Daydreams and Other Monsters by University of Texas at San Antonio

DAYDREAMS AND OTHER MONSTERS

DAYDREAMS AND OTHER MONSTERS at The University of Texas at San Antonio Main Art Gallery

Curated by Alana Coates

San Antonio, Texas

Catalogue published to accompany the exhibition Daydreams and Other Monsters, a group show featuring the artworks of Louie Chavez, John Hernandez, Peter Saul, and Megan Solis at the UTSA Main Art Gallery at the University of Texas at San Antonio. June 7 â&#x20AC;&#x201C; August 4, 2017. Curated by Alana Coates Contributors: Alexandra Alvarez, Andy Campbell, Alana Coates, David Rubin, Dr. Scott Sherer Edited by Dr. Scott Sherer Designer: Casie Lomeli Photographers: Peter Saul Artworks: Ansen Seale John Hernandez artworks: David Wharton, Juan Vallejo and Ansen Seale Megan Solis artworks: Luis M. Garza Louie Chavez artworks: Alejandro Augustine Padilla and Juan Vallejo ÂŠ 2017 copyright

TABLE OF CONTENTS Director’s Foreword: Disruptive Fantasies by Dr. Scott Sherer.........................................................................................................................................4 Preface by Alana Coates........................................................................................................................................................................................................................7 Curatorial Concept..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................8 Munstor by John Hernandez................................................................................................................................................................................................................9 The Hot Colors of Rebellion by Alana Coates...........................................................................................................................................................................10 Not so Happy by Andy Campbell.....................................................................................................................................................................................................20 Megan Solis: Finding Freedom Through Art by David S. Rubin.......................................................................................................................................24 Louie Chavez: How the Internet is Running Our Lives by David S. Rubin...................................................................................................................26 The Process of Making a Memory Monster: A Visit to John Hernandez’s Studio by Alexandra Alvarez....................................................28 Q & A with Peter Saul.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................32 Daydreams and Other Monsters: Gallery of Images...........................................................................................................................................................34 Artist CVs.....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................61

Directorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Foreword

DISRUPTIVE FANTASIES by Dr. Scott Sherer

Nowadays, no matter how well schedules are structured, the insistence of digital communications threatens

at the borders. Turning off cell phones and disconnecting from the internet are temporary adjustments to the persistent desire for connections with others. Many of us type e-mails and send them in such haste that we do not pause for the few moments that would catch typos and poor grammar. It has become second nature to expect near immediate delivery of our private thoughts and to expect direct response from others. In curating Daydreams and Other Monsters, Alana Coates draws attention to the ways in which artists gain inspiration from more traditional forms of engagement, such as through developing personal relationships with other artists and critics and their work as well as through technological filters that enable the fast access to ideas that in turn come to linger and generate new work and new conversations. Over the last few years, Coates has been fascinated with the puzzle of connections that link Peter Saul, John Hernandez, Louie Chavez, and Megan Solis. At one pole, Saulâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s riotous reputation spans five decades; while at the other, Solis has only been exhibiting in the twenty-teens, with Hernandez and Chavez beginning their impressive careers in the long range between. Saulâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s surreal visions of contemporary life, historical figures, and iconic imagery in the history of art are disorderly and disturbing works, with content that refuses to be contained within any parameters of normative figuration and narrative. Ethel Rosenberg in Electric Chair (1987) depicts a woman strapped down to a wooden structure with flames shooting from her head and her body glowing red under a fur coat that suggests that nothing could protect her from the heat of the Red Scare that claimed her life and that of her husband. Legal Abortion (1990) depicts disembodied hands holding hammers that pound two heaps of guts that suggest a rude depiction of female breasts that are themselves somewhat reminiscent of Jell-O molds. This violence appears to grow from the side of a malformed head, painted in vomit-green. Tears fall from the face, and the viewer leaves with the base nausea, that can only be non-partisan, that human bodies may be served as political fare. Hernandez produces works in which a broad array of seemingly recognizable forms refuse to be fixed. In both painting and sculpture, Hernandez seduces his viewers with the delight of vibrant color and potential representations gone awry. Bird Brain (1984) features two winged creatures, one bright blue and the other bright green. As they fly toward each other, they suggest the paradoxes of danger that live within innocent imagination. In sculptures constructed with found objects, Hernandez creates small fantastical islands. Whirly Bird (2014) seems to imply a figure (perhaps an artist) offering gifts to an unseen recipient. Easy Rider (2002) positions a skeletal figure riding a motorcycle with a distended counterpart on the handlebars, 4

floating upon a cloud-like form. On a shaped wood panel, Eye Salute (2000) emphasizes the gaze of two enormous eyes and gesturing arms that look toward unknown directions. Chavez directs his energies to themes in contemporary culture that become nightmares in individual and collective consciousness. He often references themes that circulate in popular culture, and he has become especially interested in memes that circulate on the internet. Like their viral cousins, Chavez’s images and text are variably tethered and unmoored from any particular location. Lone Lyfe (2017) suggests a figure in panic that is dissolving into a lurid pink materiality while the monitor of a personal computer glows in the background. Swipe (2017) harnesses the energy of wide-open eyes, the human brain, and the muscles of Rosie the Riveter to confront the digital world. Funk y’all (2017) uses the style of graphic novels to suggest the power of the individual—in this case the magnificent singer Beyoncé—to engage challenge with the force of personal conviction. Solis creates figures that seem to be stand-ins for the rest of us. The slumped form in Break down at Jo Ann’s fabric store (2017) prompts uncomfortable identification where the cartoon-like form forces a central paradox of humor where empathy meets disdain. In He cried when he burnt the rug, I cried when I had to get Obamacare (2017), twinned forms, while playful in their simplicity, call out for release from the space that confines them. Solis opens a suggestive field of narrative possibility in the context of the dubious value in fetishized commodities in The ring, the bling and the acrylics are from CVS (2017). In a range of videos such as He is my future (2017), Solis instills the fragility of the self that may persist, withstanding the pressures of both outside forces and private dreams. In making her selections for Daydreams and Other Monsters, Coates introduces or re-introduces her audiences to artists who each welcome viewers to unique environments that nevertheless also live within contemporary contexts. This exhibition is profoundly daring as it leaves behind the comfort of representational imagery for the challenge of the fantastic. I am especially pleased to welcome Alana back to UTSA. In the years since she earned her MA in Art History, Alana has been successful in a range of professional positions in the arts. With her critical instincts and laudable dedication, more great projects are surely to come. I would like to thank Greg Elliott, Department Chair, Laura Crist, Gallery Coordinator, Vikky Jones, Graphic Designer, and John Hooper, Exhibits Fabricator for their consistent work toward maintaining the UTSA Art Gallery’s successful track record of service to our communities.

Scott A. Sherer, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Art History and Criticism, and Director, UTSA Art Gallery and Terminal 136 Coordinator, UTSA Museum Studies Minor

Megan Solis, The ring, the bling and the acrylics are from CVS, 2017

PREFACE While working on a project documenting one of Louie Chavez’s public murals, I asked him which local

artists inspired him the most. He said, “John Hernandez and Megan Solis.” At the time, I was not familiar with either one of them. Nor did I know that I would be embarking on such an adventure with all three of them a few years down the line. I discovered some animation works by Megan Solis on Facebook, in which she incorporated a painting by Chavez. I realized that between the three of them—Chavez, Hernandez, and Solis—they possessed a dynamic energy. I then approached Chavez with the idea for the show and he introduced me to the others. When I met Hernandez, I asked him whom he admired artistically. He said, “Peter Saul,” and he informed me of Saul’s connection to San Antonio. As an independent-curator, I would have never thought that I would get the opportunity to curate an exhibition that included Saul’s artworks. His works are in major collections such as, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art, New York—and he is currently represented by the prestigious Mary Boone Gallery. One day, while perusing a fantastic retrospective catalogue of Saul’s work, I discovered a local collector, Joe Diaz, owned a number of his works. That day, the daydream became the monster of the exhibition that will be nearly two years in the making once it opens to the public. I am especially grateful to Joe Diaz, whose commanding understanding of contemporary art has been influential nationwide. An avid collector, Diaz has demonstrated his true heart for the arts and artists themselves, lending private works for public enjoyment. Without his help, knowledge, generosity and time, I would have never been able to explore the curatorial thread presented in this exhibition. I would also like to acknowledge the kindness of Georgina in this undertaking and dedicate this catalogue to Zoe Allegra Diaz. I am honored to return to my alma mater to curate an exhibition and I am grateful to Dr. Scott Sherer, Director of the University of Texas at San Antonio Art Gallery, for enabling me to carry out my vision within the UTSA Gallery walls. Additionally, I am thankful for all of the donors who aided in the making of this catalogue: Patricia Goltzman, Paul Martin, Stephen & Barbara Mattson, Bruce and Carol Heylmun, Frances Solis, Manuel Diz and anonymous donors. I am also grateful to the writers who contributed to the project: Andy Campbell, Alexandra Alvarez, David Rubin, Dr. Scott Sherer. Of course, this exhibition would not be possible without the artists—with gratitude to all! 7

the Curatorial Concept behind

DAYDREAMS AND OTHER MONSTERS by Alana Coates

Peter Saul is an internationally acclaimed artist who rose to fame with a strong counterculture aesthetic and

a wild politically-incorrect figurative practice. Although, Saul is typically associated with the Hairy Who & the Chicago Imagists, he never actually lived in Chicago and had only frequently exhibited there. Although Saul lived in Texas for nearly two decades while teaching a The University of Texas from 1981-2000, he is not often associated with the state. During this period, the artist exhibited his work at the Martin-Rathburn Gallery in San Antonio, which operated in the Blue Star Complex in the 1990s. In addition, Saul had a solo exhibition at Artpace in 1997, featuring his works from the 1960s -1990s. Through connections with the city, Saul has greatly influenced San Antonio artists. Now in his eighties and currently residing in New York, Saul has managed to inspire generations of artists both in San Antonio and around the world. John Hernandez, a San Antonio native, was one local artist who came in contact with Saul’s work when it was exhibited in San Antonio. Thrilled with seeing Saul’s paintings, Hernandez connected Saul’s style to his own, clearly sharing a preference for lurid colors and eccentric, sometimes outlandish, subjects. Younger artists today are still enthralled with Saul’s practice, including Megan Solis and Louie Chavez, two emerging artists who also run against the grain. United with a contrarian aesthetic, this exhibit brings together four intergenerational artists Megan Solis (b.1990), Louie Chavez (b.1979), John A. Hernandez (b.1952), and Peter Saul (b.1934) to explore artistic inspirations within similar sensibilities, specifically with an appreciation of ‘lowbrow’ imagery, critiques of popular culture, and conflicts with self that are presented with brash colors and the unexpected.

MUNSTOR by John Hernandez, c. 1980s

“Let me build you a creature with large eyes, the kind that roll out when it sneezes and with a scar that runs snot down its cheeks and even a short razor cut. The creature stands and it never sits – hunched shoulders green and red and blue and pink with large pimple sores that course over down its back spelling the word ugly – giggling the monster creates itself with flower withered eyes – with long undulating fingers – each cut each rotting out for a quarter or a dime – the future zombizoid confronts its existence with its sagging vein encrusted gestures of a damp rag. Car exhaust powder from its slit for a mouth and for a month it evolves more evermore into a horror show of ugliness ugly. ”

THE HOT COLORS OF REBELLION

onstrates himself as a history painter in Ethel Rosenberg in Electric Chair. In 1953, Ethel Rosenberg and her husband Julius were executed in New York for charges of espionage for the Soviet Union. One might guess that the fact that the state of Texas has sentenced more people to death than any other in the nation, influenced his topic of choice, but Saul expressed interest in executions prior to creating this piece.

by Alana Coates

Regarding Ethel Rosenberg in Electric Chair, Saul states, “Maybe she was guilty, maybe she wasn’t, but certainly in those days, most Americans felt the Russians weren’t smart enough to have built the atom here is a common denominator found in the work bomb by themselves and must have stolen the knowlof Peter Saul, John Hernandez, Louie Chavez, and edge from someone…probably us.” Ironically, Saul Megan Solis—a sense of rebellion and non-confor- blends the once highest-esteemed genre of painting mity, along with an enthusiasm for a heavy dose of styles, the history painting, with a madcap Garbage color. This group of new age fauvists or “wild beasts,” Pail Kids aesthetic. 1 deliver a diverse bag of sensory reactions to accompany each zing visually served.

Saul, Hernandez, Chavez, and Solis have no concern for social graces. They spill out whatever their minds contain onto their matrix of choice without consideration of softening things for the viewer. However, some grave topics are diverted for the heavy-hearted with the incorporation of childlike attributes, a sense of whimsy, and at times the surreal. In this exhibition, Saul’s work delves into politically sensitive topics specifically for Texas—such as capital punishment, legalized abortion, and on the lighter side, the presumably mundane faculty meetings at the University of Texas in Austin, where he used to teach. Social fumbles and sexual misconduct fill the latter. Doodles and fully formed caricatures of colleagues are found in exacerbated situations, running amok in the picture plane with phallic faces Garbage Pail Kids, Adam Bomb, Courtesy of the Topps Company, Inc. and oozing extremities. Front and center in Faculty Meetings, slouches a one-eyed drooling man dressed in a green suit. He drags his arms alongside himself Compare GPK’s Adam Bomb to Ethel Rosenberg in like an orangutan with a speech bubble that reads, Electric Chair and one might find the images are not only similar for the fiery irruption extruding from “Wanna feel ‘em”—a sure way to jeopardize tenure. Ethel and Adam’s heads, but also in the extraneous Borrowing subject from a real narrative, Saul dem- cartoon treatment of death by inhuman methods. 10

Art historian Judith Stein mentions Legal Abortion in her review of Saul’s retrospective at the Orange County Museum of Art. “Saul studs the landscape of her gray matter with other tacks labeled MEN, MARRIAGE, TASTEY (sic) VEGETABLES, CLEAN BATHROOMS, MONEY, and LOVE. Saul, Hernandez, Chavez, and Solis In apparent response to Freud’s famously unanswerable question, ‘What do women want?’ Saul created have no concern for social graces. an unflattering diagram of female desire. Sexist? Oh, They spill out whatever their minds yes. Funny? That also.”2 Surely, Sigmund Freud, the contain onto their matrix of choice psychoanalyst who wrote extensively about topics without consideration of softening such as Penis Envy, the Oedipal complex, and about things for the viewer. the women’s psyche beings controlled largely by their sexual reproductive functions, would recognize In Texas, a strongly conservative state, Roe v. Wade Saul’s map of the female brain with MEN and MARis under constant attack by legislators wishing to re- RIAGE being front and center. write the law. In Legal Abortion, Saul exposes the brain of a woman contemplating abortion. Her facial features contort as both eyes shift to her right ear and her quivering lips reach her nose. Her eyes are bloodshot from tears as hands protrude from the side of her head hammering ideas into her cranium. A large splat of blood surrounds the hammer strike over the nail labeled LEGAL ABORTION—presumably the decision is made to terminate the child, as the nail is deeply driven into the frontal lobe, the part of the Peter Saul, detail of Faculty Meeting brain said to control judgment, planning, and problem solving. She is either green with grief and sick- Saul’s oeuvre never demonstrates politically-correct ness or made to reflect the attributes of a monster. commentary. Besides sexism, many works may Since Saul does not tend to lean towards sympathy, read as potentially racist as black bodies are often we might assume the latter, but it could also contain portrayed in demeaning fashions and often as drug users. However, some call Saul a great moralist. Art elements of both. historian, Anne Tronche states, “the flagrant obscenity of his works does nothing but expose the flaming hypocrisy of a world concerned with masking its own indecency.” As a moralist-painter Saul uses “the grotesque to pictorially mimic the disorientation, the woes and the disturbances of a dissolute world oscillating between intoxication and destruction.”3 Both seem to be rendered as characters suitable for children’s amusement. Although the artist was familiar with the Garbage Pail Kids, Saul says he was most fond of a comic strip called Trailer Trash, published in Austin, Texas.

Saul himself has said that he wishes to portray the reality of American culture: “to make it real, I’ve put it thru (sic) the wringer…shown it in a disgusting light.” Furthermore, he cites José Clemente Orozco as one of his artistic heroes. Orozco was indeed the most critical of the Mexican muralists, openly criti-

Peter Saul, detail of Legal Abortion

cizing the clergy, Mexican history, and the government in his paintings. “I feel close to Orozco and I’d like to do for my country what he’s done for his…if that isn’t too immodest. Making the way of life intensely real, using specifics—not too general but insisting on big meanings, that is social meaning which seems to me now very important.”4

sion of herself. Chavez explains the image was taken from an internet meme, Beyoncé Derp, that circulated after a few unflattering moments were caught on camera of the beloved singer at her 2013 Super Bowl performance. BuzzFeed published “The 33 Fiercest Moments from Beyoncé’s Halftime Show,” in which the pop star was boasted for her fierceness and concluded it being the “year of Bey,” because after all, “she runs the world.”6 The online trouble started when Beyoncé’s publicist requested that BuzzFeed remove the unflattering photos, in which Buzzfeed responded by highlighting those exact images and created a post titled, “The ‘Unflattering’ Photos Beyoncé’s publicist Doesn’t Want You to See.”7 This action spun a slew of counteractions of bad Beyoncé memes all over the internet, including the image Chavez appropriated. Chavez positions himself as a commentator on today’s internet culture in which, “trolling and hate posting are rampant,” and he sympathizes with Beyoncé as a victim of provocative posts aimed at angering and poking fun. Perhaps Chavez is attempting to bestow her with due respect. Centered in a spiked Bubblicious-Grape colored mandorla, the radiating Beyoncé figure is reminiscent of a Virgin of Guadalupe, similarly encased in Chavez’s 2011 La Muerte no es el Fin mural.

An example of this is the only print from Saul in the exhibition titled, SHICAGO JUSTUS (Chicago Justice). Created in 1971, this work was included in the collection CONSPIRACY: The Artist as Witness, published by the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York to raise money for the legal defense of a native-born Texan, Bobby Seale. Seale, co-founder of the Black Panther Party, was arrested along with others who became known as the Chicago Seven while protesting at the Democratic National Convention. Saul respected Seale, yet the artist rendered him as a phallic figure. Regarding this contradiction, Saul states, “There is no good reason or even any reason at all, why Bobby Seale was depicted as a phalliclooking figure. It simply occurred to me as a way to activate the subject in an unexpected way…to have some impact.”5 The bluntest of the group, Saul and Chavez are outright offensive at times. While Saul’s transgressive gaze surveys a broad landscape, Chavez has long concentrated on the objectification of women in his paintings and tends to fit them into one of two categories: objects of sexual desire and/or beasts. Both artists’ visual approach and elements of misogyny are consistent in their oeuvres and neither apologize. Chavez follows in the footsteps of Saul’s social criticism, but from a generational viewpoint immersed in technology. Chavez focuses on imagery from the internet, largely with a pop-culture focus, and scrutinizes how far removed the pictures get from their original context. He questions how technologies alter society’s traditional social fabric with new forms of computer induced interactions.

Louie Chavez, La Muerte no es el Fin, 2011 Courtesy of the Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, TX

In Funk y’all, American Pop-Star Beyoncé Knowles is depicted as a kneeling and overly-muscular ver12

Louie Chavez, Funk Yâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;all, 2017

The juxtaposition of Beyoncé with the creature from the science-fiction film classic Alien is also a hot-mess for interpretation. The backdrop contains machinery and control panels from the movie’s spaceship interior. Ripley, Sigourney Weaver’s character in the film (viewed as an action hero, although conflictingly so) is replaced with Beyoncé in her black leather and lace bodysuit from the halftime performance, which could also be appropriate for superhero adornment.

to connect the lones feelings to a barren wasteland of isolation. 11 The lone duck is addicted to the empty highs and dopamine rushes caused by “likes” and other forms of online social approval from his “friends.” He may also lack the charm and social graces needed to approach others in the real world, but has the courage to approach them online by using his highly-curated internet persona. Hence his fears, insecurities, and ill intentions keep him in complete social detachment, unable to attain true relationships—the pursuit of happiness befuddled in a digitally induced haze.

The adjacent alien approaches, as a manifestation of Beyoncé’s anger over the online photos says Chavez. However, in analysis of the film, others refer to the alien figure as “the mother’s phallus” and/or a “toothed vagina,” and even as “the monstrous feminine as a cannibalistic mother.”8 The subjective symbolism in Chavez’s Funk y’all might be interpreted as empowerment by some and as a fear of fierce females by others. Though social media highlighted her publicist’s fumble, we can imagine Beyoncé as the sole survivor of such an extraterrestrial attack, and she was probably more concerned with moving on to her next powerhouse production; “I got hot sauce in my bag, swag.” 9 Chavez has centered this entire series on the negative effects our true-life social interactions endure due to the rising popularity of relationships built with computer applications. Studies show that people who spend too much time on social platforms such as Facebook, may cause feelings of inadequacy and envy since many people use such arenas to highlight the positive elements and successes in their lives. In addition, frequency of social platforms can lead to an overall diminished sense of belonging.10

Louie Chavez, Night Fish, 2017

Online voyeurism is the focus of Night Fish. In this painting by Chavez, the Facebook creeper is diminished to a googly-eyed squid-like monster, although more in a playful Disney under-the-sea fashion than as a demonizing character. The sexy smoking female Lone Lyfe depicts the feelings of isolation such tech- figure has been duplicated and enlarged in scale, exnologies may cause. The dazed and confused duck pressing the all-consuming nature of her allure. The represents the delusions that may accompany soli- imaginary Facebook status reads “you awake?” but tude and stalking. Lones are machismo characters, within the status bar, rather than in a private message proud of remaining single, and they often prey on to this figment of desire. Due to the text’s placement, females for entertainment. This figure has the glare ultimately this reads as a sad (or vulgar) call out, imof the monitors still in his eyes, as his late-night plying “anyone awake?” searches for new targets has made his senses a blur. A line pattern mimicking nerve endings is found in While Chavez and Saul lean towards inappropriatethe background, and Chavez states that this is meant ness with their forms, it is Solis who is the great agi14

tator of the senses. The most likely one of this group to use untraditional materials, each item is carefully chosen and arranged—not found. Her soft-sculptural reliefs can be called assemblages of intimacy—symbolically and literally at times—for their incorporation of personal items of clothing.

you” and “I could die,” successfully transfer the anxiety of the artist to the observer. The screen flips its orientation a number of times and disorients the viewer—any longer and the viewer would surely be in a trance. Although, the onlooker’s first response may be that of agitation, one can also experience sadness and pity for the central figure found in the work. She has an uncomfortable level of girly-ness and looks pathetically alone in her digital environment. Her cavernous mouth echoes the lyrics of emptiness, longing, and a bit of psychotic obsession with someone apparently unattainable. None of her attempts at drawing air hearts, blowing kisses, and hip swings in her short skirt followed by frantic hand-waves, are able to allure her object of affection.

In her sound pieces, Love song lullaby 2 & 3, the artist recites poems backwards, resonating in the disenchantment and unavailability of the titles soothing promises. Solis states that the works are about the struggles of being innately flawed humans. Many of us create avenues of escapism, but can never be completely divorced from reality. The hypocritical lullaby does not bring true love, joy, or tranquility. The artist whistles so the listener can drift and escape into a fantasy land, where melancholic trances, delusions, In contrast to the debilitating nature of He is my fuand the whimsical meet the caustic. ture, Family Dollar Emotion is an audacious, loopedHe is my future is another great example of her abra- digital drawing made from a tablet, in which Solis siveness. This short video is made with a traditional contrasts innocence and naivety with the harsh realself-portrait inserted into Motion Portrait (an app ity of the online world and hook-up culture of conthat can transform images into a three-dimensional temporary society. In a very simplified rendition of avatar figure.) Solis samples lyrics from the 1958, emotions, the overly happy cartoon girl flips to an all “All I Have to Do is Dream” by the Everly Brothers. text screen that reads, “Excuse me fuckboy, r u busy The close harmony singing of the duo is replaced or wut.” Representing a girl who is, although dissatiswith an eerie and unsettling discord of select chorus fied with the current date culture the millennial genlines from the original song delivered with a tam- eration finds themselves in, this character is at least pered version of Solis’ voice. The viewer encounters cognizant of it. In contrast to the sad figure found in a chafed pale-skinned figure with an uneven bald- He is my future, she at least knows how to play the scalp and a fixed gapping mouth. The pitch, along game. with select repetition of lyrics such as, “and I want

Megan Solis, still of He is my future, 2017

Megan Solis, still of Family Dollar Emotion, 2017

Family Dollar Emotion is a satire on “dating culture” today and the communications spun from a world of Tindering and “dick pics.” The figure in Family Dollar Emotion directly mocks that of He is my future, in which the very title alludes to the character’s existence hanging on the acceptance of the man she desires—her future depends on it.

partner in the production, Brandon Pittman. Sinister elements form a dreamlike trance, while Solis as the red-figure plucks the stuffing content from a plush toy. After overhearing a toxic argument, the film flashes back to the beach covered in a misty fog, making the viewer assume it is a troubled memory from the past. The red figure rakes a swirl insignia in the sand before she drifts into the ocean.

Other aspects of popular culture creep into Solis’ work at a subconscious level rather than direct appropriation. Her film Wake and Easy Bake Oven, reflects the dark-humor in the animated British internet sensation Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared, a short segment series that critiques children’s television shows by narrating a broadcast seemingly for youth that abruptly becomes off-kilter and inappropriate for young viewers. The title of Solis’ film alludes to a ridicule of the Easy-Bake Oven, a popular functional toy oven for kids and marijuana culture.

This swirl is seen again in Solis’ Something bad is going to happen: Introduction to Charlie, another example of subconscious attributes to popular culture. The cardboard cutout of a bald yellow cartoon child, Charlie—Solis’ alter ego—has a swirl on his forehead and shares similar characteristics to that of Salad Fingers, a British flash animation series that was popular in the early 2000s. Though both have a slouched, unorthodox demeanor and a three-limbed arm structure, Charlie seems to be a more youthful and innocent figure. Like Solis, John Hernandez does not deliver pleasantries on a platter. Under his use of garish paints and rad toon-style figures, some darker contemplations can also be found. Many times, Hernandez employs familiar cartoons in his arrangements; other times, he creates monsters and creatures of pure imagination that echo his love of collage, assemblage, and complexity. Hernandez, a master of layers, makes this evident in his wooden works, toys, and even his 3-D rendered prints.

Megan Solis, still of Wake and Easy Bake Oven, 2017

The sounds of “gurgle, slurp, pop” open the film with Dreams, monsters, and devil-may-care the image of a child-like logo but also hint to a darker undertone immediately. Flashing to a beach scene attitudes unite the group in a contrarwith shadows of the artist walking hunched-over ian aesthetic. Full of jaded joviality and caught by the camera’s pan, mimics the overarching liberated with laughter, Saul, Chavez, themes in the film of repression and avoidance. The Solis, and Hernandez are all great anwaves ground the viewer in reality, while the other archists with a keen ability to provoke brightly colored props hint to a land of pretend. Solis and unnerve. appears dressed in a red head-to-toe costume with two antennae-pig-tails on top her head, reminiscent of some kind of Dr. Seuss character. Within the inte- Unlike the insolence of Saul, Chavez, and even Sorior room, she tosses a red rope with clanging objects lis at times, Hernandez keeps the viewer largely in a time-warp of a protected innocence. He does not similar to how a priest swings his thurible. attack viewers with nausea and ugliness; he saturates The overlapping reverie is produced by her musical them with color, creatures and oddities—he is a mas16

ter of arttoons. Eye Salute, Anvil Supreme, and Jerry’s Kids, are all examples of eye-popping fantasy creatures. Such classic renderings of eye-popping toons are Hernandez’s specialty, a pictorial concept that has been around as long as animations have been. They typically express shock, desire, or bestow general monster attributes.

Dreams, monsters, and devil-may-care attitudes unite the group in a contrarian aesthetic. Full of jaded joviality and liberated with laughter, Saul, Chavez, Solis, and Hernandez are all great anarchists with a keen ability to provoke and unnerve. They love to reject convention and center their practice off-canon, dancing to the beat off their own visual drums. Creatures and other figures appear in a nonformulaic manner full of absurdist qualities, spitfire, and rebellion sugar-coated with lurid color. Each artist employs dark humor, caustic at times, to critique contemporary society and to challenge their viewers while remaining ambivalent in their personal politics.

John Hernandez, Bird Brain, 1984

In Bird Brain, two birds flying above the gallery exhibition space crash their beaks in the corner of the wall. Another example, Itty Bang Bang is a conglomerate of glittery ice cream cone and old-fashioned McDonald’s happy meal toys riding on a bicycle. Hernandez’s offbeat figures and bright colors turn reality into an amusement park, freeing us from the classical ideals of beauty and refinement. He is excessive and decadent in every detail, as the candy-flamboyance of his toys attest. This is not to say his works are not without heavier commentary. In his small sculpture made of found objects, Charlie, Hernandez is giving homage to cartoonists who met a tragic fate. Charlie refers to the French satirical periodical Charlie Hebdo. In 2015, a number of prominent artists were killed over satirical cartoons the weekly newspaper published of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. The phrase, “I am Charlie” became a popular among supporters of freedom of expression and free speech after the attack. In Hernandez’s sculpture, we see the coy artist with a tilted ball cap hold up a pencil in one hand and a cartoon in the other. 17

John Hernandez creating Octopus Garden Photo by Juan Vallejo

NOTES 1

Email communication with Peter Saul, May 25, 2017.

Judith Stein, “Peter Saul: A Retrospective” Exhibition Review on College Art Association April 29, 2009 http://www.caareviews.org/reviews/1248#.WPOhjFPyvq0 2

3 Anne Tronche “Peter Saul, inventor” in Peter Saul, (Paris: Somogy, 2006), 54.

David McCarthy, “Defending Allusion: Peter Saul on the Aesthetics of Rhetoric,” Archives of American Art Journal Vol 46, No. 3-4 (2007): 51. 4

Email communication with Peter Saul, May 25, 2017.

Lauren Yapalater “The 33 Fiercest Moments from Beyoncé’s Halftime Show” BuzzFeed February 4, 2013. https://www. buzzfeed.com/lyapalater/the-fiercest-moments-from-beyonces-halftime-show?utm_term=.nx6JqXAKk#.py1G3OEDj 6

7 “The ‘Unflattering’ Photos Beyoncé’s Publicist Doesn’t Want You to See” BuzzFeed February 5, 2013. https://www.buzzfeed. com/buzzfeedceleb/the-unflattering-photos-beyonces-publicist-doesnt-want-you-t?utm_term=.haDQVYXAq#.xr4zQ7lpq 8 Barbara Creed “Alien and the Monstrous-Feminine” in Alien Zone: Cultural Theory and Contemporary Science Fiction Cinema (London: Verso, 1990), 140. 9 Lyrics from Formation in the Lemonade album – a nod to southern roots and a brand of baseball bat she uses to smash up cars in Hold up. 10 Lindsay Dodgson, “Spending More Than 2 Hours on Social Media Per Day Could Make Your Feel Isolated” Independent March 8, 2017. http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/spending-more-than-2-hours-on-social-mediaper-day-could-make-you-feel-isolated-a7618701.html

Urban Dictionary: Lones: One who hunts at nightfall, usually for young, innocent virgins. http://www.urbandictionary. com/define.php?term=Lone 11

NOT SO HAPPY by Andy Campbell

In her treatise on happiness, feminist cultural theorist Sara Ahmed writes, “Happiness

shapes what coheres as a world.” 1 Ahmed’s work demonstrates that the cultural imperative towards happiness, more specifically for people to be and remain happy, has broad implications for what or who is listened to, and what is considered an acceptable way to be in the world. Basing her analysis on common figurations such as the “melancholic migrant” and the “feminist killjoy,” one of Ahmed’s many insights is that happiness is an affordance of privilege, attached to legacies of imperialism and conquest, rather than an ideal state of grace. To put this another way: normal people are happy, and those who fall outside of normativity’s bounds… well… . Striking out against facile calls to paper-over more unruly affects (depression, anger, disappointment, pain), and in coordination with critiques issuing forth from the quadrants of critical race, feminist, and queer theories, Ahmed’s resituating of the terms of happiness can be correlated directly to Megan Solis’s recent sculptural and performance-based work. In a phone call Solis refers to the “obnoxious happiness,” of her sculptures, and the “dull, underlying pain” that subtends them.2 Across Solis’s sculptures, videos, and performances the nominally happy subject is taken to task via all the “stuff ” that would otherwise indicate a life of cheer—stuffed animals, glitter, and birthday cake. Mushing these materials together has the strange effect of negating any positive affective charge that the materials might otherwise carry. A good example of this is the domestic scene presented in the soft, wall-based sculpture, He cried when he burnt the rug, I cried when I had to get Obamacare, 2017. In it two green felt faces, one happy, one surprised, rest next to one another as though lying in bed. The happier of the faces is surrounded by an American flag tank top, a silk nightgown and a phallic-like protuberance to which a single, quixotic false eyelash is attached. The other face is encircled by a blond wig, a zebra-print bathing suit, a green hair ribbon, and a paper birthday hat common to children’s parties. Above this second figure is pinned a small magenta ribbon reading “Birthday Girl!” The toggle between celebration and destruction is indicated in both

Megan Solis, Still from Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, 2017

the title and Solis’s prodigious use of found materials—which poorly upholster the sculpture’s substrate in a method that can only be called patchwork. As a whole, the sculpture pushes notions of aesthetic acceptability, an in-your-face assemblage of constituent parts that never fully cohere. How the figures are crying (out of guilt? Sorrow? Anxiety? Happiness?) is left unanswered; Instead, the confessional language of the sculpture’s title—the only clue given as to the narrative content—pits transgression and destruction against the (now or soon-to-be repealed) national imperative to be and remain well.

turns it into the backdrop for a scene of violence (a “gutted stuffed duck”), chintzily decorated with lipstick-kissed toilet paper. In the middle of the floral squares of the afghan, Solis has gathered bundles of Q-Tips, evoking stamens—the part of the flower that produces pollen. In this way Solis reformats quotidian materials that might touch a body to hilarious effect.

Citing artistic influence from Peter Saul (also included in this exhibition), Mike Kelley, and The Hairy Who (a group of Chicago Imagists), and graphic novels such as Jamie Hewlett and Alan Martin’s Tank Solis has built an archive of depresGirl and Daniel Clowes’s Ghost World, Solis has built sion and angst that she pitches against an archive of depression and angst that she pitches overzealous applications of color, against overzealous applications of color, geometry, and material. Solis’ sculptures are over-gendered, geometry, and material. meaning they are over-determined by the assembled materials that make them up. In 4th Grade Baskin A strong materials-based humor pervades these as- Robbin’s Ice Cream Cake, 2017, a headless soft figsemblages. The list of materials of The ring, the bling ure wearing a blue skirt is crucified against a Disand the acrylics are from CVS, 2017, are typically ney princess fabric background. The figure wears a evocative: saran wrap, fabric, gutted stuffed duck, crop-top that reads “TOMBOY”, and yet, counter to pantyhose, lipstick, toilet paper, sock, pipe cleaner, its linguistic message, pastel pasties issue out from cotton, acrylic, and torn afghan. Robbing the afghan this shirt. Confounding the sense of how a tomboy blanket of associations with warmth and care, Solis should dress (being the term for the anti-normative

Megan Solis, Charlie, Self Portrait!, 2017

expression of female masculinity in an ostensibly female-bodied child), these pasties intentionally confuse adult and child, producing a sense of unease, and even provocation. At the top right of 4th Grade… the as-of-yet only black Disney princess, Tiana from 2009’s Princess and the Frog, appears, in what is the visual equivalent of a linguistic quip, handily illustrating how young bodies are raced and classed, in addition to gendered.

whispering and other high-pitch/low-volume sounds such as crinkling paper or tapping nails. In these states the affect of happiness is accessed via processes external to a subject (running counter to the self-help movement which advocates that happiness comes from within). In the suite of Solis’s three video/performances, Charlie crushes up and snorts over-the-counter drugs, ingests/digests the written dreams of others, and eventually buries them in the ground. Happiness is proposed in these works as an ultimately cosmetic, and superficial, ontology.

Some of the works on display in this exhibition are made in relation to one of Solis’s alter-egos, Charlie, a small-breasted, multi-armed sad-sack on rollerblades. Charlie’s too-muchness, evidenced by his penchant for titling his child-like drawings and collages with exclamation points (Freedom to Express!, Self Portrait!, and I Love, Love!), is an important analogue to the strategies of making deployed by Solis in her non-persona work. Although Charlie appears sad, unstable, and dizzy, in his construction paper self-portrait he is joyous and smiling. This is a mirror of Solis’s objects, which on the outside appear funny and jubilant, but upon deeper reflection evince bad and difficult feelings. Through Charlie, Solis is able to explore alternative states of being, from drug-induced highs, to nighttime dreaming, and ASMR activation (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response), in which low-grade euphoria is produced via

Megan Solis, still from Wake and Easy-Bake Oven, 2017

In the end, Solis’s work does what happiness, despite all its claims, fails to do for those who are pushed to the margins—it coheres a world by making room for the incoherent, the messy, and the overdetermined. There’s even room left for birthday cake. NOTES Sara Ahmed, The Promise of Happiness (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2010): 2.

Conversation with artist, March, 12, 2017.

MEGAN SOLIS: FINDING FREEDOM THROUGH ART

printed on her clothing is anything but happy as she is shown headless and with pimpled legs, holding on to a princess quilt decorated with Disney characters, yet looking like she might lose her grasp at any moment and slip away. A mutilated birthday girl also appears in the latter work, accompanied by emojilike faces that emote different responses to coping with the ordeals of early adulthood which, for Solis, have involved enrolling in a healthcare plan for the first time and overcoming obstacles faced by young emerging women artists.

by David S. Rubin

Working in a variety of mediums, Megan Solis

creates imaginary situations in which suggested narratives raise questions about the pursuit of happiness. Inspired by many of her personal experiences that have involved low self-esteem and self-deprecation, Solis’ narratives often point to the futility of going after dreams that are unrealistic or unattainable. In several of her recent works, these ideas are explored through the activities of a cartoonish character known as Charlie, who functions as the artist’s androgynous alter ego, and dares to tread waters that the more timid Solis would never venture into.

To convey a sense of hopelessness in her assemblages and sculptures, Solis uses common everyday materials that are associated with the lowbrow aesthetics, punk art and music culture, and the doll sculptures by the late artist Mike Kelley. Stylistically, Solis’ figures are influenced by outsider art, underground Megan Solis, 4th Grade Baskin Robbin’s Ice Cream Cake, 2017 comics, and Chicago’s Hairy Who group, who popularized the use of irreverent comic-book style char- Appearing in sculptural form and also played by Solis acters in their figurative paintings of the 1960s. in three performance videos, the non-binary Charlie is identified by a spiral pattern implanted on its foreIn assemblage works such as 4th Grade Baskin Rob- head. Although this insignia resembles a tattoo or a bins Ice Cream Cake and He cried when he burnt representation of a third eye, Solis considers it simply the rug, I cried when I had to get Obamacare, So- to be something more like a birthmark that identilis examines the pains and struggles associated with fies Charlie as a fantasy figure. In addition to making childhood and the transition into adulthood. In the sculptural representations of her alter-ego, Solis has former, a young birthday girl with ‘TOMBOY’ im24

created paintings presumed to be by Charlie, which are childlike and filled with joyful expressions that the artist is normally reluctant to share. In the videos where Solis channels Charlie by assuming the persona more completely, she finds a new sense of freedom by engaging in irrational or outrageous activities that allow her to explore topics that she might otherwise not address. In Wake and Easy-Bake Oven, for example, Charlie alternately smokes weed and ingests mashed-up over-the-counter drugs, comparative actions that question the moral judgments that underlie why some drugs are legal and others are not. Concurrent with her assemblage and performance work, Solis has been experimenting with digital technology to create animations using such tools as her phone, a 3D rendering app, and sound and video editing programs. Featuring cartoonish figures, one of which is a digitally-distorted self-portrait set to the disjointed sounds of overlapping tracks of Solis singing, these short videos are meant to be unsettling, as they call attention to the depersonalization of human relationships that is a byproduct of a culture where dating has been reduced to the interactions of social media and computer apps.

Megan Solis, Detail of 4th Grade Baskin Robbinâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Ice Cream Cake, 2017

LOUIE CHAVEZ: HOW THE INTERNET IS RUINING OUR LIVES by David S. Rubin

Using a visual language culled mostly from the culture of the Internet, the recent paintings and sculptures

of Louie Chavez pose timely questions about the way digital communications systems have created new modes of social interaction in the 21st century. Although Chavez acknowledges that there are many beneficial aspects to Internet technology, he is nevertheless concerned about its downside, in that the World Wide Web has become a nexus for voyeuristic addictions, impersonal and often hurtful modes of social interactions, and insensitivity towards nature and humanity.

In his current body of work, Chavez draws much of his inspiration from Internet memes—images or ideas that spread virally via social media. One of the more popular memes that appears in Chavez’s paintings is the “Neil deGrasse Tyson Reaction,” a still photo of a famous astrophysicist caught in a defensive gesture, which is often shown accompanied by the phrase “Watch out guys, we’re dealing with a badass over here.” In his painting Meme Beast, Chavez shows the Tyson meme being devoured by machinery, a reference to the controlling and destructive power of digital technology itself. Painted in bold psychedelic colors that echo the luminosity of digitally presented information, the painting’s style also reflects a number of the artist’s influences, which include early 90s album covers, the vernacular of video game culture, and the cartoonish styles of such artists as Philip Guston, Karl Wirsum and Jim Nutt of the Chicago Hairy Who group, and San Antonio’s John Hernandez. Other popular memes that appear in Chavez’s oeuvre include Pepe the Frog, an anthropomorphic frog character from the comic series Boy’s Club by Matt Furie, and Beast Jesus (aka Potato Jesus), an image of a failed restoration of a century-old Spanish devotional fresco by Cecilia Jiménez, an elderly amateur art restorer. Pepe the Frog, who is commonly associated with the alt-right movement, and Beast Jesus, who often appears Photoshopped over the face of a famous portrait, appear together in Chavez’s painting Netflix and Lose, where they take on the roles of laughing witnesses to a failed attempt at “hooking up,” which is implied through the title phrase. In today’s popular texting vernacular, the message “Netflix and chill” is an invitation to watch a movie and have sex, hence “Netflix and lose” implies a failure to score. Similar texting jargon can be found in Chavez’s painting Night Fish, where the phrase “You Awake?”, which means “are you available for a booty call?”, is painted into a Facebook message bar. Other images in the painting include a woman seductively smoking a cigarette, a pair of googly eyes in reference to voyeurism, and sound wave patterns that remind us of the omnipresence of digital messaging, which has become a worldwide, 24/7 phenomenon. 26

Louie Chavez, Installation view Photo by Juan Vallejo

John Hernandez, detail of Octopus Garden Photo by Juan Vallejo

THE PROCESS OF MAKING A MEMORY MONSTER: A VISIT TO JOHN HERNANDEZ’S STUDIO by Alexandra Alvarez

or those of us in America who have not been living in a dark room isolated from the reach of pop culture’s blinding light are familiar with the Beatles’ smash 1967 hit Strawberry Fields Forever. The psychedelic and psychoanalytic anthem is a disorienting experience set to flutes, percussion, and brilliant harmony. In the song, John Lennon asks the listener to allow him to be a spirit guide into a landscape where nothing is real--there are no expectations, and no limitations. Why should the listener embark on a trip that could potentially last forever? Because, in real life we are not experiencing to our full capacity, we have our eyes closed; we are blinded. What most people don’t know is that Strawberry Field was an actual place. Located near Lennon’s childhood home in Liverpool, England, Strawberry Field was a recreational ground and Salvation Army orphanage. By adding an “s” and “Forever”, Lennon transformed his childhood memory into a tangible synesthetic experience for mass consumption. The methodology Lennon used to compose Strawberry Fields Forever is an act of remembrance, followed by distortion and addition. San Antonio-based artist John Hernandez works within Liverpudlian Lennon’s same vein of artistic production. Like Lennon, Hernandez uses imagery from his childhood to make psychedelic and kaleidoscopic works of art. Through a process of collecting, tracing, severing and re-facing, John Hernandez transforms pop culture imagery from cartoons, movies, and Sci- fi into portraiture. The final products serve as meditations on the published iconography of the 20th century that have become buried in the collective consciousness.

Hernandez’s playground was the animated and 24-7 accessible landscapes of American pop-culture. Born in San Antonio in 1952, Hernandez’s preoccupation with pop culture imagery is symptomatic of his experience as a child in the early years of television and high-fructose corn syrup in post World War II hedonistic America. Since adolescence, Hernandez has collected the pop culture memorabilia he has come into contact with. The materials of Hernandez’s memories hang like a swing set in his studio space in west-side San Antonio.

consistent, neat and distinct portfolio. Works such as Easy Rider from 2002 and Whirly Bird 2014 are therefore fundamentally similar despite a twelveyear gap in production. “I collect things and they inspire me to distort something,” Hernandez states. From Allen Aldridge to Peter Saul, Hernandez studies how other creators compose things, and he relates materials and fuses what he learns into works of art. He explains his physical process as the following: he traces forms on acetate paper, places the pieces of paper on a light projector, moves the pieces of paper around to make a collage, uses tape to hold a final composition together, places another acetate paper on top and traces an outline of the composition. Once the final form is assembled, he puts the singular acetate sheet on the overhead projector, projects the image onto the wall, traces the image on butcher paper, cuts out the butcher paper with scissors, breaks up all parts, traces the sectionals of the image on birch plywood, cuts out the outline, assembles all of the pieces of birch plywood together, then lastly paints his sculpture. At times he will outsource his composite designs to a fabricator. He continues, “I make it my own by changing the surface.” Today in 2017, most artists use Photoshop to manipulate images. Editing, collaging and coloring are the tools Hernandez uses for personalizing his borrowed forms. He chooses which parts to show or not show, makes connections to other sources and then paints his permutations bright candy colors.

Taxonomically separated by walls and rooms, Hernandez’s studio, also his former childhood home, houses materials such as: records, books, cartoons, magazines, and dolls. He uses samples from his private collection, which range on subject matter from Yoko Ono and How to Survive in a Disaster to Warner Brothers cartoons and a doll of Uma Thurman from Kill Bill, to create the forms for his artworks. Many of his works are composites of these previously published materials; images from his past form the literal backbone for his portraits.

John Hernandez working on Octopus Garden Photo by Juan Vallejo

Given this specific production technique, Hernandez’s style and practice have remained aesthetically precise since his career began around the time he graduated with an MFA from University of North Texas in 1980. Although they appear to be incredibly chaotic and random, Hernandez’s works are paradoxically incredibly methodological. The result is a 30

Color is a tool that Hernandez uses in both the physical process of personalizing his work and in the psychological processes as well. Stimulating our primal senses, he uses childlike colors that are a part of the psychedelic and candy industry repertoires. Simultaneously, this palette is also a personal ode to the bright colors of Texas. Color is a bright but secondary allegiance to Hernandez’s Mexican American roots when his subjects: cartoons, movie icons and sci-fi characters, are from white-America dominant pop culture. Hernandez also thinks that his bright colors set him apart from other Texan artists, whom he believes work primarily in desert or blush tones. Initially a device for personalization, color is ulti-

mately Hernandez’s technique for attachment and subversion.

works explicitly address his Mexican American background like his usage of the holy icon of the “paleta” in Batcicle. His status as a child of a border city is Every single outline in Hernandez’s work is a cita- evident alongside his status as a Woodstock teen. tion. Dissecting the citations in his work is a schizo- Additionally, his works show academic training in phrenic process that requires knowledge of the sub- his evocation of style and motifs from previous art ject matter he is referencing. However, if silhouettes movements. Like the futurist work Dynamism of a and composites cannot be specified, components of Dog by Giacomo Balla, Hernandez depicts moments his work are traceable. The foundations of his work of movement such as Jerry’s Kids, a the portrait of a are literal objects we have seen or have had the op- fish swimming out of a paint can of worms. He uses portunity to see before. the gluttonous portraiture style of Rococo and Romanticism in Itty Bitty Bang Bang, a statue of a food truck mutant. Explicitly and discretely, his work contains Easter-eggs of Modernist motifs like the reference to Pete Mondrian’s style in the base pattern of Lions Tale. Yet, it is neither style nor theme that give Hernandez his edge. What ultimately distinguishes Hernandez is his unique, highly referential, well-researched yet seemingly juvenile artistic process. To engage with the work of John Hernandez is to enter a space of psychoanalytical recall of pop-culture consumerism. His artworks are like zeitgeist toys he gives us to play with from his treasure chest of memorabilia. Like the messages received under the influence of psychedelic or during a psychoanalytic John Hernandez, Commandostein, 1991 therapy session, his artworks are manifestations of Early on in life we are willingly introduced to car- the subconscious made tangible. You can see them, toons. Cartoons are a space for alternative realities you can remember them, and your stomach can taste in the present. The history of cartoons is not just one the citric acid. of entertainment but also one of violence. Cartoons have been used to illustrate political satire since the Hernandez does not ask the viewer to accompany time of Francisco Goya and have been used to exag- him on any journey nor is he providing new social gerate politicalized stereotypes such as gender, rac- commentary rhetoric. Rather, he uses pop culture ism and class. We see Hernandez reference the tropes imagery to re-create viable emblematic moments. He of cartoons in the politically charged Commandos- goes through a meticulous process of remembering: he experiences, he encodes, he traces, he attaches tein and Anvil Supreme. and he retrieves to imagine alternative narratives that By using fantasy imagery, Hernandez also plays with- may have been missed. He takes memories and turns in the realm of Hispanic magical realism. His choice them into psychedelic commodities. In conclusion, to create mythical creatures in real time challenges John Hernandez makes trippy little creatures that are the parameters of what is considered to be reality. not so easy for you to open your eyes and look at. This fantasy-reality play parallels the artistic aims of magical realists. There are also moments when his 31

Q & A WITH PETER SAUL Alana Coates: You were in Texas for almost two decades, can you please tell me a little bit about how living in Texas may have impacted your work? Peter Saul: Texas gave me the idea for several obvious pieces of subject matter mainly the Alamo and cowboys riding horses. It was a very pleasant place to live but mentally, I didn’t have that much connection to it. AC: Executions are a reoccurring theme in your Peter Saul, Ethel Rosenberg in Electric Chair, 1987 work. Did the frequent incorporation of corporal punishment have anything to do with your time in PS: I definitely pay attention to the culture. I don’t Texas since the state has sentenced more people to remember the Garbage Pail kids very well, but there death than any other state? was a comic strip out of Austin called Trailer Trash, which I looked at and thought about a great deal. PS: No, enthusiasm for execution in Texas was Also, I like Zippy the Pinhead and the paintings of something I was aware of but I was interested in the Robert Williams which I used to look at in Juxtapoz subject long before I got to Texas. Magazine while I was living in Texas. Most of my actual ideas for visual imagery come from Smokey AC: Regarding your work: Ethel Rosenberg in Stover, Crime Does Not Pay, and Walt Disney comElectric Chair, 1987. Do you think Ethel Rosenberg ics which I remembered when I was living in Europe. was guilty? Mad itself I didn’t pay much attention to beyond the idea of simply telling a story which occurred to me at PS: Concerning Ethel Rosenberg, maybe she exactly the right moment, so I was lucky to find it. was guilty, maybe she wasn’t. But certainly, in those days most Americans felt the Russians weren’t smart AC: SHICAGO JUSTUS was made for the legenough to have built the atom bomb by themselves, endary portfolio “CONSPIRACY: The Artist as Witand must have stolen the knowledge from someone, ness”, published by the Center for Constitutional probably us. Rights, to raise money for the legal defense of the Chicago 7, and this print is about Bobby Seale the AC: You have said to have been influenced by co-founder of the black panther party. Why is he deMad Magazine when you discovered it in Paris, were picted as a phallic figure? you ever a fan of Garbage Pail Kids (which came out much later 1985)? 32

PS: There is no good reason, or even any reason at all, why Bobby Seale was depicted as a phalliclooking figure. It simply occurred to me as a way to activate the subject in an unexpected way and perhaps help my picture to have some impact. I was very interested in having as much psychology in my pictures as I could.

PS: I did attend those two art schools. However, the California School of Fine Arts was mainly about modern art and I didn’t really learn any skills. Washington Univ. in St. Louis was for 4 years and I did my best to get what I could from the classes. But I think all artists are pretty much self-taught.

AC: I’ve read that you attended California School of Fine Arts and Washington University School of Fine Arts in St. Louis, but I’ve seen most recently (in the Blondeau & Cie promotions) that you are a selftaught artist?

Peter Saul, SCHICAGO JUSTUS (Chicago Justice), 1971

DAYDREA OTHER MO

GALLERY O

AMS AND ONSTERS

OF IMAGES

MEGAN SOLIS

Opposite Top: Megan Solis, Freedom to express!, 2017, acrylic, construction paper, puffy paint, pen, tiny rubber bands, plastic tape, modeling clay, oatmeal mixture, 12 x 18”

Above: Megan Solis, Charlie, Self Portrait!, 2017, acrylic, construction paper, colored pencil, marker, 12 x 18”

Opposite Bottom: Megan Solis, Charlie, I love, love!, 2017, acrylic marker, construction paper, puffy paint, fake nails, marker, pen, 12 x 18”

Opposite Top: Megan Solis, Break down at Jo Ann’s fabric store, 2017, black faux fur, multicolored faux fur, red latex, 37 x 64 x 62” Opposite Bottom: Megan Solis, He cried when he burnt the ring, I cried when I had to get Obamacare, 2017, assorted fabric, synthetic hair, lipstick, remnnants of birthday cake, 34 x 46 x 4”

Top: Megan Solis, The ring, the bling and the acrylics are from CVS, 2017, Saran Wrap, fabric, gutted stuffed duck, panty hose, lipstick, toilet paper, sock, pipe cleaner, cotton, acrylic, torn afghan, 53 x 41” Bottom: Megan Solis, 4th Grade Baskin Robbin’s Ice Cream Cake, 2017, assorted fabric, glitter, glue, puffy paint, 50 x 42 x 8”

Top: Megan Solis, Something bad is going to happen: Introduction to Charlie, 2017, cardboard cutout digital print, 48 x 20.5â&#x20AC;?

Bottom: Megan Solis, Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response, 2017, dimensions variable, duration: 10:00

Top: Megan Solis, Wake and Easy-Bake Oven, 2017, dimensions variable, duration: 10:00 Bottom: Megan Solis, Dream, dream, dream, when Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m with you, 2017, dimensions variable, duration: 10:00

Top Left: Megan Solis, He is my future, 2017, dimensions variable, duration: 01:38

Sound Piece: Megan Solis, Love song lullaby 2, 2017, sound, duration: 01:17

Bottom Left: Megan Solis, Family Dollar Emotion, 2017, dimensions variable, duration: 00:53 Right: Megan Solis, Demystifying Dizziness, 2017, acrylic, glitter, puffy paint, false lashes, human hair, plaster, plastic, Tic-Tac, 15.4 x 11.5 x 5â&#x20AC;?

Sound Piece: Megan Solis, Love song lullaby 3, 2017, sound, duration: 01:39

Megan Solis, Detail of Break down at Jo Annâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s fabric store, 2017

LOUIE CHAVEZ

Top: Louie Chavez, Lone lyfe, 2017 acrylic on canvas, 36 x 36” Bottom: Louie Chavez, Seen, 2017 acrylic on canvas, 36 x 36”

Top Left: Louie Chavez, Fukushiman (sunglasses), 2015, resin casted sculpture, 8 x 5 x 4”, from the collection of Ricardo Solis Top Right: Louie Chavez, Mini Mutants, 2015, resin casted sculpture, from the collection of Ricardo Solis

Bottom Left: Louie Chavez, Deff Koons (pink panther), 2016, polymer clay, 8 x 5 x 3” Bottom Middle: Louie Chavez, Chumbucket (Multi-colored Shark), 2015, resin casted sculpture, 8 x 5 x 4”, from the collection of Ricardo Solis Bottom Right: Louie Chavez, Burgore (hamburger head), 2016, resin casted sculpture, 8 x 5 x 4”

Top Left: Louie Chavez, Night Fish, 2017, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48” Bottom Left: Louie Chavez, Swipe, 2017, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48”

Above: Louie Chavez, Funk y’all, 2017, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48” Opposite: Louie Chavez, Nerf Nightmare Factory, 2017, mixed media, 84 x 60”, Floor Piece, 8’ and The call out kid, 2017, mixed media assemblage, 42 x 35 x 24”

Top Left: Louie Chavez, Beastin, 2017, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48”

Opposite: Louie Chavez, Meme Beast, 2017, acrylic on canvas, 60 x 48”

Top Right: Louie Chavez, The call out kid, 2017, mixed media assemblage, 42 x 35 x 24”

Bottom: Louie Chavez, Heat of the night, 2017, tapestry, acrylic on canvas, 120 x 144”

JOHN HERNANDEZ

Bottom: John Hernandez, Summer Totem, 2005, sillkscreen, 22 x 27 .75, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

Top Left: John Hernandez, Anthroatlas, 2014, 3D silkscreen, 30 x 22” Top Right: John Hernandez, Jerry’s Kids, 2000, silkscreen, edition of 48, 30 x 22”

Top Left: John Hernandez, Easy Rider, 2002, found objects, acrylic, 5 x 5.25 x 2”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Top Right: John Hernandez, Whirly Bird, 2014, found objects, acrylic, wood, 7 x 9.5 x 9.5”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Bottom: John Hernandez, Red Wing (Study for Pale Ryder), 2012, found objects, acrylic, 8 x 5.5 x 8.5”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

John Hernandez, Batsicle, 2000, acrylic on wood, 63” x 24 x 12”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

Above: John Hernandez, Bird Brain, 2001, acrylic on wood, 18 x 22 x 4.75”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Top Right: John Hernandez, Bird Brain, 1984 mixed media on wood, 16.5 x 14.5”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Bottom Right: John Hernandez, Eye Salute, 2000, acrylic on wood , 28.37 x 19.75, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

John Hernandez, Octopus Garden, 2017

Top Left: John Hernandez, Itty Bang Bang, 2002, found objects, acrylic, wood, 8 x 7.5” diameter, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Bottom Left: John Hernandez, Charlie, found objects, acrylic, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Below: John Hernandez, Lion’s Tail, 2000, acrylic on wood, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

Left: John Hernandez, Anvil Supreme, 1988, acrylic on wood, 22 x 14 x 8”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Right: John Hernandez, Revolver, 2014, 3D silkscreen, 30 x 32”

PETER SAUL Above: Peter Saul, Ethel Rosenberg in Electric Chair, 1987, acrylic on paper, 60 x 40â&#x20AC;?, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

Top: Peter Saul, Legal Abortion, 1990, ink, colored pencil, and acrylic on vellum, 20 x 27”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz Bottom: Peter Saul, SHICAGO JUSTUS (Chicago Justice) from Conspiracy: The Artist as Witness, 1971, silkscreen, edition of 150, 18 x 24”, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

Above: Peter Saul, Faculty Meetings, 1994, drawing: pen and marker on paper, 20 x 25.75â&#x20AC;?, from the collection of Zoe Allegra Diaz

ARTIST CVs ARTIST CVs

Megan Solis, Dream, dream, dream, when Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m with you, 2017

Megan Solis, still from Wake and Easy-Bake Oven, 2017

MEGAN SOLIS Education 2016

Bachelor of Fine Arts, University of Texas at San Antonio, TX. Residency

2016

Hello Studio Residency, Upstairs Studios at the Blue Star Arts Complex, San Antonio, TX.

2015

Arteles Artist Residency Center, Haukijärvi, Finland.

Selected Solo Exhibitions 2017 2016 2015

Artists Looking at Art Series, McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX; curator Rene Paul Barilleaux (forthcoming Fall) The Strange Afterlife of X-Tina, Invisible Gallery, Houston, TX; curator Jessica Garcia. February. Christina is a Coward, Hello Studio, Blue Star Arts Complex, San Antonio, TX; curator Alana Coates. June – August. (catalogue) My Bloated Stomach is Water and Glitter, R Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Rigoberto Luna. March. Xanax Keeps Me Strong, The Lullwood Group Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Chris Castillo. October.

Selected Group Exhibitions 2017 Daydreams and Other Monsters, University of Texas at San Antonio, Main Campus Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Alana Coates. June. (catalogue). 2016 Not Like the Other, Performance Art Houston, Instagram Performance Project Houston, TX; curator Brandon Zech. October. Spring BFA Exhibition, University of Texas at San Antonio, Main Campus Gallery, San Antonio, TX. May. 2015 A Vulgar Farce, Studio Fantomas, San Antonio, TX; curator Alejandro Augustine Padilla. November. Arteles Residents 2015, Arteles Artist Center, Haukijärvi, Finland. May. (catalogue) Renew and Reprise, High Wire Arts Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Cindy Palmer. March. 31st Student Exhibition, University of Texas in San Antonio, San Antonio, TX. Juror: Sandra C. Fernandez. March. Colorful Damage: The Art of Megan Solis and Mauro Rangel, Silkworm Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Joe De La Cruz. January. 2014 Remember the Plazmo!, Plazmo Contemporary, San Antonio, TX; curator Louie Chavez. August. Yuck, Yuck! A Mural Reveal, High Wire Arts Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Megan Solis. May. Murals 2014

Yuck, Yuck! Mural on High Wire Arts Gallery façade, San Antonio, Texas. Solo. Pink Girl. Poorcore Music, Interior Mural, San Antonio, TX. Collaborative.

Art Talks 2017

Artists Looking at Art Series Interview with Rene Paul Barilleaux, Chief Curator / Curator of Contemporary Art, McNay Art Museum, San Antonio, TX. (forthcoming). Panel Discussion, Life after a BFA Invited guest lecturer University of Texas, San Antonio, TX. (forthcoming).

2016

“Why would you do that to me?: Performance Art According to Megan Solis” invited guest lecturer Northwest Vista College, San Antonio, TX. November 9.

Press Mentions Turner, Tom. “Artist Talk with Megan Solis” BlueStar Arts Complex, August 5, 2016. Haddad, Faith. “Disappointments are Revealed During Final Performance by Megan Solis” BlueStar Arts Complex, August 5, 2016. Courtney, James. “Megan Solis Exhibition Culminates with Bizarre First Friday Performance” San Antonio Current, August 3, 2016. Rees, Christina and Brandon Zech. “Top Five” Glasstire, July 28, 2016. Silva, Elda. “Christina is a Coward” San Antonio Express-News, July 1, 2016. Rindfuss, Bryan. “First Friday Preview: 4 Shows Not to Miss” San Antonio Current, June 29, 2016. Haddad, Faith. “To See: Christina is a Coward by Megan Solis, Second Resident Artist of Hello Studio’s BlueStar Arts Complex, June 29, 2016.

New

Program”

Courtney, James. “Xanax Keeps Me Strong” San Antonio Current, October 7, 2015. Jones, Vikky. “Spotlight on Megan Solis” College of Liberal and Fine Arts, The University of Texas at San Antonio, February 16, 2016, http://art.utsa.edu/megan-solis Swann, Connie. “Xingona Files: Megan Solis” Chingona Renaissance, May 12, 2017. Catalogues

Megan Solis: Christina is a Coward (San Antonio: Hello Studios) 2016. Authors: Alana Coates, Marco Aquino, Gabriella Boschi Scott, Isabel A. Servantez III, Tatiana M. Uhoch, ed. Alana Coates & Maria Soscia [ISBN: 978-1-36-754704-9] Arteles Residency Catalogue (Finland: Arteles Artist Residency Center) 2015. p181. http://www.arteles.org/artists_projects.html

Megan Solis, detail of Demystifying Dizziness, 2017

Louie Chavez, Installation View

LOUIE CHAVEZ Selected Solo Exhibitions 2016 Prime Cuts, AP Art Lab, San Antonio, TX; curator Amanda Poplawsky. February. 2015 Supafakumachin, Seven Minutes in Heaven, Fox Motel, Room #2, San Antonio, TX; curator Jessica Garcia. March. 2014 Metalsexual, Silkworm Studio, San Antonio, TX; curator Joe De La Cruz. June. 2013 Quadricept, Invisible Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Jessica Garcia. September. Future of the Future, Plazmo Contemporary, San Antonio, TX; March. 2011 Changarrito (Inaugural), Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, TX; curator Claudia Zapata. March. 2010 Slime Time, Jive Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Agosto Cuellar. March. Gold, Luminaria, San Antonio, TX; Invited by Chuck Ramirez. March. Dulce, Soapbox Gallery, Brooklyn, NY; curator James Greenfeild. January. Selected Two-Person and Group Exhibitions 2017 Daydreams and Other Monsters, University of Texas at San Antonio, Main Campus Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Alana Coates. June. (catalogue). Surd, Upstairs studios, Blue Star Arts Complex, San Antonio, TX; curator Lauri GarciaJones, April. Connections & Intersections: Art from the Americas (Changarrito Retrospective), Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, Austin, TX; curator Cory Anne Hurless, January – April. 2016 Zine Night, Studio Fantomas, San Antonio, TX; curator Inés Estrada (Inechi). June. 2015 A Vulgar Farce Studio Fantomas, San Antonio, TX; curator Alejandro Augustine Padilla. November. Mexic-Arte Museum Changarrito Collection, Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, TX; curator Maximo Gonzalez. January. 2014 Shoot Yourself, Gravelmouth, San Antonio, TX; curator Shek Vega. March. The Color of Blind, Mercury Project, San Antonio, TX: curator Trina Bacon. March. Bare Naked, Brick at Blue Star Arts Complex, San Antonio, TX; curator Trina Bacon. November. 2013 On and Off Fredericksburg Road: 6th Annual Studio Tour. San Antonio, TX; organized by Bihl Haus Arts. February. (catalogue) Photos in Translation, Zaza Gardens. San Antonio, TX; curator Trina Bacon. September. 2011 Post Pop Politics: Louie Chavez and Gabriel Delgado, Lone Star Studio, San Antonio, TX; curator Sean Fitzgibbons. September. 2010 Pop Yo Trunk, Una noche en la Gloria, San Antonio, TX; curators Jimmy James Canales and Monessa Esquivel.October. 2009 Mickey House Performance, All Things Project, New York, NY; curator Sam Kho. September. Paper Bullets, One9Zero6 Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Albert Alvarez. June. Heartbreak City, Kitsch Art Space, Laredo, TX; curator Rudy Murillo. August. Murals 2015 2011 2013

Make the City Shake, Dreamonoid’s Arcade, San Antonio, TX. Solo La Muerte no es el Fin, Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, TX. Solo Effort That Counts, Fasken Recreation Center, Laredo, TX. Solo

Art Talks 2015

A Look at the San Antonio Art Scene: Chris Davila & Louie Chavez. Convergent Media Talk at the University of the Incarnate Word, San Antonio, TX. Invited by Joseph Lopez. February 23, 2015.

Press Mentions Aquino, Marco, “Pink Leche and Seven Minutes in Heaven” Out in SA, March 7, 2015.

Anderson, Niall. Softoy Hobby, Man-E-News “New ‘Nuke Beach’ resin figures from Slime Time…” July 11, 2015. Blaze, Misty. “My Somewhat Satisfactory ‘Seven Minutes in Heaven” San Antonio Current. March 8, 2015. Delgado, Gabriel Diego. “Future of the Future: New works by Louie Chavez” Emerald City. February 18, 2013. ---. “Post Pop Politics” La Prensa, September 21, 2011. (Xichel Dietrich) ---. “Post Pop Politics” Emerald City, December 26, 2012. ---. “Surd group show” Contemporary Texas, May 2017. Fisch, Sarah. “Art is (Not) Dead: How to not starve as a San Antonio artist.” San Antonio Current, February 4, 2014. Griffiths, Josh. “Art Talk-Louie Chavez of ‘Nuke Beach’ Art Whore, August 23, 2015. Kegley, Tami. “A Stimulating ‘Seven Minutes in Heaven” Rivard Report, March 11, 2015. McIntyre, Kellen Kee. On and Off Fredericksburg Road: 6th Annual Studio Tour; organized by Bihl Haus Arts. (San Antonio: Litho Press, Inc.) 2013. p.56. Outz, Leland. “On the Scene” San Antonio Express-News, June, 23 2009. Rees, Christina and Brandon Zech. “Top Five” Glasstire, July 2, 2016. Rindfuss, Bryan. “First Friday Preview: 4 Shows Not to Miss” San Antonio Current, June 29, 2016. ---. “Future of the Future” San Antonio Current, March 6, 2013. Kirsten Crow. “Kitsch Art & Music: Breakin’ hearts” Laredo Morning Times, August 21, 2009. “Wham!” Front Cover Art. El Placazo, San Anto Cultural Arts Newspaper, April 2013.

Louie Chavez, detail of Swipe, 2017

John Hernandez, Installation View Photo by Juan Vallejo

JOHN HERNANDEZ Education 1980 1975 1972

Master of Fine Aarts, University of North Texas, Denton, TX, Bachelor of Arts, Our Lady of the Lake University, San Antonio, TX AA, San Antonio College, San Antonio, TX

Selected Solo and Two-Person Exhibitions 2017 The Art of John Hernandez, Mabee-Gerrer Museum of Art, Shawnee, OK 2016 Whew…That’s a Relief! The Madcap World of John Hernandez, 1978-2015, The Gallery at UTA, University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX; curator Benito Huerta 2015 John Hernandez, Gravelmouth Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Shek Vega 2014 Parade, Avis Frank Gallery, Houston, TX 2009 Zoe’s Room, San Antonio Museum of Art, San Antonio, TX; curator David Rubin 2005 Joan Grona Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Joan Grona 2002 Déja Vu: John Hernandez and Benito Huerta, The Grace Museum, Abilene, TX 2000 Jerry’s Kids, ArtPace, San Antonio, TX; panelists Dan Cameron and Hans Ulrich Obrist 1999 Fables, Sala Diaz, San Antonio, TX; curator Hills Snyder 1998 Dallas Visual Art Center, Dallas, TX 1996 Stand, Blue Star Art Space, San Antonio, TX 1994 Gatekeeper, Otto Schweins Gallery, Cologne, Germany Then and Now: The Polemics of Change, Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, TX Museum of Agenda and Transgression (MOAT), Dallas, TX Born Free, Tyler Museum of Art, TX 1992 Encounters 1: John Hernandez and Rainer Ganahl, Dallas Museum of Art, TX John Hernandez, Moody Gallery, Houston, TX; curator Annegreth Nill Drawing in Situ, Washington Project for the Arts, Washington, D.C.; curator Marilyn A. Zeitlin San Angelo Museum of Art, San Angelo, TX 1990 Amazon Pledge of Vengeance, The Pilot Hole, San Antonio; curator Hills Snyder Edith Baker Gallery, Dallas 1989 John Hernandez, Plus-Kern Gallery, Brussels, Belgium 1988 DW Gallery, Dallas, TX 1987 Moody Gallery, Houston, TC 1985 Animal House, DW Gallery, Dallas, TX; curator Diana Block 1984 Moody Gallery, Houston 1983 Construction/Site, DW Gallery, Dallas TX Two-Person and Group Exhibitions 2017 2013 2005 2004

Daydreams and Other Monsters, University of Texas at San Antonio, Main Campus Gallery, San Antonio, TX; curator Alana Coates. June. (catalogue). Estampas de la Raza: Contemporary Prints from the Romo Collection, McNay Museum of Art, San Antonio, TX. (traveling exhibition) – Albuquerque Museum of Art, Albuquerque, NM; Vincent Price Art Museum, Monterey Park, CA Leaving Aztlan: Rethinking Contemporary Latino and Chicano Art, Center for Visual Art, Metropolitan State College of Denver, CO Serie Project, Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, TX Center for Mexican American Studies, University of Texas, Austin, TX ¡Arte Caliente!: Selections from the Joe A. Diaz Collection, Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi, TX. (traveling exhibition) National Hispanic Cultural Center, Albuquerque, NM and San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA Serie Project, Galeria Luis Nishizawa-ENAP-UNAW, México City, México

2003 2001 2000 1999 1998 1997 1996 1995 1994 1993 1992 1991 1990 1989 1988 1987 1986

Galeria Lorenzo Homer, Philadelphia, PA Tyler Junior Collage and Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, TX An Invitation to Laugh, El Centro College, Dallas, TX Serie Project, Glass Curtain Gallery, Columbia College, Chicago, IL John Hernandez and Art Polendo, Joan Grona Gallery, San Antonio, TX Seriotoon: Comics & Commentary, The Gallery at the University of Texas at Arlington, TX Texas Dialogues: Scenic Overlook, Blue Star Art Space, San Antonio, TX Then and Now: The Polemics of Change, Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, TX San Antonio Collects, Blue Star Art Space, San Antonio, TX Drawing/Prints, Mulcahy Modern, Dallas, TX John Hernandez and Kaleta Doolin, The Sculpture Center, NY Collective Visions, San Antonio Museum of Art, TX La Junta de los Rios: A Journey’s End, The Sculpture Center, NY Works on Paper, State Thomas Gallery, Dallas, TX Gregory Horndeski and John Hernandez: Recent Work, State Thomas Gallery, Dallas, TX Establishment & Revelation, Dallas Visual Art Center, TX Tres Proyectos Latinos, Austin Museum of Art, TX One of These Things Is Not Like the Other, Angstrom Gallery, Dallas, TX Fresh Ink: Austin Print Workshops, Austin Museum of Art, TX La Junta de los Rios: A Fantastic Journey, 5501 Columbia Art Center, Dallas, TX Multiples Only: A National Book Art Invitational, University of Dallas, TX Far from the Border, Firehouse, Del Rio, TX Cultura, Center for Hispanic Arts, Corpus Christi, TX Binary Ground, Hickory Street Annex, Dallas, TX The Everpresent Moment, Ringling School of Art and Design, Sarasota, FL Vista Series, San Angelo Museum of Art, San Angelo, TX The Group Show, Grey Matters, Dallas, TX Peaceably Assembled, Little Egypt Enterprises, Houston, TX Northwest by Southwest: Painted Fictions, Palm Springs Desert Museum, CA Mid-America Images: Lone Star Art, Emporia State University, Emporia, KS Invitational, Roswell Museum and Art Center, Roswell, NM Woodwork, Arlington Museum of Art, Arlington, TX Small Works, Edith Baker Gallery, Dallas, TX From the Backroom, Saxon-Lee Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Winners, Mid-America Biennial, Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO A Century of Sculpture in Texas: 1889-1989, Archer M. Huntington Gallery, University of Texas, Austin, TX. Traveled to Amarillo Art Center, Amarillo, Texas; San Angelo Museum of Art, San Angelo, TX; Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi, TX; and El Paso Museum of Art, TX Sin Fronteras (Crossing Borders), Gallery of Contemporary Art, University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, CO TV Shows, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX Invitational 30, Longview Museum and Art Center, Longview, TX O’Kane Gallery, University of Houston, TX Hernandez, Horndeski & Richardson, Edith Baker gallery, Dallas, TX Contemporary Art from Texas, Groninger Museum, Groningen, Holland The Chicano Experience, Miami-Dade Community College, Miami, FL Third Coast Review: A Look at Art in Texas, Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, CO; traveled to University of Colorado Art Galleries, Boulder; PowerPlant Visual Arts Center, Fort Collins, CO; and Blue Star Art Space, San Antonio, TX Collecting on the Cutting Edge, Laguna Gloria Art Museum, Austin, TX True Wit, Cullen Center, Inc., Houston, TX The Flower and Garden Show, DW Gallery, Dallas, TX Ghouls, South Dallas Cultural Center, Dallas, TX Emerging Faces, North Lake College, Irving, TX Nave Museum, Victoria, TX State of the Arts: Texas, Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA Chulas Fronteras: An Exhibition of Contemporary Hispanic Art, Midtown Art Center, Houston, TX Mask Show, Conduit Gallery, Dallas, TX

Day of the Dead, Blue Star Art Space, San Antonio, TX 1985 On View, New Museum of Contemporary Art, NY; curated by Marcia Tucker Comic Relief, Barry Whistler Gallery, Dallas, TX John Hernandez, Hill Snyder, Randy Twaddle, Patrick Gallery, Austin, TX Texas Artists, Moody Gallery, Houston, TX Post February, University of Texas, Austin, TX 1984 Pattern, Laguna Gloria Art Museum, Austin, TX A Partial Look, Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi, TX Singular Points of View, Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi, TX 1983 Borrowed Time, 2639 Elm Street, Dallas, TX Construction/Site, DW Gallery, Dallas, TX Awards 2000 1989 1988

Artist in Residence, ArtPace, San Antonio, TX Individual Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts Individual Fellowship, Mid-America Arts Alliance

Bibliography: Books, Catalogs, and Brochures Baerwaldt, Wayne. John Hernandez. San Antonio: ArtPace, 2000. Carlozzi, Annette Dimeo. 50 Texas Artists. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1986. ---. Third Coast Review: A Look at Art in Texas. Aspen, Colorado: Aspen Art Museum, 1987. Cordova, Ruben Charles. ¡Arte Caliente!: Selections from the Joe A. Diaz Collection. Corpus Christi, Texas: South Texas Institute for the Arts, 2004. Edwards, Jim. Singular Points of View. Corpus Christi, Texas: Art Museum of South Texas, 1984. Freeman, David M. “John Hernandez at Blue Star.” Voices of Art vol. 4 no. 2 (June 1996): 6-8. Goddard, Dan R. “Local artists in Dutch Exhibit.” San Antonio Express-News, March 19, 1988. Govnar, Alan. La Junta de los Rios: A Fantastic Journey: An Installation by Kaleta Doolin and John Hernandez. Dallas: Columbia Art Center, 1996. Haks, Frans. Contemporary Art from Texas. Groningen, Holland: Groninger Museum, 1988. Hayes, Anna. “Hispanic Culture Captured in Exhibit.” (Temple, Texas) Temple Daily Telegram, August 3, 1986. Hendricks, Patricia D. and Becky Duval Reese. A Century of Sculpture in Texas: 1889-1989, Austin: Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery, 1989. Huerta, Benito. Chulas Fronteras: An Exhibition of Contemporary Hispanic Art. Houston: Midtown Art Center, 1986. Hough, Katherine Plake. Northwest by Southwest: Painted Fictions. Palm Springs, California: Palm Springs Desert Museum, 1990. Lucie-Smith, Edward. American Art Now. New York: William Morrow & Co., Inc., 1985. Mitchell Charles, D. Seriotoon: Comics & Commentary. Arlington, Texas: The Gallery at the University of Texas at Arlington, 2001. Rusnell, Wesley A. 1990 Invitational. Roswell, New Mexico: Roswell Museum and Art center, 1990.

Tennant, Donna. The Chicano Experience: John Hernandez, Benito Huerta. Miami, Florida: InterAmerican Art Gallery, 1988. Tucker, Marcia. On View. New York: New Museum of Contemporary Art, 1984. Zeitlin, Marilyn A. Peaceably Assembled. Houston: Little Egypt Enterprises, 1990. Articles and Reviews Bray, Jeff. “Boxes and Baubbles.” Montrose Voice, July 20, 1984. Chavez, Lorenzo. “The Eyes of Texas are upon them: Worlds of 13 Hispanic artists go on tour in the Lone Star State.” (Waco) Tribune-Herald Vista vol. 2 no. 2 (October 5, 1986): 20. Daniel, Mike. “Coloring their worlds in uniquely striking ways.” The Dallas Morning News, May 23, 1997. Ellens, Marial. “Knupselkrant: Texas.” Anders Bekeken, April 26, 1988. Fox, Kevin. “Fragments and pieces: Guy, Hernandez exhibits at DW Gallery show different approaches to similar ideas.” Dallas Downtown News, May 2-8, 1983. Freudenheim, Susan. “Bold venture puts spotlight on trio’s art.” (Fort Worth) Star-Telegram, October 18, 1983. ---. “John Hernandez and Linda Guy at DW Gallery.” Art in America vol. 72 no. 1(January 1984): 133, 135. Gambrell, Jamey. “Texas State of the Art.” Art in America vol. 75 no. 3 (March 1987): 114-129, 151. Hickey, Dave. “State of the Art” (Fort Worth) Star-Telegram, September 4, 1983. Jigsaw, Julie. “John Hernandez at DW Gallery.” (Dallas) Detour Magazine (March 1988): 14-15. Kutner, Janet. “Warehouse of dreams. Trio’s show is surprise hit in Deep Ellum.” The Dallas Morning News, September 16, 1983. ---. “DW comes into its own.” The Dallas Morning News, October 20, 1983. ---. “Provocative images exhibited by regional artists.” The Dallas Morning News, June 12, 1985. ---. “From black-and-white to whimsy.” The Dallas Morning News, April 27, 1989. ---. “A cut above: Artists use wood as starting point but get different results.” The Dallas Morning News, June 20, 1990. ---. “Rooms with a view.” The Dallas Morning News, February 29, 1992. ---. “Where rivers and artists meet.” The Dallas Morning News, June 14, 1996. McKay, Gary. “New Scenes: The Coming Wave of New Artists. (Houston) ULTRA vol. 7 no. 7 (March 1988): 44-51. Mitchell, Charles Dee. “Trio goes independent and large scale in Borrowed Time.” Dallas Observer, September 22-October 5, 1983. ---. “Cartoon Images Blown from the Skull.” Dallas Observer, May 30, 1984. ---. “…and diversity defines Dallas.” New Art Examiner vol. 13 no. 1 (April 1986): 31, 35-37. ---. “John Hernandez at ArtPace.” Art in America vol. 89 no. 7 (July 2001): 110. Perrée, Rob. “De Ontmaskering Van Dynasty.” Kunstbeeld (April 1988): 16-19. Reyes, Sylvia. “Avant-garde artist’s pictures not always pretty.” San Antonio Light, September 7, 1990. Rubin, David. “John Hernandez’s Maximal Style” Glasstire, February 23, 2016. Tyson, Janet. “Wood in all its forms, from 14 artists’ hands.” (Fort Worth) Star-Telegram. June 24, 1990. Welch, Roger. “Hernandez unleashes “nightmarish ‘Fables’ show.” San Antonio Express-News, September 9, 1999.

Public Collections Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi, TX Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX Groninger Museum, Groningen, Netherlands Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, IN Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, TX Tyler Museum of Art, Tyler, TX, University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX

John Hernandez, detail of Red Wing (Study for Pale Ryder), 2012

Peter Saul, detail of Legal Abortion, 1990

PETER SAUL Education 1950-52 Stanford University, Stanford, California and the California School of Fine Arts, San Francisco 1956 Bachelor of Arts, Washington University School of Fine Arts of St. Louis Selected Solo Exhibitions 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2000 1999 1998

Make America Great Again, Blondeau & Cia, Geneva, Switzerland (Two-person Show with John Tweddle) Peter Saul Retrospective, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, Germany Peter Saul: from Pop to Politics CBI-G Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; organized by the George Adams Gallery, NY You Better Call Saul!, Gary Tatintsian Gallery, Moscow, Russia Some Terrible Problems, Michael Werner Gallery, London, England Six Classics, Mary Boone Gallery, New York City, NY Reading, Hall Art Foundation, Vermont Some Crazy Pictures, David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles, CA From Pop to Punk: Peter Saul, Paintings from the 60’s and 70’s, Venus Over Manhattan, New York City, NY (catalogue) Figaro, The Arnold and Marie Schwartz Gallery Met, Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center, New York City, NY Holy Moly, Städtische Galerie Wolfsburg, Wolfsburg, Germany Paintings from the 60s and 70s, Mary Boone Gallery, New York City, NY Neptune and the Octopus Painter, VeneKlasen Werner, Berlin, Germany Peter Saul/Jim Shaw: Drawings, Mary Boone Gallery, New York City, NY(Two-person Show) Fondation Salomon Art Contemporain, France (catalogue) Mary Boone Gallery, New York City, NY Stupid Arguments, Corbett vs. Dempsey, Chicago, IL (catalogue) Fifty Years of Painting, Haunch of Venison, New York City, NY Sheer Terror, Nolan Judin, Berlin, Germany New Paintings, David Nolan Gallery, New York City, NY (catalogue) Praz-Delavallade, Paris, France Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA Peter Saul: A Retrospective, Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA Peter Saul: A Retrospective, Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA Galerie Charlotte Moser, Geneva, Switzerland David Nolan Gallery, New York City, NY(catalogue) Leo Koenig Inc., New York City, NY Paintings 1985–2005, Musée Paul Valèry, Sète, France (catalogue) Homage to Dali, Nolan/Eckman Gallery, New York City, NY Suburbia: Paintings and Drawings, 1965-69, George Adams Gallery, New York City, NY Drawings, Jack Hanley Gallery, San Francisco, CA Galerie Aurel Scheibler, Köln, Germany The Sixties, Nolan/Eckman Gallery, New York City, NY (catalogue) Galerie Charlotte Moser, Geneva, Switzerland Heads: 1986-2000, Nolan/Eckman Gallery, New York City, NY (catalogue) Galerie du Centre, Paris, France Musée de l’Hôtel Bertrand, Dole, France; Retrospective Musée des Beaux-Arts, Mons, Belgium; Retrospective Musée de l’Abbaye Sainte-Croix, Les Sables d’Olonne, France; Musée de l’Hôtel Bertrand, Châte auroux, France; Retrospective (catalogue) Recent Drawings, Nolan/Eckman Gallery, New York City, NY Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Paintings and Related Drawings 1960-64, George Adams Gallery, New York City, NY 1997 Galerie du Centre, Paris, France Artpace, San Antonio, TX 1996 Art World Portraits, Smart Museum of Art, Chicago, IL Texas Gallery, Houston, Texas, USA George Adams Gallery, New York City, NY 1995 Turner, Byrne and Runyon, Dallas, TX Don‘t Kiss Ass, Ynglingagatan I, Stockholm, Sweden Castro‘s Mother Destroys Miami and Related Drawings, Frumkin/Adams Gallery, New York City, NY Old and New, On Canvas and Paper, Galerie Bonnier, Geneva, Switzerland 1994 Herbert Palmer Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Martin-Rathburn Gallery, San Antonio, TX 1991 Krannert Art Museum, Champaign, IL Peter Saul: Political Paintings, Washington University, Saint Louis, MO Galerie du Centre, Paris, France (catalogue) 1990 Peter Saul, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX Contemporary Art Center, New Orleans, LA Laguna Gloria Art Museum, Austin, TX 1989 Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, CO (catalogue) 1987 Peter Saul, New Paintings and Works Paper, Allan Frumkin Gallery, New York City, NY (catalogue) Peter Saul, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX 1986 Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco, CA Crime and Punishment’ and Other New Paintings, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX 1983 Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris, France 1981 Kilcawley Center, Youngstown State University, Youngstown, OH 1980 University of Illinois, Dekalb, IL; Retrospective (catalogue) Madison Art Center, Madison, WI; Retrospective 1976 Housatonic Museum of Art, Bridgeport, CT 1973 Galerie Klang, Köln, Germany California State University, Sacramento, CA 1972 Galerie Darthea Speyer, Paris 1971 Musée d‘Art et d‘Industrie, Saint-Etienne, France 1968 Reed College, Portland, OR California College of Arts and Crafts Gallery, Oakland, CA San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA 1967 Galerie de’Foscherari 60, Bologna, Italy Contemporary Gallery, Kansas City, MO Galerie Breteau, Paris, France 1965 Anne Aebels Gallery, Koln, Germany 1964 Notizie Gallery, Turin, Italy Galerie Breteau, Paris, France 1963 La Tartaruga Gallery, Rome, Italy Rolf Nelson Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Galerie Breteau, Paris, France Selected Group Exhibitions 2017 2016

Daydreams and Other Monsters, University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, TX; (catalogue) Homage to the Fountain, Francis M. Naumann Fine Art, New York City, NY Drawing Island, The Journal Gallery, Brooklyn, NY Piss and Vinegar, New York Academy of Art, New York City, NY We Need to Talk, Friedrich Petzel Gallery, New York City, NY Character, V1 Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark It Was Never Linear: Recent Painting, Sheldon Museum of Art, Lincoln, NE

2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008

Human Interest: Portraits From the Whitney’s Collection, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Musée d’Art Contemporain, Marseille, France; Zoo Machine Mystifier, National Centre for Contemporary Arts, Moscow, Russia Mutated Reality, Gary Tatintsian Gallery, Moscow, Russia MoMA PS1, Long Island City, New York City, NY Better than de Kooning, Villa Merkel, Galerien der Stadt Esslingen am Neckar, Esslingen am Neckar, Germany What Nerve! Alternative Figures in American Art from 1960 to the Present, Matthew Marks Gallery, New York City, NY (catalogue) Rawhide, Venus Over Manhattan, New York City, NY America Is Hard To See, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Picasso in Contemporary Art, Deichtorhallen Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany If You’re Accidentally Not Included, Don’t Worry About It, Galerie Zürcher, Paris, France Spaced Out: Migration to the Interior, Red Bull Studios New York City, NY What Nerve! Alternative Figures in American Art from 1960 to the Present, Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Providence, RI (catalogue) Peahead, Franklin Parrasch Gallery, New York City, NY Comic Future, Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, OH Look at Me: Portraiture from Manet to the Present, Leila Heller Gallery, New York City, NY If You’re Accidentally Not Included, Don’t Worry About It, Zürcher Studio, New York City, NY FAR OUT!, Marlborough Chelsea, New York City, NY Imaginary Portraits/Prince Igor, The Arnold and Marie Schwartz Gallery Met, Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center, New York City, NY Comic Future, Ballroom Marfa, Marfa, Texas, USA Tumescence: Peter Doig, Sigmar Polke, Peter Saul, Michael Williams, Michael Werner Gallery, New York City, NY Marcel Duchamp’s ‘Nude Descending a Staircase’: An Homage, Francis M. Naumann Fine Art, New York City, NY Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out, White Flag Projects, Saint Louis, MO Sinister Pop, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Masters of Reality, Gering & Lopez Gallery, New York City, NY MAKE Skateboards, I-20 Gallery, New York City, NY Pretty on the Inside, Paul Kasmin Gallery, New York City, NY Incongruous: When Art laughs, Musée cantonal des Beaux Arts, Lausanne, Suisse Captain Pamphile, a picture novel in pieces, Deichtorhallen Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany Ordinary Madness, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA Touch and Go: Ray Yoshida and his Spheres of Influence, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Sullivan Galleries, Chicago, IL The Visible Vagina, David Nolan Gallery, New York City, NY Nature Once Removed, Lehman College Art Gallery, Bronx, NY Desire, Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX Private Future, Marc Jancou Contemporary, New York City, NY Ils sont venus de si loin, Galerie Delta, Rotterdam, The Netherlands Celebration, FRAC Auvergne, Clermont Ferrand, France Consider the Lobster, The Center for Curatorial Studies & Hessel Museum of Art, Bard College, Annandale-onHudson, New York City, NY Image Matter, Mary Boone Gallery, New York City, NY The New Yorkers, V1 Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark Until the End of the World, AMP, Athens, Greece N’importe quoi, Musée d’Art Contemporain, Lyon, France Exile on Main Street: Humour, exaggeration & anti-authoritarianism American art, Bonnefanten museum, Maaastricht, The Netherlands (catalogue) Looking for Mushrooms. Beat Poets, Hippies, Radio and Minimal Art: Art and Counter Culture in San Francisco around 1968, Museum Ludwig, Koln, Germany Bad Painting, Good Art, Museum Moderner Kunst, Vienna, Austria Jekyll Island, Honor Fraser Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Multiplex: Directions in Art, 1970 to Now, The Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY Action/Abstraction—Pollock, de Kooning, and American Art 1940-1976, The Jewish Museum, New York City, NY

2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001 2000 1998 1997 1995 1994 1990 1989 1988 1987

Action/Abstraction—Pollock, de Kooning, and American Art 1940-1976, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY Figuration Narrative 1960-72, Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, France Lots of Things Like This, Apexart, New York City, NY Aaron Curry, Richard Hawkins, and Peter Saul, David Kordansky Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Parfum d’été, Galerie Charlotte Moser, Geneva, Switzerland Mr. President, University Art Museum at Albany, Albany, New York City, NY Summer of Love, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Exhibitionism: An exhibition of exhibitions, CCS Bard Hessel Museum, Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York City, NY Automatic, Franklin Parrasch Gallery, New York City, NY Refugees of Group Selection, Franklin Parrasch Gallery, New York City, NY Paradise, Patrick Painter Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Il était une fois Walt Disney, Musée des Beaux Arts de Montréal, Montreal, Canada Multiplex: Directions in Art, 1970 to Now, Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY Rouge Baiseri, Fonds Régional d’art contemporain des Pays de la Loire, Carquefou, France Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC Brattleboro Museum & Art Center, Brattleboro, VT The Artful Jester, The Painting Center, New York City, NY Il était une fois Walt Disney, Grand Palais, Paris, France Antisocial, Fonds Régional d’Art Contemporain d’Auvergne, Auvergne, France Twice Drawn, Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery, Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York Art of Engagement: Paintings, Drawings, Prints and Sculpture, Jack Rutberg Fine Arts, Los Angeles, CA Works on Paper, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX Looking at Words, Andrea Rosen Gallery, New York City, NY Post War Draught women and 1 Monitor, Meyer Riegger Gallery, Karlsruhe, DE Body Language, George Adams Gallery, New York City, NY Disparities and Deformations: Our Grotesque, SITE Santa Fe, Santa Fe, NM The Anxious Image, The Painting Center, New York City, NY Bush-Whack!, George Adams Gallery, New York City, NY The Not-So-Still Life: A Century of California Painting and Sculpture, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA Splat, Boom, Pow, Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston; ICA Boston, MA Les Contemporains de 1960 à nos jours, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France 3 Pop Guys 40 Years After, Galerie du Centre, Paris, France Funny Papers, Daniel Weinberg Gallery, Los Angeles, CA Grooves, Leo Koenig, New York City, NY Eye Infection, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, NL (catalogue) Jokes, Musée d’art Moderne et Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland Self Made Men, D.C. Moore Gallery, New York City, NY Open Ends, The Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY Pop & Post-Pop (on Paper), Texas Gallery, Houston, TX Drawings 2000, Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York City, NY Face to Face, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, NL View: Three, Mary Boone Gallery, New York City, NY Facing History, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France A Show of Hands, George Adams Gallery, New York City, NY Drawings, Nolan/Eckman Gallery, New York City, NY Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Murder, Thread Waxing Space, New York City, NY Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL Hand Painted Pop: 1958-1962, Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Drawings, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX Reagan: American Icon, Bucknell University, Lewiston, PA Different Drummers, Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, DC Pop Apocalypse, Gracie Mansion, New York City, NY Comic Iconoclasm, Institute of Contemporary Art, London, United Kingdom

1986 1983 1978 1976 1971 1968 1967 1964 1963 1962 1961 1959

University of California, Berkeley, USA; Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO; Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, VA Made in U.S.A: Art from the ‘50s and ‘60s, Richmond, VA Recent Works by Ten Texas Artists, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX American Renaissance: Painting and Sculpture Since 1940, Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, FL Figure as Subject: The Last Decade, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY Red Grooms/Peter Saul: The Early Sixties, Allan Fumkin Gallery, New York City, NY Art About Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY 72nd American Exhibition, Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL Texas Group Show, Texas Gallery, Houston, TX American Painting and Sculpture 1948-1969, Krannert Art Museum, University of Illinois, Champaign, IL Violence in Recent American Art, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL Funk, University Art Museum, University of California, Berkeley, CA Recent American Drawings, Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA Pop, etc., Museum des 20. Jahrhunderts, Schweizergarten, Vienna, Austria The New Realism, Municipal Museum, The Hague, Netherlands 67th Annual American Exhibition, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL Forum, Abbey Saint-Pierre, Ghent, Belgium Galleria La Tartaruga, Rome, Italy Musée Cantolan, Lausanne, Switzerland; 1st Salon International de Galleries-Pilotes A New Realist Supplement, The University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor, MI New Directions, San Francisco Museum of Art, San Francisco, CA The University of Colorado, Boulder, CO The Society of Contemporary American Art, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL International Selection, The Dayton Art Institute, Dayton, OH Salon de Jeune Peinture, Paris, France

Selected Bibliography 2015 2014 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2006 2007 2003 2008 2002 2000 1989 1991 1989 1987 1980

Peter Saul, From Pop to Punk, Paintings from the 60s 70s, Venus Over Manhattan, New York What Nerve! Alternative Figures in American Art from 1960 to the Present, RISD Museum Peter Saul, Fondation pour art contemporain Salomon, Alex Peter Saul: Stupid Arguments, Corbett vs. Dempsey, Chicago Viva la Difference, Poetry inspired by the painting of Peter Saul, Off The Park Press, New York Peter Saul: New Paintings, David Nolan Gallery, New York Exile On Main St., Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht Peter Saul, Hatje Cantz, Stuttgart Peter Saul, David Nolan Gallery, New York Peter Saul, Peintures 1985-2005, Musée Paul-Valéry, Sète Splat, Boom, Pow, The Influence of cartoons in Contemporary Art, Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston Peter Saul, The Sixties, Nolan/Eckman Gallery, New York Eye Infection, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam Peter Saul, Heads 1986-2000, Nolan/Eckman Gallery, New Yorkpeter saul Peter Saul, Rétrospective, Somogy, Paris Peter Saul, Galerie du centre, Paris/New York Peter Saul, Galerie Thomas R. Monahan, Chicago Peter Saul, Aspen Art Museum, Aspen Peter Saul, New Paintings and Works Paper, Allan Frumkin Gallery, New York Peter Saul, A Retrospective Exhibition of Works by Peter Saul, Northern Illinois University, Illinois

Selected Public Collections Art Institute of Chicago, IL Becht Collection, Amsterdam The Blanton Museum of Art, Austin TX Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh

Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TX Di Rosa Art Preserve, Napa, CA Fonds National dâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;Art Contemporain, Paris FRAC Region Nord, Lille, France Greenville County Museum of Art, SC Huntington Gallery, University of Texas, Austin, TX Kansas City Art Institute, MO Krannert Museum, Champaign, IL Los Angeles County Museum, CA Madison Art Center, WI Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, NY Moderna Museet, Stockholm Musee Cantini, Marseilles Museum of Art, Honolulu Museum of Art, University of California, Berkeley, CA Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA Museum Ludwig, Cologne Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, CA Sintra Museum of Modern Art, Portugal Smart Museum, University of Chicago, IL Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City, NY