VISUAL ARTS + MUSEUMS

Join the Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts - UH and Blaffer Art Museum for Contemporary Salon: Okay Mountain, on Okay Mountain’s installation First Take on view at Blaffer Art Museum January 15 - April 2, 2011.

Blaffer Art Museum and the University of Houston Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts have teamed up once again to present a Contemporary Salon, a roundtable discussion on Blaffer's current First Take: Okay Mountain exhibition. The Salon will take place on Wednesday, Feb. 23, 6:30 p.m., at Blaffer Art Museum. Admission is free to the public and the talk will be preceded by a wine-and-cheese reception. The museum will extend its normal hours, remaining open through the duration of the event. Blaffer is located in the Fine Arts Building on the University of Houston's central campus.

For each Contemporary Salon, a diverse range of panelists featuring artists, arts professionals and experts discuss Blaffer's current exhibitions. Moderated by Blaffer director and chief curator Claudia Schmuckli, the Feb. 23 discussion will include Okay Mountain artists Sterling Allen, Nathan Green, and Ryan Hennessee, UH School of Art associate professor Rachel Hecker, and local gallerist and First Take: Okay Mountain underwriter Arturo Palacios.

"We're thrilled that three members of Okay Mountain collective are able to join us for this fun and lively discussion," said Blaffer curator of education Katherine Veneman. "What a real treat. Attendees will get to hear terrific insights on Okay Mountain's installation from the artists themselves in addition to individuals very familiar with their work," the Mitchell Center's director of programs Bree Edwards added.

Formed in 2006 in Austin, Texas, Okay Mountain collective is comprised of artists Sterling Allen, Tim Brown, Peat Duggins, Justin Goldwater, Nathan Green, Ryan Hennessee, Josh Rios, Carlos Rosales-Silva, Michael Sieben, and Corkey Sinks. Their exhibition at Blaffer, as described by the artists, explores the methods and rituals held in common by otherwise isolated groups -- from followers of self-help messiahs to fundamentalist cults to Fortune 500 companies -- who "employ a combination of initiation, insider/outsider mentality, esoteric language, and a hierarchy of progressive advancement to inspire a streamlined, new identity that supersedes the complexities of everyday existence."

For their Houston debut, the artist collective has created a series of discreet sculptures enveloped by lights, images, and sound. The colored lights of the totem-like Dream Machine spill out of emoticons that feature different variations on the graphic theme of Okay Mountain's logo, a smiley face inscribed in a triangle. Spinning around and around, it cast its hypnotic and dizzying spell as if to induce a state of trance.

Trust Staircase dominates the gallery with its massive ascending presence leading nowhere. Covered by glowing "coals," each illuminated step emits an inspirational directive to be absorbed and followed on the viewer's mental climb into an altered state of consciousness. The mattress placed on the ground behind the stair's high point suggests a soft and comforting landing to the leap of faith required by the journey into cult mentality -- or does it refer to a rude awakening?

At the other end of the gallery, the sculpture Bunk Beds offers a false image of nightly rest, with each bed equipped with pillows, sheets, blankets, and soothing vistas of a televised island paradise but devoid of the restful comfort of mattresses. One-way mirrors inserted at the head of the beds expose the potential sleeper to peering eyes from behind the structure and the backside reveals further possibilities of imposition. The exposed switches allow for the lights and monitors in the bunk beds to be controlled not from within but from a vantage point that permits the observation of the occupant and the adjustment of his environment from outside. Thus stripped from privacy and control, the implied occupant is subjected to voyeurism and manipulation.

Bleachers invite the viewer to watch Instructional Video, featuring the artists and hired actors demonstrating guidelines to handling everything from how to administer medical assistance to assembling furniture to how to do dishes. The corporate graphics, generic setting, clunky acting and robot-like delivery of the instructions in the voice-overs add to the story of depersonalization at the core of this exhibition.

The exhibition is organized by Blaffer director and chief curator Claudia Schmuckli, and marks the second installment of the museum's newly established project series First Take.

LOCATION: Blaffer Art Museum, University of Houston, 120 Fine Arts Building Entrance 16 off Cullen Blvd.
ADMISSION: Free

About Blaffer:
Founded in 1973, Blaffer Art Museum at the University of Houston was named in honor of the late Sarah Campbell Blaffer, a noted Houston arts patron and collector. Since its inception, the museum has been a vital force in the presentation and promotion of contemporary visual arts in Houston. Blaffer is located in the Fine Arts Building on the University of Houston's central campus, entrance 16 south of Cullen Boulevard. It is free and open to the public Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., closed Sundays, Mondays, university holidays and during exhibition installations (visit the website or call to confirm). The museum is ADA compliant. For general inquiries, please call 713.743.9521, or visit the museum online at www.blafferartmuseum.org.

About the Mitchell Center:
The University of Houston Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts cultivates interdisciplinary collaboration in the performing, visual and literary arts. From its base at the University of Houston, the Mitchell Center offers public events, residencies and courses that fuse artistic disciplines, ignite dialogue and present new ways of experiencing the arts in contemporary life. The Mitchell Center forms an alliance among five units at the University of Houston: The School of Art, Creative Writing Program, Moores School of Music, School of Theatre and Dance, and Blaffer Art Museum at the University of Houston. For general inquiries, please call 713.743.5548, or visit the Mitchell Center online at www.mitchellcenterforarts.org.