Written by Adelaide Roueche-Beard, TAG Curatorial Intern
In conjunction with the Narrated Memories exhibition running from September 5 to December 7, The Art Galleries at ACC are hosting three gallery talks. These talks explore the themes of the works of ACC alumni Laurie Frick, Heather Parrish, and Michael Villarreal. The second talk in this series, “Art + Political Engagement,” happened on October 13 in Gallery 2000.
The Art + Political Engagement program brought together a panel of art educators to discuss the intersection of art, education, and politics, in conjunction with the Community College Humanities Association 2023 National Conference. The discussion included Bernie Diaz (Art Department, Chair), Yousif Del Valle, (Art Department, Associate Professor), and Madeline Kinkel (Humanities & Religion, Assistant Professor). The roundtable discussion was led by Olivia Spiers, TAG Gallery Coordinator for Outreach & Programming.
In accordance with the website, Art + Political Engagement focused on Heather Parrish’s Double Down and the ways in which art can be a catalyst for political discourse and engagement. Parrish’s body of work explores themes of inhabitation and of “boundaries as fluid composites of [perception]” (Parrish). Double Down is the product of Parrish’s collaboration with Katherine Leah Pace, an urban environmental historian who has researched the lesser-known history of Waller Creek–an urban waterway that travels through the heart of downtown Austin, forming the original east-west racial divide later reinforced by the construction of I-35. (For more information on Waller Creek, see: https://admc.austincc.edu/tag/narrated-memories/)
Heather Parrish, Scar (Not Too Close), 2022, polymer photogravure, 21 x 30 in. Image courtesy of the artist.
Using Parrish’s art as a jumping-off point for art education Spiers states, “[Double Down] touches on the cycles of displacement in Austin. . .There are a lot of ways that art can be political. . .When someone interacts with an artwork, it’s really two narratives interacting with each other: the visitor’s narrative interacting with the narrative the artist is trying to communicate.” Adds Del Valle: “You can make your own connections without ever reading about the artwork yourself. . .what I got [from the artwork] is not invalid.” Says Kinkel “The artist may have intended something, but it’s our job to see what it is that the work is actually doing. There are other narratives to be made.”
“I try to remind students that every artwork is a product of its sociological origins,” continues Diaz, “your interpretation is the highest expression of you interacting with these works.”
Within the current political climate, educators in particular are feeling intense scrutiny towards the material they choose to cover and how they present it. As noted by Diaz and Spiers, teaching itself is a political act. Choosing to engage students with works of art like Parrish’s challenges them to reconsider the attitudes and outlooks that they bring to art beyond the artist’s intention, and ultimately challenge their values as emerging professionals and political actors
Narrated Memories features artwork from ACC alumni Laurie Frick, Heather Parrish, and Michael Villarreal. It explores how memories are collected and rebuilt in our personal lives, as well as in broader social contexts. This exhibition is on view from September 5 – December 7, 2023.
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