Menil Collection Campus in Houston

CityCrush took a wandering down to Sugarland this past weekend to attend the Texas Junior Chamber of Commerce’s “Five Outstanding Young Texans” hosted by the Sugarland, Texas chapter.  After the festivities on Saturday night honoring Dallas’ own Raj Narayanan and Mary Nix Goodrich, we spent Sunday afternoon in the heart of Houston at several important arts venues.

1.  The Menil Collection:   The Menil opened in June 1987 to house, exhibit, and preserve the private art collection of John and Dominique de Menil.  Assembled over the course of many decades by Houston philanthropists, the collection is recognized not only for its quality and depth, but also for its distinctive presentation and eclecticism.  The Menil Collection’s diverse holdings represent many world cultures and thousands of years of human creativity, from prehistoric times to the present.  The museum is also recognized for presenting special exhibitions and programs throughout the year.  The Menil Collection anchors a cultural enclave of shaded streets where bungalows stand side-by-side with art-filled chapels, artist pavilions, and outdoor sculpture… the whole neighborhood shpaed by the vision and the spirit of the de Menil family.

The main body of art is the Menil’s extensive collection of Surrealist art.  They have an amazing collection of Magrittes (Thomas Crown Affair aficionados will appreciate it) ,and also dabble is some other more well known artists like Duchamp and Dali, oh yeah, and a Picasso that almost everyone just walks past because they don’t recognize his signature style.

Besides the Surrealist stuff, the collection houses an amazing array of modern art, including some critic favorites like Mondrian.  While none of the art is overly famous, they as a whole encompass a far reaching view of 20th century artwork.  In addition, the Renzo Piano designed campus also includes an impressive collection of artifacts and carvings from 15,000 B.C. forward.

2.  Rothko Chapel:   The Rothko Chapel invites us to extend ourselves beyond what we think possible.  When you enter the Chapel, everything seems very dark.  The Chapel is oriented toward the sacred and yet it imposes no traditional worship environment.

In 1964, Dominique and John de Menil commissioned the American Abstract Expressionist artist Mark Rothko to create a sacred environment.  Rothko’s fourteen majestic paintings of deep velvety blacks and rich purples successfully cultivate the spiritual qualities envisioned by the de Menils… reverence, intimacy, timelessness.  This modern work of religious art is comparable in importance to the Chapel of the Rosary in Vence, France, by Henri Matisse and Notre Dame du Haut Chapel in ronchamp, France, by Le Corbusier.

The Rothko Chapel offers hospitality to people from the world’s relgious traditions, as well as to those unaffiliated with a particular tradition.  All are welcome, every day of the year, to worship, meditate, or pray within the octagonal space of the Chapel.

More than 50,000 people from all over the world are drawn to the Rothko Chapel annually.  For many, the Chapel fills the role that old churches hold in European cultures and mosques hold in Muslim countries.  It is a place where an individual can be at peace in silence.  Free from interference… isolated but not alone.

In stark contrast to Rothko’s meditative space is artist Barnett Newman’s Broken Obelisk, which ascends from the reflecting pool in front of the Chapel.  The Broken Obelisk is one of only three such sculptures in existence, and the only one located in a reflection pool.  The de Menils purchased the sculpture in 1968 and dedicated it to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  The Rothko Chapel and the Broken Obelisk are considered among the greatest artistic achievements of the mid-twentieth century.

3.  Cy Twombly Gallery:   In 1995, collaborating with the Dia Art Foundation, The Menil Collection opened the Cy Twombly Gallery, a satellite building on the Menil campus.  Also designed by Renzo Piano, the Gallery houses more than thirty works by the abstract painter and sculptor Cy Twombly.

Emerging from the New York art world of the early 1950s, Cy Twombly brought a distinctive approach to painting and sculpture that evaded precise affiliation with the predominant movements of the twentieth century, including Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, and Minimalism.  Now, here you should read “scribbles and drips of paint” to the uneducated eye.  I wish I could be nicer, but I’m afraid that Cy is lost on me.  I need an art history class to understand the context and a biography to comprehend Twombly’s thought process.

Evidently, inspired by ancient Mediterranean history and geography, Greek and Roman mythology, and epic poetry, Twombly created (sometimes on a grand scale, in multiple-panel works) a frequently inscrutable world of iconography, metaphor, and myth.  The breadth of Twombly’s imagination and his interdisciplinary approach to subjects traverse vast distances, resulting in works that are at once baroque and spare, modern and ancient.

All in all, this area of Houston is a do-not-miss should you be wandering South.