The Visual Arts Center (VAC) at the University of Texas at Austin is pleased to announce its spring 2021 exhibition program. In its 2021 season, the VAC reaffirms its commitment to being a platform for artists, curators, and educators to experiment and test ideas, sparking generative conversations about art and contemporary society.
Will Wilson: AIR / Survey
January 30–March 27, 2021
Large-scale resource extraction is a toxic reality for those living in the southwestern United States. From the mining of uranium, oil, and coal, to the rerouting of water sources to generate hydroelectric power for cities throughout the US, these material dislocations disproportionately harm Native American peoples in the region. An attention to these practices, and the impact they have on the human and non-human environment, defines the work of Santa Fe-based artist Will Wilson (Diné/Navajo). Large-scale photographs in AIR / Survey engage with the visual traditions of survey photography, while a new, site-specific installation envisions what an architecture of apocalypse might look like through structures built by a sole survivor. A new version of Wilson’s AIR Lab installation functions as a site for conversations about Indigenous medicines, cultural continuity, and food sovereignty.
Madeline Hollander: Score for 7 Solos
January 30–March 27, 2021
The rhythms, patterns, and mechanisms that define contemporary life inform Madeline Hollander’s interdisciplinary practice. In Score for 7 Solos, Hollander incorporates a selection of retired fire hoses from the Austin Fire Department, repurposing them for a site-responsive choreographic score. Recalling environmental catastrophes, including wildfires that swept through California in 2020, the fire hoses are a poignant reminder of the climate crises we experience on a regular basis. In the context of the gallery, they assume a new function as expanses of line, awaiting interpretation. Twisted and overlapping, the hoses create a complex network of loops color coded to represent the days of the week, referring to the way in which the pandemic has impacted our regular routines and the constancy of the 7-day week. Dancers from the UT Austin Department of Theatre and Dance will respond to the choreographic notations articulated by the hoses through improvisational movements. Documentation of these responses will be projected onto screens that face the gallery’s south lawn.
Luiz Roque: República
February 5–March 27, 2021
Drawing upon the visual language of sci-fi thrillers and documentary film, Luiz Roque’s poignant work reframes the social, geopolitical, and environmental shifts that have become defining features of contemporary life. Through filmic vignettes and photographs, Roque’s work addresses gender and identity, sensuality and desire, standards of beauty, and the repression of marginalized communities. His films transport the viewer to far off places, from desert landscapes to lush, green urban spaces to subterranean dwellings, shifting between utopian dreamscapes and dystopian realities. Luiz Roque: República is a focused look at his work from the last five years. In República (2020), the film from which the exhibition takes its title, Roque focuses on the discrimination experienced by immigrants, capturing the discomfort and disorientation described by the film’s main character, Marcinha do Corintho. Urubu (2020)—a new film made during the COVID-19 pandemic—references the loss of freedom that characterized 2020.
More information about spring 2021 exhibitions and associated programming can be found on our website.
The exhibitions and programs at the Visual Arts Center are made possible, in part, by the VAC Founding Donors and the VAC Circle.
