John Sutton Photography
CONTRIBUTORS
DANIELLE AVRAM is a curator, writer, and assistant professor of contemporary galleries and exhibitions and the director of the SP/N Gallery at UT Dallas. She has held positions at Texas Woman’s University; SMU; High Museum of Art; and the Pinnell Collection. This issue she returns to The Power Station, where she once worked, to spotlight Paulo Nimer Pjota. Danielle has an MFA from the School of The Museum of Fine Arts and Tufts University, and a BA from UT Dallas.
NELLY ADHAM is a Miami-based fashion stylist who brought the tropics with her in Tropical Brilliance. Represented by RR&Co. in Dallas, Nelly’s timeless and distinctive style is credited to her artistic eye and love for visual expression. With an avid passion for style and aesthetics, Nelly’s unique perspective allows her to seamlessly combine striking yet classic styles with a one-ofa-kind modern edge to reflect current and upcoming trends.
10
CHRIS BYRNE authored The Original Print (Guild Publishing, 2002) and the graphic novel The Magician (Marquand Books, 2013), within the Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University; Rare Book/Special Collections Division, Library of Congress; Ryerson and Burnham Archives, The Art Institute of Chicago; Thomas J. Watson Library, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. He is co-editing Frank Johnson: Secret Pioneer of the American Comic Book for Fantagraphics with Keith Mayerson.
PATRONMAGAZINE.COM
STEVE CARTER offers a profile of Fort Worth’s Abraham Alexander, a soul-stirring singersongwriter who’s a rising star on the scene. Alexander recently completed an 18-date coast-tocoast tour as Leon Bridges’ opening act, and his second album is nearing completion. “What a pleasure it was getting to know Abraham Alexander and his music,” Carter reports. “This guy’s got it—he’s the real deal, and you heard it here.”
PEGGY LEVINSON takes us inside the home of legendary chef Dean Fearing and his equally talented wife, the global chief marketing and content officer of Cinemark, Wanda Gierhart, in A Tasteful Retreat. There she finds a love of art, design, food, and wine, as one would expect from the combined creative genius of this twosome. With design by Dan Nelson and architectural updates by Bruce Bernbaum, the home boasts warmth, eclecticism, and signature style.
LAUREN CHRISTENSEN has over two decades of experience in advertising and marketing. As a principal with L+S Creative Group, she consults with a wide variety of 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.
CHRIS PLAVIDAL is a Fort Worthbased photographer, represented by Sisterbrother MGMT, known for his extraordinary shoots in beauty, still life, jewelry, interiors, and fine art. In this issue, he returns on assignment for Patron with Tropical Brilliance. Here, working in concert with Nelly Adham and Elaine Raffel, he used his artistic eye for detail to capture the season’s finest jewels accompanied by flora flown in from Florida.
NANCY COHEN ISRAEL is Dallas-based writer, art historian, and educator. Over the past decade, she has had the privilege of interviewing Dr. Mark Roglán for many of the stories about the Meadows Museum featured in Patron. As a member of this community, as well as in her role in the education department at the Meadows, she was devastated by his passing in October. She was honored to write a tribute to him for this issue.
ELAINE RAFFEL is a local creative director who lends her fashion and luxury goods prowess to Patron’s pages, drawing from her experience working with the crème de la crème of retail. For Tropical Brilliance she cast Miami-based Nelly Adham as art director and stylist to work with Fort Worth photographer Chris Plavidal. “When Nelly spotted these stunners in a nursery, we agreed it was the perfect way to showcase worldclass jewels.”
LEE CULLUM is a Dallas journalist who is in love with the performing arts. Ring Up The Curtain is a sequel to a piece she did during lockdown, when troupes were struggling to stay afloat. Of the few who performed at all was the Dallas Symphony, playing with a chamber orchestra of 40 distanced musicians to a small audience at the Meyerson Symphony Center. Now the DSO is back to full force onstage, as are its cultural neighbors, no longer waiting in the wings of limbo.
JOHN SMITH flexes his degree in architecture to photograph homes of distinction by the best in the trade. His years of experience provide him with a unique appreciation for his clientele’s vision. In A Tasteful Retreat, designed by Dan Nelson with architect Bruce Bernbaum and contractor Joel Greenwald, John captured Wanda Gierhart Fearing and Dean Fearing with their two cooperative pets Gumbo and Walker and Dean’s famous Lucchese boots collection.
