New Ruby City exhibition celebrates landmark 1996 show by art luminary Frances Colpitt

Adding another voice to the chorus paying tribute to the late art-world powerhouse Frances Colpitt, Ruby City’s exhibition “Synthesis & Subversion Redux” takes the original spirit of Colpitt’s historic 1996 show “Synthesis & Subversion” and wrings new life out of it.

Nearly 30 years ago, “Synthesis & Subversion” sparked conversations about the new direction of Latino art and the radical approach a tight-knit group of artists took to identity, hybridity and intersectionality at the go-go turn of the century, when conceptual and minimalist currents reigned supreme.

A new group of five San Antonio artists — Juan Carlos Escobedo, Jenelle Esparza, Bárbara Miñarro, Angeles Salinas and José Villalobos — approach the original show’s borderland themes from a wildly different angle. Foregrounded above all else, alongside the beauty of mundane objects, is the importance of once-marginalized crafts and the importance of the body.

Escobedo’s cardboard-forged articles of clothing grow deeply intricate landscapes, for example, while Miñarro’s soft sculptures incorporate clothing worn by migrants. Salinas deconstructs immigrant motherhood using textiles and suspended elements, and Villalobos and Esparza explore the materiality of farm labor in the form of multimedia installation.

All in all, it’s a sprawling show that dwells on the themes of belonging, marginalization and past traumas, while also living on the cutting edge just as Colpitt initially envisioned 30 years ago.

Free (reservations recommended), 10 a.m.- 6 p.m. Thursday-Sunday, Ruby City, 150 Camp St., (210) 227-8400, rubycity.org.

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This article appears in Mar 5-18, 2025.