VISUAL ARTS + MUSEUMS

Please join the Houston Arts Alliance for the dedication of Open Channel Flow by Matthew Geller,  a new permanent work for the City of Houston Art Collection.

Hosted by:

Houston Public Works & Engineering Department
Houston Parks and Recreation Department
Houston Arts Alliance

DATE: Friday, September 25
TIME: 4 - 6 pm
LOCATION: Buffalo Bayou Park, just west of Sabine Street Pump Station
MORE: Parking is available in City Lot H at Fonde Community Center, 110 Sabine Street

Matthew Geller is particularly drawn to overlooked or underutilized environments, which can include anything from private imaginary worlds within brick walls to back alleys to sprawling open public spaces. It is in these environments that he teases out small fragments of narrative by augmenting or amplifying the raw materials of a given place. He asks the viewer to engage with both what was always there as well as what might be. His public art works are playful, humorous, unexpected and accessible. They have an ability to engage a broad cross section of the public often in situations of unusual intimacy. The works, which offer a seductive invitation to participate, support the notion that public art can have a broad appeal without being what is most familiar.

Matthew’s public art commission for the Sabine Water Pump Station in Houston opens in September 2009 and will, like many of his other works, use water as one of its primary materials. He is also working on a design-build commission for the new municipal court in Austin, Texas and a ‘Pocket-Park’ for the Nottingham neighborhood in Cleveland, Ohio.

He has produced numerous temporary public artworks in downtown New York City, as well as projects at Evergreen House in Baltimore, Wave Hill in The Bronx, Arthouse in Austin, and the Long Island Children’s Museum. He has also produced sculptures and installation in both galleries and museums.

He has received fellowships from the American Academy in Rome, The National Endowment for the Arts and the New York Foundation from the Arts, among others. He has received grants from the Creative Capital Foundation, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Art in Public Spaces program, the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, the Greenwall Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts and the New York State Council on the Arts, among others.

Matthew Geller lives and works in New York City.

For more information on the artist, visit www.matthewgeller.com.