Provenance Gallery February Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present, LUCRE, an installation featuring recent work by Jenelle Esparza.

In a continuation of Esparza’s work with cotton, Lucre will be comprised of approximately 250 pieces of handmade cotton paper money, various found objects, and graphite drawings. The focus of this installation is the fiber itself, the hands it passes through, and the money that passes in all directions. 

“The cash flow goes down the hierarchy of the company and into the hands of the workers only to be recirculated back into the the economic flow. It’s ironic that the very money being circulated is made primarily out of the fiber being picked. The installment of the cotton money pieces is meant to represent this directional, stigmatic flow and transformation of the cotton fiber. This surge is occasionally interrupted by various artworks and found objects that are meant to steer the thought process to issues surrounding cotton such as legal matters, provision of labor, and of course the human element.” 

- Jenelle Esparza

ABOUT THE ARTIST 
Jenelle Esparza is a photographer originally from Corpus Christi, Texas. Though primarily a photographer, Esparza also works in multi-media installation and creates abstract photo-based pieces. She received her BFA in photography from the University of Texas at San Antonio in 2010 and continues to exhibit annually. She was recently awarded the 2015 NALAC (Nat’l Association of Latino Arts and Culture) Artist Grant for her project ‘El Color de la Obra’ on Latinos in the South Texas cotton industry. She has exhibited nationally and currently manages her photography studio working for local artists and arts organizations.

Artist's Website: www.jenelleesparza.com

Exhibition will be on view until February 26th, by appointment.

PROVENANCE GALLERY JANUARY EXHIBITION

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present, File>Save For Web, an exhibition featuring the work of digital artist, Acidwinzip. 

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Opening Reception: Second Saturday, January 14th, 7pm - 10pm 

Exhibition on View until January 27th, by appointment 

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Her digital collages are inspired by nostalgia, Internet culture, Religion, and Art History and are comprised of computer-generated images and other elements, cut and pasted onto a digital canvas. The work is mostly a humorous take on modern internet consumer culture, our obsession with nostalgia and the internet persona. It explores the contrast of traditional art -vs- modern computer-generated art and remixing the two to create something new. 

This series of digital collages was developed over the past year and was primarily made for online viewing through the artist’s Instagram feed. This exhibition is the first time the collages will be displayed off-line and the artist, who until now has remained anonymous, will reveal her identity for the first time. 

ABOUT THE ARTIST 

Acidwinzip is a multimedia project developed by artist Ursula Zavala with works in digital and video art. Acidwinzip began November 2015 as a personal Instagram art project. She has remained mostly anonymous up until this point in an attempt to let her work to speak for itself and obtain its own identity or “persona.”

She has worked on numerous art collaborations with other digital artists who share her vision for internet-inspired art. She recently made the shift to video and has created animated versions of her usually static images, sometimes adding music submitted by musicians.

Zavala was born and raised in San Antonio’s South Side. She studied Fine Arts at San Antonio College and Our Lady of the Lake University. She currently works as the second half of a local freelance company called VLH Illustration + Design. She is available for commissions and artists collaborations. 

Artist’s Website: www.acidwinzip.tumblr.com

Provenance Gallery December Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present, Denial, an exhibition featuring mixed media ceramics by Elyse Grams. Join us for the Opening Reception on Second Saturday, December 10th. Exhibition will be on view until December 27th by appointment. 

ABOUT THE EXHIBITION
“I created these pieces in response to a personal loss nearly a year ago to the date of this opening. They represent the continual re-imagining of my life, and the way we try to fill holes within ourselves and others in order to pull ourselves back together. We compartmentalize, organize, and re-file memories until they fit within boxes, that can be safely stored away, rarely to be recovered. We cover those boxes in beautiful things to hide any lingering loss or depth of feeling. 

I have taken functional ceramic vessels and warped them through a variety of techniques to make them ultimately useless, yet beautiful. I wanted these objects to show the way that we as a society hide our grief in plain sight. We are all coping with something, we are all collectively going through motions. We are all trying to be something.” -- Elyse Grams

ABOUT THE ARTIST 
Elyse Grams is a San Antonio based artist whose work explores qualities of femininity in conjunction with the ideas of functionality and uselessness. She approaches these ideas through a variety of mediums; clay, fiber, metal, and wood, using the form of a vessel as a springboard for these ideas. This work was the initial exploration of functionality and its many meanings and metaphors.

She will receive her Bachelors of Fine Arts with a concentration in Ceramics from the University of Texas at San Antonio in May of 2017. There, Elyse serves as Public Relations for Clay Fusion UTSA’s ceramic club on campus. In 2016 she was awarded first place in the Annual Juried Student exhibition. Elyse expects to continue her education in a Post-Baccalaureate program or a Masters of Fine Arts program within the next few years. 

Artist's Website: www.elysegrams.squarespace.com
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Provenance Gallery November Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present, Crux, an exhibition featuring recent paintings by Kat Shevchenko. 

"Crux is a documentation of the the internal world of the psyche in the moments of upheaval. When I came across the the word crux, meaning, the core, or essence of something resonated with me. I knew that was the impetus of what my current paintings' theme had been revealing. While I created them I was battling my internal morass with the need to reconcile changes that had transpired within and without. Life’s trials and struggles produce alchemical reactions that forever transmute the self. In Crux, I longed to capture the beautifully chaotic process of transformation at the pivotal moment as it transpires, or in the wake of its aftermath. This mysterious process is depicted in the feminine embodiment with symbols from the natural world to reveal what is simmering beneath the surface of consciousness. At times devastatingly emotional, at other times existentially retrospective, these are the introspective journeys within that are seldom seen."

ABOUT THE ARTIST 

Kat Shevchenko was born in San Antonio, Texas. She studied illustration at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, CA and painting at the University of Texas at San Antonio. In 2006 she ventured to Austria to study the Old Master’s/mixed technique of painting with oils over egg tempera under paintings. Guided by surrealistic automatism she continues to explore experimental approaches utilizing traditional oil painting techniques driven by inspiration from the natural world, dreams and life experiences which are interwoven into a personal mythology that has influences ranging across the spectrum from the Renaissance, surrealism, and symbolism and at times infuses a delicate touch of dark humor.

Exhibition will be on view until November 27th, by appointment.

Provenance Gallery October Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present Adorn the Mess, an exhibition featuring the work of Jen Frost Smith. Join us for the opening reception on Second Saturday, October 8th, from 7pm - 10pm.

Smith uses methods of action painting and collage to create an immersive environment in which symbols and mark-making express the layers of self-worth within the language of contemporary art such as painting, video, and installation. She is a self-professed Maximalist. 

"Crippling self-doubt offset by the need to create and share images makes a curious cocktail. There is a constant war anthem in the head of some artists. There is no pretty bow to wrap and deliver the flaws. Agoraphobic early morning sessions of wild mark making and late night impulses to record mundane processes form the curvature of the week. Let’s ignore the platitudes and face the mess. I’m the mess and my work is the mess. Let me adorn it for you to make it easier to look at."

Accompanying the installation at Provenance Gallery, during the month of October, is an interactive web-based performance located at adornthemess.persona.co.

ABOUT THE ARTIST
Jen Frost Smith grew up in central Texas and attended college at the University of Texas at Austin where she studied Trans-Media and Sculpture. After completing her BFA she moved to Baltimore, MD to study at the Maryland Institute College of Art and completed her MFA in Photographic and Electronic Media. She has exhibited work nationally including, Austin Museum of Digital Art, Co-Lab, Transmodern Festival, Museum of Human Achievement, Current Gallery, Freight Gallery and most recently, Pink Box Collective. She currently lives and works in San Antonio, TX, and is Co-Director and Resident Artist at Clamp Light Studios & Gallery.

Artist Website: www.jenfrostsmith.com

Exhibition will be on view until October 30th, by appointment.

Provenance Gallery September Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present Family Happiness, an exhibition featuring the work of Allison Valdivia. 

By viewing old family photos as artifacts, Valdivia creates her own stories, projecting hidden philosophies based on personal experience, on what she sees in the object before her, and from the lack of family history shared with her. She asks the questions: What is a family? What makes a family? The photo presents and depicts the idea, but by asking these questions, Valdivia goes beyond the surface of the image of the “happy family” by playing up particular emotions hidden within the photo. Valdivia aims to find her answers by creating images that depict a story forgotten or withheld. 

“I often find myself looking to the past, looking to my family and culture to find a sense of who I am. As a Latina, I feel a sense of guilt at times that I didn’t grow up knowing about my culture, about my family’s history. Growing up a military brat and an artist, I have felt a lot of pressure from my family, as I have strayed far from their concept of the ideal. In response to their rejection, I have felt an absence: myself in their lives, and them in mine. I am fascinated by the idea of motherhood, the relationship between a mother and a child, and the impact that the relationship has on both individuals. I am fascinated by both the idea of family and lack of family. Coming from a broken family, I try to see all perspectives, from the hurt child with the lack of the parent to the parent without a child.”

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Allison C. Valdivia is a visual artist and former military brat who found her way to San Antonio, Texas. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at the University of Texas in San Antonio, graduating in the Spring of 2016 with a concentration in Painting/Drawing and a minor in Art History. Her work has been exhibited throughout San Antonio at R Space, High Wire Art Gallery, and The San Antonio Art League Museum. She was featured in UTSA’s College of Liberal and Fine Art’s 30th, 31st and 32nd Student Art Exhibition at UTSA’s main gallery. Recent exhibitions include Print Austin’s “The Contemporary Print” exhibition at Flatbed Press + Gallery, curated by Mary Heathcott, executive director of Blue Star Contemporary Art Museum and Delta National Small Print Exhibition at Bradbury Art Museum, Jonesboro, Arkansas, jurored by Dennis Michael Jon, Associate Curator of Prints and Drawings at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. 

Artist’s Website: www.allisonvaldivia.com

Exhibition will be on view until September 30th, by appointment.

For more information, please contact Stephanie Torres at stephtorressa@gmail.com.

Provenance Gallery August Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present Momento, an exhibition featuring the work of Andrea Reyes. Please join us on Second Saturday, August 13th from 7pm - 10pm for the opening reception. The exhibition will be on view until August 28th by appointment. 

Reyes’ paintings appeal to the sense of touch through her use of different mediums to create actual physical texture. They are three-dimensional paintings with an interest in shape, a variation of tonality, and color. 

“I get to experience a moment of innocence by experimenting, discovering, feeling free, and being spontaneous with my work. I follow my instinct in order to know what I will do, what I am doing, and to know when I am finished. When creating each painting I try to be in the present and in the moment by forgetting what I created in the past or what will be the end result of my painting. 

I respond to options and changes as they arise, not thinking about perfection or judgment. Once I disconnect from everything meditation occurs during the process of my painting. Every action becomes an acquired knowledge and a new experience of using and applying and thinking about the next step in my work.”  

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Andrea Reyes is a San Antonio-based abstract painter. Her artistic process began at an early age when she took pastel, clay, and painting classes in her hometown of Piedras Negras, Mexico. Her inspirations principally come by being in the present time and having moments of innocence, experimentation, discovery, and also by acting spontaneously in her work, following her instincts. The paintings are characterized by using a variation of colors and tonalities using primarily acrylic and oil paints, in addition to other mediums when using textural compositions. Drawing and photography are other mediums that are big elements of her artwork. 

Reyes completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree with a concentration in Painting and a Minor in Business Administration in the University of Texas at San Antonio in December of 2015. She taught painting courses in Piedras Negras, Mexico during the summer of 2015 and is currently working as an art professor at private schools in San Antonio, Texas.

Reyes’ drawings and paintings have been exhibited in various group shows in San Antonio, Texas, including a Pop-Up Shop at Café Commerce, the 31st Art Student Exhibition at the University of Texas at San Antonio Art Gallery, and the BFA Group Exhibition at the University of Texas at San Antonio Art Gallery. 

Artist’s Website: www.andreareyesart.com

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Provenance Gallery July Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present Three Hail Marys, Two Our Fathers, an installation featuring the work of Lisette Chavez. Opening on July 9, and will be on view until July 23.  

“I lied at my first confession.”

Bored in weekly sermons and trips to holy sanctuaries, Chavez often found herself distracted by over- the-top ornamentation and violent imagery; it was both divine and unsettling. Religious icons in and out of her home became constant reminders of morality, pain and the grotesque.

In this body of work, Chavez uses texts to reveal personal confessions that imply shame. Hand-drawn images and the printed word serve as a biographical narrative, which document what she suppressed living in a conservative Catholic family. The “front” she carried became a way for her to conceal what she perceived then as a hypocritical household.

With her expansive collection of objects and icons, Chavez will transform Provenance Gallery into a sumptuous, shrine-like space, that will be simultaneously alluring and disturbing: 

“My intention is to convey the unease between purity, seduction and evil. Intricate drawings, repetition and pattern have become rituals in my process, which allude to the monotony of mundane rituals that occur in worship. Gaudy religious icons, which were once dull, have been heavily accessorized with “bling” in an attempt to make the object more interesting. They hint at the mass production of holy celebrities in order to sell faith.

Although I feel reverence for these religious icons, I question my faith because I have no remorse for my actions and my sins. By revealing my personal confessions, I hope to confront myself with truth and disclose the discomfort in trying to balance religious beliefs and actions in everyday life.” 

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Lisette Chavez was born and raised in the Rio Grande Valley, located on the southernmost tip of Texas near the Mexican border. An enduring interest in lithography resulted from a love of drawing at an early age. Her most recent work questions faith and confronts the discomfort in balancing religious beliefs and actions in everyday life.

She is an educator and printmaker, specializing in lithography. She earned her M.A. degree at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi and her M.F.A. at the University of Arizona. She is the founder of Show Me Your Print Shop, an international online resource and blog for print shop organization.

Her work is held in numerous museum, university and private collections including: the Museum of Texas Tech University, Lubbock; Monash University, Gippsland, Australia; Proyecto Ace, Buenos Aires, Argentina; St. Lawrence University, Canton, New York and the University of Colorado-Boulder. She is currently an Artist Lab Fellow and resident of the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center in San Antonio, Texas. Chavez is currently organizing Holy Press, a lithography workshop and residency slated to open in the Fall of 2016.

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Photos By David Rodriguez

Provenance Gallery June Exhibition

Provenance Gallery is pleased to present Omissions, new work by Nicole Geary.

The exhibition Omissions is a culmination of work created during and after Geary’s residency in Scotland in the spring of 2016. She was selected for the Hospitalfield Interdisciplinary Residency, and used the time to respond to place and the meaning she found in the rocks of the surrounding area:  

“I traveled to particularly important geologic sites such as Siccar Point at the North Sea, and studied other ephemera as it applied to my memory of the visit, including smells, weather, and even the bruises I got in traversing the landscape. In Omissions, I make connections to the story in the rocks and the telling of our own stories: leaving out some details, coloring the narrative, and the eventual erosion from our memories. These geologic sites helped me to see our stories much like a book, layered and lithified, but altogether a glimpse that is bright and tangible one minute and grayed out the next.” 

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Nicole Geary is an American artist hailing from the green, swampy lands of Florida, where she earned a BFA in printmaking from the University of Florida. She graduated with an MFA in printmaking from the University of South Dakota in 2013. She exhibits in juried print and sculpture shows, international residencies, and regularly participates in printmaking conferences. Geary teaches at the Southwest School of Art and St. Philips College, was a resident in the Artist Lab at the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center, and has been awarded a grant from the Artist Foundation of San Antonio. She exhibits nationally and internationally. Geary lives and works in San Antonio, Texas.

Artist's Website: www.nicolegeary.com