Station Museum

In trying to visit all of Houston's museums, I have run into two questions: What constitutes a museum, and how can I find a listing of all of Houston's museums? I will comment on the first question in a later post, but for the second question, I have been using a variety of print and electronic resources to pull together sites to visit. One of the resources is a Museum Locator app that I had already downloaded to my iPhone. This is not a very robust app (it has missed many museums in other cities), but my search for Houston produced two museums that I had not heard of. So, the Station Museum of Contemporary Art was next up on June 15.

This museum emphasizes "fine arts and artists that are rarely, if ever acknowledged by other cultural institutions. The museum's goal is to encourage the public's awareness of the cultural, political, economic, and personal dimensions of art." This brought to mind a recent article in the New York Times: Should Classical Music Be Political? The artist on display, George Gittoes, specifically commented about his work: "My art isn’t very palatable—it isn’t meant to be—I feel that there are a lot of artists out there who are doing work which is about fashion, it’s about decoration or it’s about—how beautiful the world is …"

Sign advertising George Gittoes's exhibit

Art, in various media over time, has been political, scandalous, and unpalatable (and more). I tend to prefer art that is entertaining or morally uplifting, but I also appreciate art that challenges us. It is good that Houston has a museum with this goal in mind, and I wish I had heard about it before. I also was pleasantly surprised that they allowed photography inside (one of my pet peeves about museums).

USA sculpture at the Station Museum

Visitors are met with a political sculpture in the parking lot, and a sign on the door warned of "Strong Subject Matter." Highlights of the exhibit can be seen at the museum's website, and I found the artist's work to be thought-provoking and not too confrontational. In the end, I was rather ambivalent about the quality of the artwork, though I found his Blood & Tears from 1996 compelling. I did not make more than a quick pass through the exhibit, but I signed up for their mailing list to learn about other exhibits that might challenge (or inspire) me.

Warning sign on the Station Museum's door