Even in these last weeks of 2021, the year still has an indeterminate feeling about it. In many ways, it began as an ugly coda to 2020: The COVID-19 pandemic was still unchecked by vaccines, which finally became widely available around March and April. The 2020 election didn’t feel over and done with, especially after the insurrection of January 6, an encapsulation of the Trump era with its combination of farce and violence. And then, of course, there was the deadly statewide freeze and grid failure in February.
Yet, by the summer, it didn’t seem things were all that bad. As more jabs were administered, cultural venues, including art museums and galleries, reopened. The public, including hundreds of thousands of new Texans, flush with cash, seemed eager to reenter the world and reengage with art. The Texas Biennial returned, as did local art events across the state that were canceled the previous year. And yet, 2021 is ending on a note of trepidation as another coronavirus variant spreads.
So what to make of all this? What makes 2021 strange is that there doesn’t seem to be a widely shared mood. There are plenty of valid reasons to feel optimistic, pessimistic, exuberant, exhausted, content, anxious, or some tangled combination of the above. By turning to art, perhaps we can help clarify, if only to ourselves, what 2021 was all about.
Below is a brief email conversation (lightly edited for clarity and length) among Texas Monthly contributors Michael Agresta, Molly Glentzer, and Rainey Knudson on works of art they felt captured something essential about the year, and on forthcoming 2022 shows they’re excited to see. —Josh Alvarez, arts and entertainment editor
MA: I’m curious what we’re all excited about for 2022. Any exciting developments on the Texas art horizon from where y’all stand? My answer to that is perhaps a small thing, but I thought it was very cool that I got to attend an absolutely top-notch art exhibition in Waco this October. The show, featuring paintings by reclusive mailman/genius painter Kermit Oliver, has been extended through Jan 22, 2022 at Art Center Waco. A lot of Texas cities are booming right now, not just the biggest ones, so it’s fun to see a town like Waco start to put itself on the map, artwise.
RK: Kermit Oliver is wonderful. I’m glad for the reminder to see that show in Waco.
As for me, the show I’m probably most looking forward to is Lynda Benglis at the Nasher Sculpture Center in Dallas, opening in May. Benglis is a genius with materials, and the show will focus on new and recent work, including her wonderful, meaty wall works covered with glitter. Some readers might be familiar with the Benglis in the permanent collection at the Fort Worth Modern—a wonderful, dark gray, blobby corner piece from 1970 titled For Carl Andre. Her work is rough-and-tumble and super energetic. I can’t wait.
MG: I am hopelessly and unrealistically ambitious: I want to see everything!
But if I have to choose . . . I am jazzed about the prospect of geeking out with “Soundwaves: Experimental Strategies in Art + Music,” which opens at Rice University’s Moody Center for the Arts in January. It will combine sculpture, audio, video, painting, and performance, and it will feature a bunch of artists whose work I love (Anri Sala alert, Michael!), plus some I am looking forward to learning more about. Nevin Aladağ, Nick Cave, Raven Chacon, Charles Gaines, Jennie C. Jones, Idris Khan, Christine Sun Kim, Jason Moran, Sarah Morris, and Trevor Paglen also are on the list. And Jamal Cyrus, Spencer Finch (whose lighting installation hangs at the MFAH’s Cafe Leonelli), and Jorinde Voigt are creating new works for it.
