Matt Stokes: these are the days

arthouse

Artist talk Saturday, January 24, 3pm

If you missed Temporary Services' exploration of Austin punk at testsite, Matt Stokes's installation at arthouse probes the legacy of Austin punk scene from a whole new angle. His dual screen film installation flips performance on its head: he filmed the audience first and then asked the band to create a recording in response. Plus, arthouse is showing an array of ephemera Stokes has collected from insiders. Not to be missed.

Photography in the Abstract

Lora Reynolds gallery

Opening Reception Saturday, January 24, 6-8pm

Lora Reynolds brings back independent curator Maureen Mahony, who organized Suspended Narratives for the gallery in 2005, to put together works from the 1930s to the present that explore the idea of abstraction in photography. Artists include Margaret Bourke-White, Harry Callahan, André Kertész, László Moholy-Nagy, Gerhard Richter, Aaron Siskind, Wolfgang Tillmans, and Andy Warhol. Mahony will give a curator's talk at 7pm on opening night.

Adam Sipe: Sun Plays Keys

SOFA

Opening Reception Sunday, January 25, 12-4pm

SOFA presents works on paper by Brooklyn painter Adam Sipe. SOFA is a new apartment gallery with Sunday afternoon openings and a roster of emerging and established artists. SOFA is less interested in the finished product and, instead, emphasizes experimental and in-process works.

Heyd Fontenot: Business in the Front, Party in the Back

Art Palace

Opening Reception Friday, January 30, 8-10pm

NY Arts Magazine quotes artist Heyd Fontenot, "if there is a radical nature to sexuality, it lies not in its ability to titillate, but rather in its inherent powers of spiritual transformation." Be transformed among Fontenot's latest paintings of "naked people" at Art Palace.

Annette Lawrence: Free Paper

Flatbed Press

Through February 6

More than one person told us to go see Annette Lawrence's Free Paper when it was at Dunn and Brown last year. Now there's a chance to see it here in Austin. Lawrence has transformed all the junk mail she received over the course of one year into thousands of hand-torn strips of paper, neatly stacked on shelves—a meditation on the passage of time and the mundane.

Warren Oates in the Economic Crisis of 2008

Okay Mountain

Through February 21

Dave Bryant asked artists for their "ugly duckling" work for this show, and sometimes it shows. The premise is intriguing, however, offering a behind-the-scenes glimpse at what artists make that they wouldn't normally put in a gallery.

Show #21: Protagonist

And/Or Gallery

Opening Reception Saturday, January 24th, 6-9 pm

This group show examines the use of narrative and character in a variety of mediums, including video, multi-media works, painting and photography. Keep an eye out for former Austinite and twin wunderkind Ray Uhlir.

Drawing In

CADD Art Lab

On View through March 5, 2009

Seems like Texas can't get enough drawing these days. These works have been selected to highlight recent drawing-oriented activity in Dallas galleries, including po-mo drawings that have been cut, sewn and/or suspended in space.

Focus: Ranjani Shettar

Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth

On View through February 8, 2009

Ranjani Shettar makes sculptural installations that combine industrial and handmade materials. The artist is best known for her stunning suspended works, such as Just a bit more, 2005–06, made of delicate webs of beeswax which recently won wide acclaim in this year’s 55th Carnegie International.

Highway 71 Revisited: Barry Stone

Lawndale Art Center

Opening Reception Friday, January 23, 6:30 – 8:30 pm, Artist talks at 6:00 PM

The ongoing series includes photographs of Stone’s family, strangers under highways, fake flowers, abstracted galaxies made from flour, field recordings and collage. If you're not familiar with this Austin-based artist, you are seriously missing out.

Also be sure not to miss openings of Kathy Kelley's In the Space of Absence, Patrick Renner's found sound (Public Music Reconnaissance) (found telephone poles with attached sound-harvesting devices!) and Aram Nagle's Battle Play Set.

Brad Tucker: Tijuana Brass

Inman Gallery

On View through February 21, 2009

In Tijuana Brass, Austin based artist Brad Tucker has erected a sprawling suite of new floor and wall sculpture. Scissor gates, foam blocks, and carved wooden objects together compose an installation for the viewer to navigate physically, optically, and conceptually as a playing field of cultural associations.

Don't miss Darcy Huebler's Thought Process, also on view at Inman.

Hedwige Jacobs: new drawings

CTRL Gallery

On View through February 21

Using simple materials (pencils, pens and markers on paper), Jacobs creates drawings that playfully investigate how we live and interact as a society.

Cheryl Childress: ...That's All We Know.

Cactus Bra Space

Opening Reception Friday, February 6, 6-9pm

Cheryl Childress’s first solo exhibition, ...That's All We Know, presents the artist's photographs in conjunction with text exerpted from newspapers and crime testimonies. According to the press release, Childress's photographs stage "petty acts of accomplishment" to explore the thin line between "fantasy and delusion." We're not sure exactly what this means, so you'll have to go find out.

Kehinde Wiley: The World Stage: Africa, Lagos ~ Dakar

Artpace

Through May 3

The World Stage: Africa, Lagos ~ Dakar, organized by The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, opened last week at Artpace San Antonio. Featuring monumental new paintings by Brooklyn-based artist Kehinde Wiley, the exhibition builds upon Wiley's signature examination of figurative painting, drawing global inspiration from contemporary and postcolonial African art and culture.

Nature's Way

Unit B Gallery

Through March 7

Nature's Way explores the relationships that humankind and nature share—paying particular attention to the marks we make and the trails we leave behind, and natures responses to it.