.
From the entry, hallways flow into public spaces. One direction leads past a wine room into an open kitchen and living room. While Rozas used white oak for the exposed wood, the fireplace is surrounded by eucalyptus, bringing pattern into the room. Otherwise, neutral tones serve as a calming canvas for the greenery beyond the windows. “It’s important for me for every space to have a peacefulness to it and to have stillness to it,” Rozas explains.
The living room is anchored by an ottoman from The Bright Group. Its moveable tabletop provides a surface for serving. With the tabletop pushed aside, the ottoman doubles as additional seating. Since the couple enjoys entertaining, Rozas offers, “We wanted the space to feel really useable.”
A granite-topped table by Draenert, with a built-in lazy Susan, gives gravity to an adjacent breakfast room. Its roundness is echoed in the Ted Bradley–designed LED-and-fired porcelain chandelier above it. This space overlooks a courtyard enhanced by three lifesized bronze sculptures from Deborah Ballard’s Celebration series.
With each figure by the Dallas-based sculptor facing a window into a different area of the home, the courtyard feels like the beating heart of the property.
A spacious outdoor pavilion extends the home’s entertaining capacity. “We made it very light and airy,” Magadini explains. With the pool on one side, a fireplace on the other, and pickleball court adjacent to it, it unifies the outdoor living spaces.
Dining rooms are often the focal point of Magadini’s homes. Here, Rozas faced a unique challenge: “Tricy’s architecture has a mass to it. I learned to scale furniture to fit these rooms,” he notes. A circular table that seats 14 people provides a strong anchor to the space and is counterbalanced by a large painting by Paul Manes. While a Texan by birth, Manes now lives in Colorado.
On the whole, Ira says, “We like to support regional artists.” With work by David Gibson, Linnea Glatt, Mary Vernon, and Cecil Touchon (formerly of Fort Worth), among others, their commitment to the local art scene is evident throughout their home. “We started collecting several years ago. We knew that we would eventually have a house with big white walls,” Lisa explains, adding, “We started buying what we liked.”
Two of the most dramatic works in their home are commissioned
Three life-size bronze Celebration sculptures by Deborah Ballard, through Valley House Gallery & Sculpture Garden, add refined presence.
A work on paper by Mary Vernon hangs adjacent to the Draenert Tadao 1515-II round table with lazy Susan from Scott + Cooner surrounded by Walter Knoll armless chairs; Ted Bradley Nest lighting fixture from The Bright Group along with the Cahn high-back bar stool upholstered in Baywatch Malibu Sand.
A large sculpture crafted from parts of a shipwreck by an artist in San Miguel ripples vertically above a Holly Hunt Carpenter’s Bench; a chromogenic print by Allison V. Smith from Barry Whistler Gallery hangs to the right; the Scott Group Studio handmade area rug pairs beautifully with natural textures.
pieces by local sculptor Jim Cinquemani. Between the dining room and the staircase, Magadini created a quiet alcove that she felt needed to be screened to retain its cocooned aura. Cinquemani, with whom she has a long history, was able to offer the perfect solution: he conceived of an iron screen studded with colored glass. Its balance of negative and positive space gives it a diaphanous feel, while the glass stones add depth. “We worked hand-in-hand with him on what we wanted,” Lisa says. It has become everyone’s favorite room, including Rozas’. “What Jim did was just stunning,” he enthuses. Ira shares, “We liked it so much, we asked, ‘what can you do with the wine room?’” Cinquemani created a similar, though far from identical, concept here, leaving gaps as placeholders so that the couple could continue to personalize it. “Whenever we have a bottle [of wine] to celebrate a special occasion, his studio will melt it down and fit it in here,” Ira shares.
In October 2023, after two and half years of building, the couple finally moved in. When they began the project, memories of the Covid lockdown inspired several rooms, including an upstairs gym. And once Ira realized that he could work from home regularly, he knew he wanted a dedicated office. This workspace breezily overlooks the wooded yard. A whimsical painting by Barnaby Fitzgerald behind his desk has echoes of the Ballard installation outdoors. Ira is fond of wood, so Rozas had a walnut desk fabricated locally by Grazzini Furniture.
Overall, the architecture and design work symbiotically, the result of a long working relationship between Magadini and Rozas. As Rozas says, “We already have a vocabulary.” The two credit one another for the success of the home, with Rozas complimenting Magadini, saying, “Tricy is the only one who designs each room for how her clients want to live in it.” Magadini adds, “It was very collaborative to work together, which always makes a much better project.” Their joint effort perfectly balances harmony and serenity. P
A Barnaby Fitzgerald painting from Valley House Gallery & Sculpture Garden hangs behind the custom Hudson desk by Grazzini Furniture with an Aeron desk chair from Design Within Reach. B&B Italia’s Metropolitan ML100 leather armchairs flank The Bright Group’s Weekend ottoman table in Novare Catalina bronze from Culp Associates; Opalia’s seashell rug is from Truett.
A John Pomp Infinity pendant from The Bright Group hangs above a custom dining table by Irving-based Grazzini Furniture with Maxalto Febo dining chairs from Scott + Cooner; a painting by Paul Manes from Cris Worley Fine Arts brings gravitas to the dining room.
A spacious outdoor pavilion extends the home’s entertaining capacity.
A gleaming pool adds shimmery dimension to the stunning architecture of the home and pavilion.
A FEEL FOR TEXTURE
BY
ROB BRINKLEY
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JOHN SMITH
“The word we say the most at work is texture.” By work, Allison McAfee means Park Interiors, her five-person design firm in Dallas, born out of her interior design role with a custom builder and now with projects all over the country. Spend even a few minutes in McAfee’s own home and one thing becomes very clear: this woman takes her work home with her. A pair of armchairs is covered in thick, curly sheepskin. The game room is lined in wallpaper that reads like woven lattice. Rugs have deep rivulets. Even some of the works in the art collection contain unusually textural materials: velvet, cardboard, 24-karat gold.
Dimension and a little drama are on tap chez McAfee, where the in-house interior designer lives with her husband, Justin, and their two kids. The McAfees knew the house well when they bought it in 2021—it was Justin’s parent’s, built by them in 2009—but they have made it their own, refreshing every surface, reassigning some rooms’ functions, and adding a capacious game room out back. For Allison, with her background in construction management, the 14-month project wasn’t as torturous as it might’ve been for a civilian. “It was a great way to put all my passions together.”
Olivia DiVecchia’s ink on paper fly, map; please forgive me for standing still (mutate), 2022, hangs above the fireplace clad in Calacatta Primavera marble from Aria Stone Gallery; Karen Blair’s Bird with Pink Flowers 1, 2021 from Bee Street Gallery adds interest above the piano; the bench is upholstered in Pierre Frey fabric next to the Maiden Home Perry chair.
Jessica Drenk’s Aggregate Strata 2, 2023, a layered composition of junk mail, cardboard, and used paper, sourced from Galleri Urbane, adds textural contrast above a Maiden Home sofa accented with pillows in Holland & Sherry and Ferrick Mason fabric; In the hallway, Rebecca Manson’s Hackles Up (Pelt), 2022, in porcelain, glaze, and adhesives on canvas from François Ghebaly draws the eye.
Wanda Koop’s Fire at the Point, 2022, acrylic on canvas from Blouin Division, anchors the living room flanked by two white Eichholtz chairs; Made Goods Aldrich coffee table in antique gold.
Did she ever. The house now pulsates with a synthesis of vintage and new finds, plus inherited pieces and—as extra edge— contemporary art. The dining room is perhaps the most illustrative of McAfee’s ability to mix it all up. The walls are now Venetian plaster, in a deep blue-green caught somewhere between teal, Aegean, and ocean. (McAfee wonders what the neighbors must think as they walk by at night.) The traditional, polished-wood dining table was Justin’s grandmother’s. Around it, McAfee has pulled clean-lined contemporary wood chairs from Maiden Home, a favorite source. On one side of the room, a plump, curved-back vintage slipper chair found at the Round Top Antiques Fair pulls up to a chunky, three-legged marble side table that looks a little Jeff Koons. Across the room? Three entirely trippy mushroommotif works on the wall, made of dye and silk velvet by Fort Worth native Travis Boyer. Their downy surfaces nod to the mohair on the cushions of the dining chairs. (McAfee loves a moment of reference,
whether across the room or across the house, and can point out several.) Meanwhile, in the family room, a gleaming black Yamaha piano—another inherited piece, from Justin’s grandparents—holds its own with an intellectual assembly of new pieces that includes a gold-leafed, iron-and-resin coffee table on a mass of twiggy gold legs; a credenza fronted with a graphic starburst made of inlaid banana-tree bark; and a pair of wiggly, armless lounge chairs shaped like the Greek letter omega—if you knocked an omega over on its side. All over the house, this push-pull of materiality and shape occur, sometimes subtly, sometimes spectacularly. “It’s a little funky,” McAfee says, taking in her environment, “but I didn’t want it to be conventional.”
That applies to the art collection, too. For their highly personal new home, the McAfees called on Dallas-based advisor Temple Shipley early in their collecting journey. Shipley’s art chops include time as a gallery director and on museum curatorial teams,
Above the Maiden Home bed, David Wiseman’s La Lechusita, 2022 in bronze and porcelain from Kasmin, presents a sculptural focal point; Murano glass lamps through Legacy Antiques sit atop Made Goods bedside tables; bolster pillow covered in Pierre Frey fabric with Samuel & Sons trim adds tailoring; Olampia chandelier, drapery in Pindler with Samuel & Sons trim, Kufri pillows on the chaise, a vintage rug from Arsin Rug Gallery, and Phillip Jeffries wallpaper complete the space.
including the Art Institute of Chicago and the Dallas Museum of Art. Shipley now manages multiple private collections and consults on philanthropic strategies and museum donations. Here at the McAfee house, the first order of business was sending Allison McAfee “hundreds of images on PowerPoint,” McAfee says, so that Shipley could gauge what her new client gravitated toward. The thorough, fastidious McAfee “came back with her own presentation deck to me,” Shipley says. “She is the best student.” (McAfee also painstakingly picks out all the art images that beam from The Frame televisions around the house.) The educate-the-eye phase quickly escalated to gallery visits and fair trips together, adventures that have taken them as far as Los Angeles for the influential Frieze art fair.
The first work acquired under Shipley’s tutelage was the large, pelt-like piece that hangs in a passageway between the entry hall and family room. Made by New York artist Rebecca Manson of porcelain bits that look like long, curled seashells, the nearly sevenfoot-tall pelt is splayed nearly five feet wide on its wall and hints that textural works are indeed a thing in this house. In the family room, another textural work takes center stage. Made by New York artist Jessica Drenk and acquired from Galleri Urbane in Dallas, Aggregate Strata 2 is like a cross-section slice of the earth—if the earth were made of junk mail, cardboard and tossed-out papers. It’s a powerful, dimensional work, and the one that McAfee says “the most questions are asked about” when visitors come to call. “This wall also sat empty for a long time,” she says—something Shipley
Across the spread: Dye on silk velvet mushroom paintings by Travis Boyer from The Valley, Taos; Baker Furniture vintage dining table with Maiden Home mohair dining chairs; Olampia chandelier; Perennials custom rug. This page, above: Janet Sobel’s Untitled,1950, a mixedmedia work from Cecilia Brunson Projects, creates a striking contrast with Josh Greene wallcovering from SUPPLY. Right: Prairie Fire (#2), 2023, an acrylic, watercolor, and ink on paper painting by Aaron Morse, commands attention next to a vintage accent chair found in Round Top; drapery in Madeaux fabric from Culp Associates.
The space, painted in Farrow & Ball’s Card Room Green, includes an Armadillo rug, a sofa in Great Plains fabric, and a custom walnut coffee table; pillows feature Soane and Ferrick Mason fabrics with Samuel & Sons trim; Maiden Home lamp sits alongside Four Hands swivel chairs and a vintage brass and marble table from Round Top; lighting is by Petite Friture, with Roman shades in Madeaux fabric from Culp Associates.
doesn’t mind when it comes to her clients. “Waiting, looking at catalogues, seeing galleries together—it becomes its own filtration system,” she says. (Shipley is most firmly in the buy-it-only-becauseyou-love-it camp.)
As in all great collections, some of the works have deep personal meaning. A work depicting Mount Rainier, over the desk in Justin’s office, is by Indiana artist Casey Roberts, who used a cyanotype process, as is done for construction blueprints. Justin is the third generation of his family in the construction business, and he has scaled that very mountain.
In the primary bedroom, a three-dimensional work of a white porcelain owl on bronze tree branches is a nod to Allison McAfee’s mother’s love of the nocturnal birds. It is by David Wiseman, whose Los Angeles studio McAfee and Shipley visited together. Shipley is enjoying this particular discovery process. “I work with a lot of interior designers,” she says, “but not on their own homes.”
As for the McAfees, they are content to wait—educating their eyes and meeting the artists when they can. A few walls can stay bare. “The slow way of collecting,” Allison says, “has been so much fun.” P
Sherwin Williams in Foggy Day envelops the millwork surrounding the desk with a commissioned work of Mt. Ranier by Casey Roberts installed above; Herman Miller chair and ottoman add comfort above a vintage rug; drapery in Holland & Sherry fabric frames the space beside a Regina Andrew side table.
GAME ON
BY ROB BRINKLEY
A legendary racket club gets a bold new spin, blending toptier sport, striking architecture, and clubby cool.
If the competition in the parking lot is any indication—optionedup Range Rovers, Escalades, and G-Wagens galore—the battles on the courts are going to make Waterloo look like a walk in the park.
This is the energy ping-ponging off the walls at the reinvented T Bar M, the 1970s racquet-sports club in suburban Dallas that is seeing a complete overhaul in look and character. Dallas-based hospitality group WoodHouse—founder Brady Wood’s think tank behind many clever restaurants and private clubs—has been reworking T Bar M into something more than a place to swing paddles and racquets. Phase two of the transformation will soon begin, adding a spa component to a 13-acre campus that now includes courts for tennis, pickleball and padel; a glistening swimming pool; an alfresco
taqueria; and the pièce de résistance: a new private club called Banner House in a striking new building by superstar Texas architects Lake Flato. Part restaurant, part chalet, part social club, Banner House just raised the score on what a sports-club facility can be—and look like.
The atmosphere
“I’ve admired Lake Flato’s work for years,” says Wood. “I was just waiting for the right project to collaborate on.” He found it at T Bar M. “The old tennis facility, a metal structure with real character, needed someone who could honor its spirit while helping shape the future of the club.” Lake Flato, based in San Antonio and headed by founders David Lake and Ted Flato, has become known for a contemporary Texas timelessness spun out of steel, glass, wood, and
Nighttime tennis anyone? Photograph by Conner Key.
Historic tennis rackets serve as a thoughtful accent to the architecture by Lake Flato. Photograph by John Smith.
reclaimed materials. Megan Wood, Brady’s wife and a creative force in many WoodHouse projects, says Banner House “is Lake Flato at their best.” Woodsy where it faces the parking lots and glassy where it faces the tennis courts, terraces, and trees, the building is a twostory composition of Western red cedar, painted steel, painted metal panels, masonry and concrete. Inside, it is a symphony of Douglas fir and white oak, with slatted motifs for walls, ceilings and stair railings—all channeling a mod-lodge aesthetic.
For the furnishings and finishes, Wood got to finally work with another firm he long admired, Commune Design, which is based in Los Angeles and has a client list that includes Goop, Oliver Peoples, and LACMA, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Here, Commune Design has stirred together leggy chairs and angular sofas in backgrounds that brim with stripes, checks, circles, handmade clay tiles, and blocks of color—the visual language of tennis, with its clay courts, woven rackets, and court lines. (One sentimental touch: The color-saturated tiles at Banner house—in bathrooms, on fireplaces, around cocktail bars—come from Cerámica Suro in
Resort-style pool and cabanas. Photograph by Conner Key.
The slatted railing exemplifies the unifying design motif throughout Banner House.
Outdoor dining area. Photograph by Conner Key.
Jessica Nowitzki placed a work made from yarn, buckskin, acrylic, and Astroturf by Los Angeles artist Teresa Baker behind the reception desk. Photograph by John Smith.
Mexico, the creator of the artful tiles at the much-loved WoodHouse restaurant in Dallas, José.)
Because landscaping around such an architectural creation takes a masterful touch too, WoodHouse tapped Dallas-based David Hocker to reimagine the whole plot of land. For Wood it was a chance to work with a good friend. “What made it even more special,” he says, “was how well Hocker, Lake Flato, and Commune all aligned—not just aesthetically, but in how they approach materiality, craftsmanship, and design.”
The art
At almost any other racquet club, the only things you may see on the walls are sign-up sheets for classes and gentle reminders not to abuse the nets. Not at Banner House. A game-changer here is the art collection curated to appeal to every member of every age, from art connoisseurs to novices. Was it fate that art advisor Jessica Nowitzki happened to be a club member? The former associate director of the art-centric Goss-Michael Foundation in Dallas was approached by the Woods to develop a permanent collection for the club. “Art is important to our members, and to us,” says Megan Wood, who is a collector herself, alongside her husband. For Banner House, Nowitzki has a decent budget and a big idea: that the works should
be by American artists, to tap into what she calls the clubhouse’s “Americana mod vibe.” Most of the works so far are by living artists, a group that includes Texas dwellers Rachel Livedalen, Riley Holloway, and Michelle Rawlings. The first commission for the club is a mixed-media work by New York artist Malcolm Hill. At more than 16 feet wide and made of wood, rope, burlap, linen, cardboard, and paint, it holds court on a wall in the club’s chef-driven restaurant. One of Nowitzki’s favorite pieces is behind the reception desk. Made from yarn, buckskin, acrylic, and Astroturf, it is by Los Angeles artist Teresa Baker, who explores vast spaces and her native North Dakota tribal culture in her works. Nowitzki and Megan Wood are collecting works from fairs, including Art Basel and the Dallas Art Fair, and galleries, including Dallas favorites 12.26, James Cope Gallery, and Erin Cluley Gallery. Nowitzki is also mining an unexpected source that she thought of as the art program took shape: the club’s own members, who are loaning works, creating an exciting natural rotation. “We never know what they may have in their collections or in storage,” Nowitzki says, “that they might love to show.” As bonds go between members and their social clubs, art is a unique one, and that is not lost on Nowitzki. “Megan and Brady have always had a creative art component to their projects,” she says.
A commissioned work by New York artist Malcolm Hill displays in the members’ dining room. Photograph by Conner Key.
The appraisal
Yes, the food is finer now. (Omakase bar, anyone?) There are private cabanas by the pool, a curvy DJ booth inside, and mahjong matches raging almost ’round the clock in a tony, second-floor lounge. The personal trainers are consulting on the smoothie recipes. But the soul of T Bar M is alive and well. There are nearly 40 courts for tennis, pickleball and padel; programs for fitness, wellness, and recovery; high-tech analytics; and the famous tennis academy, staffed by nearly 30 pros. The beloved Thursday-night 105s are here (IYKYK), as is the annual tennis tournament in the spring that draws players from around the world. The game is most certainly the thing—only now it happens in a much chicer setting.
“We’ve preserved the leadership, the coaching staff and many original members,” says Wood, who counts the Trophy Room in the new clubhouse as one of his favorite spaces. Meant to celebrate achievements of all kinds, it is full of members’ own cups, medals, prizes, and laurels for everything from horse shows to Ironman competitions to, indeed, tennis. “T Bar M’s legacy,” Wood says, “lives on through our tennis culture.” P
An Untitled work by Michelle Rawlings hangs in the clubhouse. Photograph by Conner Key.
A painting by André Butzer is on loan from a private collection. Photograph by John Smith.
The Nook omakase bar. Photograph by Conner Key.
THREAD COUNT
SPINNING FASHION INTO THE FINE ART LOOM AT DALLAS CONTEMPORARY.
PHOTOGRAPH BY LUIS MARTINEZ STYLING BY WENDY MULAS
HAIR AND MAKEUP BY BÉLENE, KIM DAWSON AGENCY
MODEL RACHEL THOMAS, KIM DAWSON AGENCY
Rachel is pictured with Goshka Macuga’s Who Gave Us a Sponge to Erase the Horizon? (detail), 2022, tapestry at Dallas Contemporary through Kate MacGarry, London; Dolce & Gabbana sequin mesh maxi dress and crystal-embellished satin sandal available at Dolce & Gabbana, NorthPark Center.
Rachel is pictured with Mika Tajima’s Negative Entropy (Deep Brain Stimulation, Yellow, Full Width, Exa) (detail), 2024, through Pace Gallery; Alaïa Sequin fringe turtleneck crop sweater with matching dress; Bottega Veneta laminated goatskin degradé mule sandal; Judith Leiber Cosmopolitan Martini clutch, all available at The Conservatory, Highland Park Village.
Rachel poses with Kiki Smith’s Congregation (detail), 2014, through Pace Gallery; Zimmermann Lucky Metallic Frill one-shoulder tank with matching skirt with Cult Gaia Caldera clutch available at Tootsies, Plaza at Preston Center. Deepa Gurnani handmade gold crystal Karen necklace at Tootsies, Plaza at Preston Center; Elizabeth Hooper Studio gold Ripple hoop earrings available at elizabethhooper.com and Forty Five Ten, Dallas.
Rachel poses with Caroline Achaintre’s Seeker (detail), 2024, at Dallas Contemporary through Art : Concept, Paris; Akris Corsage gown with feathers on silk and a high side slit, at Akris, Highland Park Village and akris.com; Elizabeth Hooper Studio Friction earrings in sterling with baroque pearls and Ash Collection Geo Link chain in sterling available at elizabethhooper.com and Forty Five Ten, Dallas.
Rachel is pictured with Kira Dominguez Hultgren’s Split Form Center (detail), 2025, through Eleanor Harwood Gallery, San Francisco; Etro sweater with paisley jeans, Etro, NorthPark Center; Gas Bijoux Izzia earrings and arty acetate cuff; Rene Caovilla gold crystal wraparound ankle heel, all available at Tootsies, Plaza at Preston Center.
Rachel poses with Candice Lin’s Verdant Curtain (detail), 2020, at Dallas
Contemporary through François Ghebaly, Los Angeles, New York; Missoni plunging metallic ombre knit long-sleeve maxi dress available at Shop Missoni at Hôtel Swexan; Elizabeth Hooper Studio Ash Collection Eroded Wax sterling necklace and sterling Hybrid Wax cuff, available at elizabethhooper.com and Forty Five Ten, Dallas.
Rachel interacts with Kira Dominguez Hultgren’s Our Daily Parenthetical (detail), 2025, through Eleanor Harwood Gallery, San Francisco; Lela Rose crochet ruffle pointelle knit sleeveless midi dress, Lela Rose, Highland Park Village; Jimmy Choo Isa 95 black mesh paillette pumps, Jimmy Choo, Highland Park Village. Elizabeth Hooper Studio Into Orbit Jasper pendant at elizabethhooper.com and Forty Five Ten, Dallas.
Lucia Simek, Robyn Siegel, Shayna Fontana at Dallas Contemporary Gala kickoff at Le Sol.
Photograph by Peyton Mixon
DALLAS CONTEMPORARY GALA KICKOFF AT LE SOL HOUSE
PHOTOGRAPHS BY PEYTON MIXON
Elizabeth Hooper O'Mahony, Ashley Varel
Rod Sager, Jill Sager, Peter Augustus Owen Rhoheen Ahsan, Tammy Cotton Hartnett
Charlie Adamski Caulkins, Anne Wallach
Kelly Mason, Alexander Villanueva
Le Sol House
Dallas Contemporary Gala Kick Off at Le Sol House
Toni Hobley, Ben Sarpong, Kathryn Sarpong
Katie Lemon Decker, Christina Jafar
TACA SILVER CUP AWARD LUNCHEON HONORING GAYLE HALPERIN AND JIM NUGENT AT OMNI DALLAS
PHOTOGRAPHS
BY TAMATHA CAMERON AND NATE REHLANDER
Ryan Wood, Calvert Collins-Bratton
Denise Lee
Donna Wilhelm, Phil Clemmons
Lewis Chang, Carol Glendenning, Don Glendenning, Kendall Purpura
Grace Cook
Bruce Wood Dance Dallas
Jonathan Norton, Gabrielle Kurlander
Gayle Halperin, Maura Sheffler, Jim Nugent
Larry Lane, Elliott Trahan, Sofia Downing Ortega, Megan Storey
DALLAS THEATER CENTER TAKE A BOW CENTERSTAGE GALA HONORING JOEL FERRELL AT FASHION INDUSTRY GALLERY
Welcome to Francisco Moreno’s baroque sci-fi dream.
BY TERRI PROVENCAL
Francisco Moreno’s work is defined by its ability to captivate—startling, alluring, and immersive. From his camouflage-painted Datsun and accompanying mural in the WCD Project —an electrifying performance that revved up Soluna in 2015—to Chapel, now part of the Dallas Museum of Art’s collection, Moreno’s art consistently commands attention. Chapel draws inspiration from the barrel-vaulted structure of the Spanish Romanesque and the angelic and apostolic imagery of the Hermitage of the Vera Cruz de Maderuelo, housed at the Prado. More recently, Bounteous Nature, a sweeping 34-foot-long site-specific mural with a sun as its main protagonist, commissioned by a private client, continues his tradition of fusing visual spectacle with layered meaning. Each project lures viewers into vivid, narrative-rich environments that resist the expected.
Moreno draws from the grandeur of the European old masters as much as he does from the vibrant visual traditions of his Mexican heritage filtered through a lens entirely his own. Born in Mexico City in 1986 and raised in Arlington, Texas, he conjures conceptually rich, often theatrical worlds where baroque opulence meets the symbolic rhythm of allegory.
Infused with sci-fi sensibilities and fantasy flourishes, Moreno’s invented realms collapse timelines, merging historical imagery with speculative futures. Mythological figures, symbolic artifacts, and futuristic forms coexist in surreal harmony, shaping a visual language rooted equally in cultural memory and imaginative possibility. He even painted cosmic angels transporting the Chapel ’s crates.
For an upcoming unveiling of The Practitioners at The Lofts at Expo Park on September 13—a building and neighborhood on Commerce Street buzzing with creative energy—Moreno rendered a mural populated by his contemporaries, mentors, and collaborators. Among them: curator Thomas Feulmer of The Warehouse, artists
and his past instructors Benito Huerta, Sedrick Huckaby, and Marilyn Jolly; art advisor Temple Shipley guiding a tour; artists Sean Cairns (seen painting) and Joel Murray (appearing as a floating, winged head); and Dr. Adam Jasienski, who once described Moreno as “a new old-master sci-fi surrealist,” all make cameos. Model Alexis Poarch stands with photographer Ellen Yang, a former resident of The Lofts. Architects David Droese and Lance Raney also appear, inspecting the scene.
This September, Moreno continues to expand his universe with Squirrel Show, opening September 18 at Col Gallery in San Francisco. Callie Jones, a Dallas native who interned for Feulmer at The Warehouse—where Moreno once worked—is one of two founders of Col, along with Julia Li. Featuring 12 new works, the exhibition investigates the squirrel as a metaphor. “I feel like the squirrel is an interesting vessel to explore the human condition,” Moreno says. “It’s so familiar to us, yet so mysterious. We understand the psychology of dogs...” he muses, while the squirrel remains enigmatic.
On September 27, Moreno’s Artist’s Journey will be featured in Soy de Tejas, a traveling exhibition at The Cheech, part of the Riverside Art Museum in California. Curated by Rigoberto Luna, the survey showcases Texas artists of Latin American descent. Moreno’s work features a devilish cherub hoisting a flaming laurel crown above a princess, with the Statue of Liberty’s spiked halo rising along her back like a stegosaurus. Nearby, a nod to Hokusai’s The Great Wave crashes into the scene, as do writhing chained beasts and an empty chair facing an easel—another layered metaphor in his everexpanding visual lexicon.
Through a dynamic interplay of past and future, the sacred and the strange, Francisco Moreno constructs immersive visions that invite viewers to step into stories still unfolding. P
Francisco Moreno, The Practitioners, 2025, acrylic on wood panels, 12 x 24 ft. Commissioned by August Real Estate for Expo Park.
