International Artist-in-Residence Exhibitions

In the midst of recent developments in programming (including the introduction of open studio events and a new curatorial residency to be inaugurated later this month by Chicago-based Erin Jenoa Gilbert), Artpace is set to unveil site-specific exhibitions created by Summer 2017 residents Christie Blizard (San Antonio), Rolando López (Aguascalientes, Mexico) and Kang Seung Lee (Los Angeles). Organized by Mexico City-based artist and curator Yoshua Okón, the trio of shows represents the culmination of residencies that began May 15. An assistant professor of painting and drawing at the University of Texas at San Antonio, Blizard once jumped out of an airplane with a Willem de Kooning drawing sewn into her skydiving jumpsuit, but is better known for her performative interventions on the early-morning sets of Good Morning America and The Today Show — where she’s always armed with signs bearing conceptual slogans such as “The Brokenness of Painting,” “Without You I Have No Mirror” and “The Absorption of Meaning.” Often focusing on the intersection of economy and culture, López’s work reached a pivotal juncture when he traced tons of toxic waste to the Guggenheim family’s mining and smelting operations in Mexico. Assuming the responsibility to address this overlooked history, López frequently incorporates industrial detritus in his work and has proposed to build the Guggenheim Museum of Aguascalientes — “a black museum, a sick museum, an underground museum.” A native of South Korea, Lee has worked to bring marginalized cultures, women and people of color to the forefront through his projects Covers (a photocopied archive presented as wallpaper and a series of five bound books) and Untitled (Artspeak?), a reinterpretation of the 1990 book ARTSPEAK created from a critical queer perspective.