Faculty Member Faith Wilding Retrospective

If you are in the Houston area check out VCFA faculty member, Faith Wilding’s, retrospective “Fearful Symmetries” at University of Houston Clear Lake Art Gallery.

Opening Reception: Thursday, Sept. 1, 6-8 p.m.

Exhibition On View: Sept. 2 – Dec. 8, 2016

The first retrospective for this highly influential feminist artist features a selection of works from Wilding’s studio practice spanning the past forty years. The nationally touring exhibition highlights a range of works on paper – drawings, watercolors, collage and paintings – exhibited together for the first time.

Taking up key, allegorical imagery in Wilding’s work, Fearful Symmetries focuses on themes of “becoming,” both the transformative event itself and the threshold to transfiguration. Imagery of leaves, chrysalides and hybrid beings fill Wilding’s work. Videos of her two prominent performances, “Waiting,” 1974, and “Wait-With,” 2007,

also explore such liminal circumstances. The tour’s fourth stop marks Wilding’s first solo exhibition in a Texas visual arts space. 

Wilding immigrated to the United States in 1961 from Paraguay. In the early 1970s she was a key figure in the formation of the first Feminist Art Program in Fresno and at the California Institute of the Arts, where she also received her MFA.

Be the first to see the works on view and meet the artist at the opening reception on Thursday, Sept. 1, 6-8 p.m. At 7 p.m., Wilding will join exhibition curator Shannon Stratton to discuss her artistic process. This program is located in the UHCL Art Gallery and free parking will be available in the Visitor Lot or Student Lot D. Complimentary refreshments including craft beer from Saint Arnold Brewing Company will be served.

Top image: Faith Wilding, Fresno Feminist Art Program, 1971. Image Credit: Isadora Duncan. Collaborative costume image, staging Nancy Youdelman. Photography: Dori Atlantis

Bottom image: Faith Wilding, “Flow,” 2010-15. Chemistry vessels and cheesecloth. Photo credit: E.K. Waller

Faith Wilding: Fearful Symmetries is a traveling exhibition curated by Shannon R. Stratton in collaboration with Faith Wilding. The exhibition originated at Threewalls in Chicago in January 2014 with an archive, reading room and screenings curated by Abigail Satinsky. Assistance in presenting the exhibition at UHCL is provided by Verva Densmore and is funded in part by a grant from the City of Houston through Houston Arts Alliance.

The UHCL Art Gallery is Bay Area Houston’s premier venue for visual arts created by living artists. We are located at 2700 Bay Area Blvd., Houston, TX 77058, approximately 4 miles east from Exit 26 on I-45 the Gulf Freeway. The gallery is on the first level of the Bayou Building. Visitor parking is available on University Drive across from the Bayou Building and in the Student Lot D. Visit http://www.uhcl.edu/parking for campus maps and information on how to purchase a temporary pass from the parking kiosk. Any person needing an accommodation for a disability should contact the Office of Student Life at 281-283-2560.

E.K. Waller Photography