“Collect Them All! Soft Brown Narratives” Very rarely has Barbie been used well in art, but Lauren Kelley pulls it off. This exhibition includes some great color photographs of staged scenes using altered Barbies and other dolls. But the real showstopper is her video Big Gurl (2006), which stars the dolls and uses stop-motion animation. It opens with a grandmother’s voice admonishing a little girl who’s crying about being ridiculed at school. “You’re almost seven, you’re going to have to just suck it up and start acting like a big girl.” The video goes on to present short narratives about the trials and tribulations of various African-American women with a masterful blend of humor and poignancy. Kelley’s attention to detail is amazing, as is her eye for social commentary and satire. Big Gurl has an intentionally rough, seat-of-the-pants aesthetic that works well; there’s nothing slick about the sets and props, but they’re so witty and ingenious, they just crack you up. Kelley sometimes uses oil-based clay — the kind used for claymation — to make Barbie’s facial features more ethnic — black Barbie is exactly the same model as white Barbie, just with darker hair and skin tone. She also uses clay to caricature features such as lips, butt and breasts. The artist’s takes on the interaction between the sexes are dead-on and funny as hell. Through October 14 at Lawndale Art Center, 4912 Main, 713-528-5858.
“CraftHouston 2006” This biennial exhibit, which saw its inception in 2002, should really be named “CraftTexas,” since the artists highlighted in the show are from all over the state. (Apparently the name will be changed for the 2008 show to reflect that very thing.) Art historian, writer and curator Suzanne Ramljak juried this year’s exhibition, which ranges from obvious “crafty” pieces to ones that blur the line between craft and fine art. Certainly much of “CraftHouston” could be considered contemporary sculpture, like Todd Campbell’s Hairline. The Austin-based artist has arranged forged and welded steel shards to create a caterpillar-like floor sculpture that resembles a feather boa, and yes, looks very much like parted hair. But Roy Hanscom’s fascinating wall sculptures steal the show. Hanscom, who is from Houston, didn’t receive an award or an honorable mention for his work here, and that’s disappointing. His works consist of intertwining stoneware “snakes.” One piece, Medusa, takes the concept literally. The sculpture is a huge horizontal rectangle of green twists. Hanscom has done an amazing job concealing where each snake begins and ends (or maybe it’s one whole snake). Like many in this show, Hanscom demonstrates how a good artist can transcend materials and labels. Through October 1. Houston Center for Contemporary Craft, 4848 Main, 713-529-4848.
“H J Bott: Raising the Line” Artist Harvey Bott is like some mad math professor — he’s obsessed with geometry. His previous show at Sicardi Gallery featured masking-tape drawings from the ’50s; it revealed a young artist’s fascination with dividing space with line and looked like an earlier and better version of Frank Stella. “H J Bott: Raising the Line” is an installment of the artist’s more recent geometric musings. Among the works is a planning drawing for his installation Fluid Architecture, a chamber that used the ridiculously low-tech materials of string and black light to create shapes in space. Another drawing, DoV Master Multiplicans (1972-76), graphs out a curved and angled shape; four of them fit perfectly together to make a square. Meanwhile, some of the graphically strongest works, like Footnote Retrospective (2005), take the ideas of his ’50s works and render them three-dimensional using strips of pale wood subtly delineated with India ink. Who knew math could be so attractive? Through October 7 at Sicardi Gallery, 2246 Richmond, 713-529-1313.
“Joe Mancuso” Joe Mancuso’s paintings at Barbara Davis Gallery have gone all floral — and that’s a surprisingly good thing. Mancuso’s trademark painting style uses solid sections of matte color painted thickly and then sanded down. It lends itself incredibly well to the large-scale, high-contrast floral images Mancuso has selected. The newspaper the artist often has used to underlay his images is gone, and these new paintings have a graphic punch and uncharacteristically high contrast and vivid colors. There’s stark black and white, but there’s also hot pink and black as well as reds and purples. Mancuso has come up with a juicy new body of work. Through October 7. 4411 Montrose, 713-520-9200.
“Witnesses to a Surrealist Vision” A 1950s Hopi Kachina doll based on Mickey Mouse, a coconut seed that looks like a butt, and a creepy-looking 18th- or 19th-century “Wildman” leather suit studded with leather spikes from the dark recesses of Germany or Switzerland are among the 133 objects coexisting in the intimate space of “Witnesses to a Surrealist Vision,” an ongoing show at the Menil Collection. All of the objects in this exhibition were either owned by the surrealists or are similar to those that they collected, according to the exhibition text. And the 130 remaining objects are all equally weird. Tucked into a small darkly lit room in the back of the Menil’s permanent surrealist exhibition, “Witnesses” is a treasure trove of amazing, eclectic objects. It re-creates the idea of the Wunderkammer (“room of wonders”), a cabinet of curiosities — natural and unnatural, real and fake. It’s a wonderful insight into the surrealist vision, as well as a provocative juxtaposition of objects from all over the world, with an emphasis on works from Africa and Oceania. The tiny space is one of the jewels of the Menil Collection, but one you might forget about in the midst of all its temporary exhibitions. 1515 Sul Ross, 713-525-9400.
This article appears in Sep 28 – Oct 4, 2006.