Hudson (Show)Room Exhibition: Farm to Market

Robert Pruitt, Chris Sauter, and Allison Wiese
10.28.04

About the Artists and Exhibition

Traveling from country to city, any driver of American roads has no doubt passed
a sign reading FM?Farm to Market. Such fluid paths between
rural and urban space serve as the departure for this exhibition. It presents
recent works by three Texans?ert Pruitt, Chris Sauter, and Allison
Wiese? alternately employ sculpture, collage, photography, and
architectural interventions to explore similarities and mythic differences between
the two locales these roads connect.

Robert Pruitt uses found objects and materials?man Rockwell
prints, crack vials, hair extensions?question the perceived gap between
suburban and urban culture. Through insertions, deletions, and juxtapositions, he
rewrites traditional notions of our past and present landscape.

Included in this exhibition are examples from Pruitt's series reworking
Norman Rockwell's ubiquitous depictions of a culturally and spatially divided
society. In New Kiddz in the Hood the artist toys with the classic image of
just-moved-in African-American youngsters warily meeting their new white
neighbors. Using digital manipulation, Pruitt graffities the moving van with
REVOLT and places the album Fear of a Black Planet on a nearby chair.
As in other works, such as his ante-bellum Chandelier, fashioned out of
crack vials, Pruitt's gesture of dislocation powerfully alters the expected scenario
and puts pressure on the cultural disparity tethered to geographic
boundaries.

Chris Sauter is known for reconfiguring suburban furniture into
landscapes (a recliner turned mountain) and excising galleries to create ghostly
Americana (dry wall turned

farmer's plow). Sauter explores the relationship between nature and culture?two realms often locked into rural and urban domains.

Sauter continues to question the connection, literally and figuratively,
between country and city with Power Lines, a scaled-down series of
electrical towers constructed of shafts of wheat. Another work locates a volcano,
grain silos, a construction site, and city skyline all in a single plane. Sauter
collides disparate worlds to suggest that technology/culture is built upon
land/nature, and that the two must partner in order to coexist.

Similarly, Allison Wiese inserts elements traditionally associated with
country living into metropolitan spaces. She has built an old-fashioned portico
onto the façade of a modernist building and brought a flock of sheep to graze in
the city. Wiese's works propose that rural and urban, often seen as opposing,
have essential common denominators and are closer than frequently believed.

In Fort two picnic tables, a quintessential urban-meets-rural signifier,
are propped up to create impromptu protection, as well as a pine cone-strewn
social space. The sight recalls picnics past but not those in the wilderness. These
lunches were in city parks or at roadside rest stops?ces neither entirely rural
nor urban. Coupled with Wiese's large-scale photo of a paintball in an exurban
field and her homemade whisky still made out of superstore parts, the piece
reminds that there is no clear boundary dividing rural/nature from urban/culture,
but rather pockets of in-between and mingling.

The works by Robert Pruitt, Chris Sauter, and Allison Wiese in Farm to
Market describe the interlinked spheres of rural and urban space. The
artists challenge the assumed dichotomy between country and city, thereby
romanticizing neither and acknowledging the complicated exchange of ideas
and identities between the two.

Artists' Biographies

Robert Pruitt received his MFA in painting from the University of Texas at
Austin, TX in 2003. He has had solo exhibitions at Celementine Gallery, New
York, NY (2004), Galveston Art Center, TX (2003), and Project Row Houses,
Houston, TX (2003). He was included in Splat Boom Pow!,
Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX (2003), and Come
Forward, Dallas Museum of Art, TX (2003). Pruitt currently lives in
Houston, TX.

Chris Sauter received his MFA in sculpture from the University of
Texas at San Antonio, TX in 1996. He has had solo exhibitions at Elizabeth
Dee Gallery, New York, NY (2004); at Art Basel | Miami Beach with
Finesilver/FYI, FL (2003); and at Artpace San Antonio, TX (1999). He was
included in Twang, Art Museum of Southeast Texas, Beaumont, TX
(2004), and Come Forward, Dallas Museum of Art, TX (2003). Sauter
currently lives in San Antonio, TX.

Allison Wiese received her MFA in visual arts from the University
of California at San Diego, CA in 2000. She has had solo projects at Sculpture
Space, Utica, NY (2004); Women and Their Work, Austin, TX (2004); and
Lawndale Art Center, Houston, TX (2003). She was included in Texas
Prime, DiverseWorks, Houston, TX (2004), and Siting Sculpture,
Dallas Center for Contemporary Art, TX (2003). She is based in
Houston, TX.

Exhibition Dates

October 28, 2004 ?nuary 16, 2005

Opening Reception

Thursday, October 28, 6:30-8:00 PM

Gallery walk-thru with the artists at 7:00 PM

Brown Bag Lunch

Wednesday, November 17, 12:00-1:00 PM

Join Education and Curatorial Associate Kate Green for a tour of Farm to
Market and a brown bag lunch provided by Sip ($6.50). Please call Artpace
for menu and reservations.

Look For It

As part of a monthly partnership with the San Antonio Current, two
related images by Robert Pruitt appear in the paper on October 21. The
unidentified images challenge the notion that media images continue to have
the power to provoke thought.

Event Location

All events held at ArtPace, 445 N. Main Avenue. Free parking at N. Flores and
Savings Streets. ArtPace is open to the public Wednesday thru Sunday, 12-5
PM, Thursday 12-8 PM, and by appointment. There is no charge for
admission.

About ArtPace

ArtPace, A Foundation for Contemporary Art | San Antonio serves as an
advocate for contemporary art and as a catalyst for the creation of significant art
projects. We seek to nurture emerging and established artists and to provide
opportunities for inspiration, experimentation and education. Through our
International Artist-in-Residence Program, we invite nine artists annually to
participate in a two-month residency which supports the evolution of new ideas in
art. Our broad range of panels, lectures, artist talks, and studio visits cultivates
diverse audiences for contemporary art and provides a forum for ongoing
dialogue.

445 North Main Avenue San Antonio TX 78205 t 210 212 4900 f 210 212 4990 www.artpace.org