All good things must come to an end as we sadly say goodbye to this year’s collection of Heights Boulevard sculptures. Artists will remove their much-beloved sculptures from the esplanade in mid-December, and if you happen to see them at work, please stop by, wave, honk… and let them know how much our community has enjoyed their work these last nine months. We are so proud of the 58 gifted artists who have participated in this temporary public art project over the last seven years—all from the great Lone Star State, including a significant number who call Houston home.
TRUE NORTH sculptures are available for purchase, and as an added bonus to the community, the artists will generously donate 20% of any sales back to TRUE NORTH’s designated fund for future exhibitions! Now…close your eyes and imagine your favorite sculpture adorning your own home or business.
JACK MASSING’s “LOCULUS” [wind vane + weather station] | 400 block
A long-time Heights resident, Jack Massing, whose works in collaboration with the late Michael Galbreth—together, known the world over as “The Art Guys”—have been included in more than 150 exhibitions and 40 solo shows in the U.S., Europe and China, and in high profile public art installations including two at Bush IAH. “LOCULUS’s” wind vane element is a large metal wrench that swings around the cardinal directions, and the sculpture’s whimsical No. 1 Repair Air pencil—of painted wood, metal and rubber—points to the viewer’s specific location on Earth—identified by the geographic coordinates indicated on the sculpture’s structural tower. $10,000
VINCENT FINK’s “Dodecahedron” | 600 block
A native Houstonian, Fink is a contemporary surrealist and full-time artist whose media include 3-dimensional works, screen-printed clothing, digital art, large-scale street art/murals, animation and interactive art installations. His early life started with drawing, then music, and out of college, a graphic design career. Fink works out of his Winter Street Studio in Arts District Houston—the colorful, urban, artist-centered community situated along the Washington Avenue Corridor and touting the highest concentration of working artists in the State. “Dodecahedron”—a 12-sided polyhedron with pentagonal faces of translucent acrylic glass, with paintings of celestial imagery, specimens and geometric orbital patterns—represents space or ether. $11,000
JACK GRON’s “Hard Rain” | 800 block
Recently retired as Chairman of the Department of Art at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, Jack Gron’s choice of metal as his primary sculptural material goes back to his upbringing in Steubenville, Ohio, where industry reigned supreme in the 50s, 60s and 70s, and his family all worked in the various mills, plants and mines. During college, Gron worked on the blast furnaces producing iron that would be converted into machine parts and structural and sheet steel of all alloys and shapes. With devastating Hurricane Harvey in mind, Gron’s “Hard Rain”—depicting a cloud form, driving rain and a vulnerable cityscape below—is made of aluminum and painted mild steel. $10,000
BILL DAVENPORT’s “Big Cabbage” | 900 block
After graduating with his M.F.A. from University of Massachusetts, Bill Davenport arrived in Houston in 1990—mattress strapped to the top of his truck—as a fellow of the Core Residency Program—an internationally-recognized post-graduate fellowship program at MFAH’s Glassell School of Art. Today, Davenport’s studio is in Independence Heights, and he is also proprietor of the fabulous Bill’s Junk in the Heights—a shop combining high art, low craft, nature and salvage, and a replica of which was once installed at CAMH. Davenport’s “Big Cabbage,” sculpted of polymer concrete and weighing in at 5,000 pounds, is his latest installment of giant vegetables found in the most delightful of places, including the popular “New Mushroom Forest” at Urban Harvest’s Community Garden on Studewood. $6,000 delivered!
LETICIA BAJUYO’s “Forces of Nature: Slinkys, Blue Skies, and Hurricanes” | 1200 block
Assistant Professor of Sculpture at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, Leticia Bajuyo has installed sculpture at Site Gallery at Sawyer Yards, the Nashville International Airport, Hillerman Library in Albuquerque and a 2020 installation at Historic Market Square Houston—10,000 CDs that would have otherwise ended up in a landfill. Bajuyo’s TRUE NORTH 2020 triptych sculpture was inspired by diagrams of hurricane development, pursuit of the ideal lawn and the spring movement of the Slinky toy. An interactive favorite among families who visit the installation, “Forces of Nature: Blue Skies, Slinkys, and Hurricanes” is made of steel and cobalt blue PEX tubing circling “perfect lawns” of artificial grass. Price available upon request. Sculptures may be sold separately.
JOSEPH HAVEL’s “On History” | 1300 block
Joseph Havel’s works can be found in numerous museum collections, including The Menil Collection, The Museum of Fine Art, Houston, and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. A small selection of solo shows has included the Center for Contemporary Art Kiev, Ukraine, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, and the Dallas Contemporary. Havel currently holds the positions of Director, Glassell School of Art, MFAH, and director of Glassell’s internationally-recognized Core Residency Program. Of his sculpture “On History”—which stands on historical tomes and seemingly reaches for the sky (or the future?)—Havel says, “‘On History’…is about the intimate and tactile way we experience questions about place, relationships and history.” $58,000 [Hiram Butler Gallery]
SHERRY OWENS & ART SHIRER’s “Carbon Sink” | 1600 block
With their studios in Dallas, together Sherry Owens and Art Shirer have merged their aesthetic sensibilities on over 20 sculpture installation projects spanning 30 years. Some of their more recent site-specific collaborations were “Art on the River,” Port Jefferson History & Nature Center, Jefferson, Texas, and “entangled” UMLAUF Sculpture Garden & Museum in Austin. Their collaborative sculpture for TRUE NORTH 2020 is created from discarded cuttings of the sinewy crape myrtle which are beautifully entwined together with hardware and, finally, carbon finished. A timely topic, Owens and Shirer say that “‘Carbon Sink’ is a visual metaphor of an organic storage place for the carbon dioxide present in our atmosphere [and] . . . [t]his sculpture represents a depository for the greenhouse gases that affect our environment.” Price available upon request.
the late BOB “DADDY-O” WADE’s “El Gallo Monument” | 1800 block
A boulevard favorite among young and old alike, Bob Wade’s El Gallo Monument—replete with colorful piglets and a “monumental” rooster—was inspired by his childhood fascination with “roadside stuff . . . during long trips on those old Texas highways.” His other outdoor works include 40’ tall cowboy boots in San Antonio, 25’ wide longhorns at UT Alumni Center in Austin and a 70’ tall saxophone now playing at the Orange Show in Houston (and all in the Guinness Book of World Records). Close friend and…Big-Ass Art book collaborator, W. K. Stratton of Texas Monthly wrote shortly after Wade’s death: Bob was an accomplished artist, best known for his outsize sculptures of cowboy boots and an iguana and his series of paintings of cowgirls based on postcards from the early 1900s. He had earned a master’s degree in painting from UC-Berkeley and could quote Clement Greenberg and other important art scholars. His work has been exhibited at the Whitney and other highbrow museums, even though, as art critic Dave Hickey observed, the biggest influence on Daddy-O’s work seemed to be the homecoming float. Bob’s sculptures and paintings are taken seriously by his peers, yet they are also as much fun as any parade. His fans include legions who have never read a word of art criticism or set foot in a gallery. That was fine by Bob. Full Texas Monthly article. Considered Wade’s last sculpture, “El Gallo Monument” is $25,000.
For information about any of the artists, or their works offered for sale, please visit TRUE NORTH 2020 or contact us at boulevardart@houstonheights.org.
TRUE NORTH and the Houston Heights Association, its 501(c)(3) nonprofit sponsor/partner, would like to thank our community- and arts-minded 2020 Underwriters—it simply cannot not happen without your support.
