New art blends with organic landscape

By Jaclyn Youngblood     3/11/10 6:00pm

Miracle-Gro is not responsible for the sculptures that have cropped up on campus; James Surls is. Rice was selected as the venue for seven of Surls' bronze and steel installation pieces, which are now featured in the Central and West Quads, the field next to Herring Hall and the area outside the BioScience Research Collaborative. The sculptures are part of a traveling exhibit that had been on display on New York City's Park Avenue. When University Art Director Molly Hubbard heard the show was coming to Houston, she submitted a bid for Rice to host the sculptures.

Hubbard said the Houston Art Alliance, which organized the Houston leg of the exhibition, selected Rice over city parks, promenades, and the art-friendly Heights District. Once HAA chose Rice as the exhibition site, Hubbard said the University Art Committee quickly accepted the bid.

Both HAA and the committee raised funds to cover the hard costs of the exhibition, which included the installation process, signage, securing a project manager and covering cost of shipping the sculpture to Houston from a Connecticut warehouse. Rice did not pay anything out of pocket.

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A Public Art Program student intern, Bradley Houston, said the committee applied for, and was awarded, a $20,000 grant from the city of Houston for exhibition publicity and promotion.

These funds will cover publishing costs of maps and guides, which will be placed in local hotels and tourist attractions, making exhibition posters and creating an iPhone application that pinpoints the location of the various art pieces on a campus map.

Houston, a Baker College senior, said the show is unique because of the extensive collaborative effort needed to bring it to Rice.

"It's a true community of Houston collaboration; it's not just a Rice event," Houston said.

Hubbard echoed Houston's sentiments about the show.

"We at Rice have utilized the resources of others and partnered in a true collaboration to bring this exhibition to Houston and to Rice," Hubbard said.

Hubbard said the sculptures arrived in Houston Feb. 19 and installation began the next day. After minor installation difficulties that day, the exhibit was fully installed by midday Feb. 21.

In the weeks since the sculptures' campus installation, they have evoked mixed emotions from students.

Martel College sophomore Simone Briggs said the arrival of the sculptures caught her slightly off guard.

"I'm sort of frightened by them," Briggs said. "They don't do much to brighten up the mood."

However, Baker College junior Tomás Lafferriere said he thought the sculptures provided a seamless integration between the natural and the man-made.

"The sculptures seem to soften things usually associated with industrial applications," Lafferriere said. "Even the flowers look like wind turbines and it makes the art look more natural."

Houston said he and many other students have shared Lafferriere's opinion.

"It's kind of the organic quality of the work itself that makes it look permanent, not as if it were just plopped there," Houston said.

The reaction from the Houston community has been generally enthusiastic, Hubbard said.

"This show has not even been announced, but the way people experience it has been phenomenal," she said. "Some people are already worried about the work leaving [Rice]."

She said some patrons have suggested purchasing one of the sculptures to keep at Rice. She added that much of the buzz has centered around the artist himself.

Houston added that Surls has had an important impact on Houston's recent art history.

"He was such a Houston figure for a long time . teaching and working, before Houston became an art center back in the 1970s," Houston said.

Surls' significance runs deeper than his Texas roots, Hubbard said.

"Surls' work is so powerful because it calls up these icons that are universal and people respond on a level that's not necessarily a thinking level, but it's more of a feeling level."

Rice was initially slated to receive only five of the seven sculptures, but HAA's final decision awarded all seven to Rice, Hubbard said. The title of the show, "Magnificent Se7en: Houston Celebrates Surls," then suddenly revealed itself, Hubbard said.

Houston said the title was fitting for the exhibition because it bespoke the nature of both the art and the artist.

"[The title] sort of typifies what we're talking about with these sculptures: They're all obviously these massive sculptures, but they all have something very individual and very human to say about the artist and about his way of viewing the world," Houston said. "I think that is what is magnificent about it."

Surls will be visiting Rice to celebrate the opening of the exhibition, Hubbard said. A private reception for patrons and sponsors will be held on March 22.

Hubbard said there will also be an open reception for the general public, featuring a lecture and question-and-answer section with the artist, March 23.

The sculptures will be on campus through the end of August.

Hubbard said she and the committee are interested in securing another traveling exhibit for Rice.

"Now that we've done this, we can't live without it," she said. "We could be one of the few institutes where we would have big, huge, changing exhibitions all the time."

Houston added that HAA is promoting temporary art exhibitions and would be interested in partnering with Rice on future projects.

The next display of public art coming to Rice is a series of 4-by-8 feet photographs by Charles Mary Kubricht, which will hang in the Raymond and Susan Brochstein Pavilion. Hubbard said the photographs will be presented before the end of the semester.

She added the committee is still searching for art for Duncan College and McMurtry College, to fulfill the "one-half of one percent" program that gives 0.5 percent of the construction budget of any newly constructed or renovated building to pairing art with the building.

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