By Chip Chandler — Digital Content Producer
A pair of retrospective shows will spotlight artists with Amarillo-area connections, and local artist Ken Tackett will display works in a one-night pop-up show.
Jim Harter: Retrospective and Stephen Frish: Outside Looking In
A pair of retrospective shows opening Friday will put a spotlight on the works of two artists with Amarillo connections.
Jim Harter: Retrospective will be on view in the Creative Research Lab, Suite 3 in the Galleries at Sunset Center, 3701 Plains Blvd., and Stephen Frish: Outside Looking In will be on view in the West Texas A&M University Experimental Gallery, Suite 66 at the galleries. They'll both open with 6 p.m. Friday receptions during First Friday Art Walk at the galleries.
Harter, a San Antonio-based painter and collagist who died in 2015, was influenced by surrealism and psychedelic art. A graduate of the then-West Texas State Univeristy, he also worked in Austin, France and New York City.
"Of anyone I know, he was the truest to himself," said Harter's sister, Barbara Whitton of Amarillo, who is helping organize the exhibition. "Some of his work would confuse people, but he kept true to himself. ... I think his work is very beautiful, and you'll see he was a very spiritual person."
Harter was "a bit of an Amarillo art legend," said Jon Revett, a WT assistant professor of painting and drawing who runs the gallery spaces. "We are doing the show to demonstrate WT's commitment to highlighting the Amarillo art community and honoring the artist and his family."
The exhibition will hang through Nov. 18.
Frish, who died earlier this year, worked as an art director and graphic designer in Minneapolis for such companies as Pillsbury, General Mills and 3M. As a commercial display designer, he was well known for his watercolor illustrations.
"Over the years, (Frish's) passion for painting — and specifically watercolor and gouache — manifested in a body of unusual and thought-provoking works that will challenge the conventions of the medium," said his son, Scott Frish, a WT professor of art.
The exhibition will hang through Oct. 24.
Outside of First Friday Art Walk, the gallery is open by appointment only. For information or appointments, email Revett at jrevett@wtamu.edu.
Shimmer: New Paintings by Ken Tackett
Amarillo artist Ken Tackett will display works he calls "beautiful and grotesque" in a one-night-only pop-up exhibition on Oct. 14.
Shimmer will open and close with a reception running 6 to 10:30 p.m. Oct. 14 in R Gallery inside the Galleries at Sunset Center.
"The majority of my work is illustrations of moments where you see people's emotions or inner beings shimmer and reveal more than is normally seen by others," Tackett said in his artist statement. "My figures and portraits are often in a state of flux; they hide one thing but reveal another."
Chip Chandler is a digital content producer for Panhandle PBS. He can be contacted at Chip.Chandler@actx.edu, at @chipchandler1 on Twitter and at www.facebook.com/chipchandlerwriter on Facebook.
