VISUAL ARTS + MUSEUMS

The Contemporary Arts Museum Houston is pleased to announce two projects by SKYDIVE in conjunction with the museum’s current exhibition No Zoning: Artists Engage Houston: the Saturday Free School for the Arts (SFSA) and a new version of its spring 2009 exhibition Sisyphus Office.

The Saturday Free School for the Arts follows the model of community schools established by radical and revolutionary groups, such as late 19th and early 20th-century anarchists in Spain whose Modern Free Schools spread political and practical knowledge to a broad spectrum of society. SFSA will offer workshops, lectures, and skill sharing classes at no cost to its participants, and will take place in the Cullen Education Room located in the lower level of the CAMH. The first class, ukulele lessons, will take place on Saturday, July 25, at 2:00 p.m. Classes usually last 1-2 hours and will be held at CAMH through October 4.

Sisyphus Office, an exhibition linking art and administration, will recur in non-art-related spaces at the CAMH, such as the front desk, staff offices, and museum elevator. Organized by SKYDIVE and San Francisco-based artist and curator Jonn Herschend, this project will feature works of art by Alex Clausen, David Fullarton, Elysa Lozano, Joe McKay, and Susan O’Malley. Fullarton’s absurd office notices blend into the existing architecture of the front desk to become part of regular office communication.

In the museum elevator, Lozano’s takeaway submission forms call for proposals for one’s own socialist organization. And O’Malley’s colorful posters, containing inspirational phrases such as “The sky is the limit” and “Make it happen,” are installed on the windows of the staff offices (5201 Bayard*) and are viewable to passersby.

A complete description and map of the works’ locations will be available at the front desk of the museum.

The works simultaneously aestheticize and subvert commercial spaces and workaday lives using what its organizers describe as “notions of existentialism, Romantic Capitalism, artistic Romanticism, and deadpan slapstickism to examine the artifice that keeps us clinging to reality and distracted from the void.” Herschend coined the term “Romantic Capitalism” to refer to the notion of creating something based on a dream or fevered vision.

“This is the sort of business that someone creates because he or she has an idea,” says Herschend. “They simply go for it and throw caution to the wind. This is the opposite of corporate capitalism. Houston is a metaphor of this. The city is free form and has no zoning law.”

*CAMH staff offices are located at 5201 Bayard. Walking: from the museum, exit to right, take right at Bissonnet and Bayard (located directly behind the CAMH)

ABOUT SKYDIVE
Celebrating its one-year anniversary, SKYDIVE is a cutting-edge artist-run space whose mission is to add to the dialogue in Houston by exhibiting projects by artists working outside of Texas. The aim of SKYDIVE is to host a range of art practices that push the limits of their material forms, including non-traditional methods of sculpture, installation, video, performance, and works that engage the viewer through participation, as well as text and web-based projects. www.theskydive.org

SKYDIVE’S SATURDAY FREE SCHOOL FOR THE ARTS - SCHEDULE
For information on the Saturday Free School for the Arts sessions, please contact Sasha Dela, (713) 551-3497, info@theskydive.org. All classes will take place at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston in the Cullen Education Room, lower level of the museum. No advance registration required.

July 25, 2:00-4:00 pm: Learn to play the Ukulele
Instructor Ariane Roesch and special guest

August 1, 2:00-3:30 pm: Capoeira Master Shows Basics
Instructor Mauricio Campos

August 8, 2:00-3:30 pm: Come Talk with Lauren Kelley
Artist Lauren Kelley interviewed by Christian Baer

August 15, 3:00-4:00 pm: How to Look at Rock Videos as Art
Instructor Bill Arning

August 22, 2:00-4:00 pm: Learn to play the Recorder
Instructor Rosane Volchan O'Coner

September 5, 2:00-3:30 pm: Learn About Free Schools
Instructor Sasha Dela

September 19, 2:00-3:30 pm: Contemporary Music in Film
Instructor Marcus Cone

Pictured:  Susan O'Malley, THE SKY IS THE LIMIT, from Inspirational Posters series, 2009.