"A Battle of Ideas"

Reviewing the Museum of Modern Art’s “The Forever Now: Contemporary Painting in an Atemporal World,” The New Yorker art critic Peter Schjeldahl pegged the 2015 survey’s theme as “present pastness” while relating its message that “substantial newness in painting is obsolete.” In the artist’s statement for her new solo show at Sala Diaz, Houston-based artist, writer and educator Casey Arguelles Gregory references Schjeldahl’s bleakly titled review (“Is There Anything Left to Paint?”) and ponders the “singular troubles and glories” faced by contemporary artists. How this post-internet conundrum factors into Gregory’s “A Battle of Ideas” (which combines paintings inspired by memories and others offering “an almost aerial deconstruction of words and symbols”) remains to be seen. Eerie and dramatic, the show’s key image (a six-foot-long piece titled Something About Longing) conjures the suspense of standing at the edge of a cliff on an alien planet. For a peek into the UTSA alumna’s life up in Hustle Town, check out her blog Artstroller (artstrollertx.com), where she covers the Texas art scene with assistance from her 2-year-old daughter Clementine.