MUST-SEE ART

Warm up to these 8 must-see art exhibitions in Dallas-Fort Worth for June

Arden Bendler Browning shares her perspective on movement, time, and place in a solo show at Galleri Urbane this month.

Photo courtesy of Arden Bendler Browning

As the lazy days of summer approach, the frenetic pace of art festivals and exhibits quiets down a bit. But that doesn’t mean artists' voices are hushed; they’re coming through loud and clear.

The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth digs deep into post-war paintings, Dallas Center for Photography delivers a look at the compelling vision of women in photography, and several group exhibitions explore a range of media and subject matter.

Art lovers ready to welcome (or seek respite from) the warmth of June should put these eight exhibits on their must-see list.

Artist's Retrospective
Lewisville Grand Theatre, through July 8
Works by members of the Visual Art League (VAL) of Lewisville will be on display this month in the art gallery in Lewisville's Grand Theater. Each entry in the show judged by Denton-area artist Laurie Weller represents a self-retrospective of its artist. Since 1978, VAL has provided support and education for member artists, while members have judged student arts shows and taught art classes to senior citizens. Like all VAL events and programming, this exhibition is free and open to the public. And if you're a first-time visitor to this stunning theatre and arts center, you'll immediately understand why local art feels right at home here.

Madeline Donahue: "Art House"
Various Small Fires - Dallas, through July 8
Experiences of pregnancy, birth, motherhood and owning a postpartum body can be exemplars of the complexity of the mother-and-child relationship. Having experienced all of the above, Madeline Donahue explores all of them with oil paintings and colored pencil drawings on paper in this contemporary art solo show.

Robert Motherwell: "Pure Painting"
The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, through September 17
Abstract expressionist Robert Motherwell explored political, philosophical, and literary themes in various art forms throughout his life (1915-1991) while communicating as a spokesman for an art movement that wasn't particularly well-understood in its early days. Motherwell was a painter of note from the post-war period, but also showed talent as a collagist, a printmaker, and a draftsman. The Modern was the site for the last retrospective of Motherwell's work during his lifetime, and the museum owns more than 50 of his works. That makes it a perfect fit as a venue for this guest-curated retrospective focusing on his paintings.

"Hold Up Half the Sky"
Dallas Center for Photography (DCP), through-July 1
This photography exhibit is part of DCP's year-long commitment to women in photography. The juried (and judged) show highlights photos that tell a story, from more than 40 female photographers. Prizes have been awarded to Emily Buckley, Pamela Chipman, and Linda Plaisted for first, second, and third place, respectively. The exhibit is free and open to the public.

Leonardo Drew: Number 235T
Amon Carter Museum of American Art, June 17-June 30, 2024
Contemporary sculptor Leonardo Drew uses organic material and techniques of oxidation, burning, and decay to create works like the ones that will grace the first floor galleries at the Carter this month. The intricate, large-scale topography of Number 235T was commissioned specifically for this space, and reflects a connectedness that translates effortlessly from art to life.

Arden Bendler Browning: "Off Screen"
Galleri Urbane, June 24-August 12
Arden Bendler Browning's sense of wanderlust inspired both the subject matter and the method for creating the pieces displayed in this show. Many of the multi-media works began as sketches or watercolors made in a moving vehicle with her husband at the wheel and kids in tow in the back seat. First impressions appeared on yupo paper, which is waterproof, and were then layered with an assortment of acrylic paint, acrylic marker, spray paint, acrylic gouached, and fluid acrylic. Some were then adhered to round panels, symbolizing a portal to the place, time, and atmosphere Bendler Browning envisions. Meet the artist at the opening reception on from 5-8 pm Saturday, June 24.

10th Annual Texas Juried Exhibition
ArtSpace111, June 24-August 26
For this show, Texas artists were invited to enter their two- and three-dimensional works in pursuit of a top prize of $10,000 and a solo show. A portion of the entry fees will be donated to the Tarrant Area Food Bank, and at the end of the exhibition all entries (not just those selected for the show) will be displayed online in the gallery's Texas Now Online Showcase. The exhibition is free to attend, and all art on display is available to purchase. Join the artists for an opening reception from 4-7 pm Saturday, June 24.

"Art of Paper"
Laura Rathe Fine Art Gallery, June 24-August 19
This group exhibition promises "sequenced architectural wall reliefs, encaustic sculptures, biomorphic patterns, repurposed ephemera, and rhythmic compositions" demonstrating that creative options are limitless when the medium is paper. Each of the 15 contemporary artists from around the world elevates paper as art with perspectives that delight and inspire. The show is free and open to the public, with an opening reception from 4:30-7:30 pm Saturday, June 24.

Leonardo Drew Robert Motherwell galleries museums

A good listen

Dallas Symphony and Fabio Luisi release landmark Wagner 'Ring Cycle' set

Fabio Luisi conducting the Dallas Symphony Orchestra

Photo courtesy of Dallas Symphony Orchestra

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Fabio Luisi wanted his Ring Cycle to be heard and not seen.

Wagner’s four-opera epic Der Ring des Nibelungen, approaching the 150th anniversary of its premiere in 1876, has been reinterpreted and deconstructed by directors finding various meanings in the conflicts among gods, humans, giants and dwarfs.

While most new recordings are on video, Luisi led his Dallas Symphony Orchestra in concert performances that were released on 13 compact discs by Delos on May 22 and are available on streaming services.

“Wagner conceived this as a total immersion in visual and acoustic, but I could focus really only on the music, and this was the point actually — not to be distracted by staging and not to have to cope with maybe strange ideas of staging,” Luisi said. “I think the music tells everything.”

Luisi became DSO music director in 2020 and broached the idea while dining two years later with (the now late) Morton H. Meyerson, a longtime board member.

“Fabio came back from lunch sort of giddy but sort of sheepishly saying: `Do you think that this would ever be possible?” recalled Kim Noltemy, the Dallas CEO at the time. “So, I said, well, let’s give it a try. So, we called around to see if there were people who wanted to support it and did a budget.”

After securing a waiver from the orchestra allowing for the needed rehearsals and performance length, recordings were made during four concerts from May 1-5 and six more from Oct. 5-20. Each opera was performed two or three times.

Americans in cast fill big roles
American singers featured prominently, with Mark Delavan as Wotan, Lise Lindstrom as Brünnhilde and Sara Jakubiak as Sieglinde, part of a cast that included Christopher Ventris (Siegmund), Daniel Johansson (Siegfried), Deniz Uzun (Fricka), Tómas Tómasson (Alberich), Michael Laurenz (Mime) and Stephen Milling (Hagen).

Delavan sang Wotan at New York’s Metropolitan Opera in 2013 after Luisi took over from an ailing James Levine in Robert Lepage’s much-maligned production staged on a 45-ton set of 24 rotating planks.

“We’re accessible and they know that we’re hungry and we have a chip on our shoulders,” Delavan said. “What conductors like about American singers is their technique is sound. Even a European conductor would say: Well, I’m going to give up some of the communication skills, only one degree of separation with the language, but I’m going to get a solid technique, and I’m going to get pretty good acting chops.”

Lindstrom has been in Atlanta to sing in its production of “Götterdämmerung,” the concluding night of the tetralogy, leading to what is being billed as the first complete Ring Cycles in the America South in 2029.

“The wonderful thing about it is the intimacy between the orchestra and us, because we’re not separated by a chunk of stage or a chunk a scenery or a chunk of concept,” she said of the Dallas performances. “And for people like me, who have had the opportunity to perform the role before, I have all those iterations to rely on for my portrayal that I can sort of filter myself through.”

A younger Luisi listened to famous renditions
Luisi, 67, first heard a Ring recording in Georg Solti’s famous studio set with the Vienna Philharmonic from 1958-65. He also admires Karl Böhm’s live recording from the 1967 Bayreuth Festival and Marek Janowski’s 1980-83 studio version with the Staatskapelle Dresden.

He first conducted Ring when he was music director of Dresden’s Semperoper from 2007-10. Luisi’s Dallas performances include more legato and softer sound than his rendition a decade earlier at the Met. He tries to keep an arc from the first notes of “Das Rheingold” to the final strains of “Götterdämmerung.”

“I have a deeper understanding about the meaning of this piece,” he said. “I consider the ring to be a big Bruckner symphony. So we have the introduction, then we have the first movement, this is “Walküre,” which happens to be a slow movement, and then we have the scherzo, which is “Siegfried,” of course, and then the long, long, last movement. There is a unity.”

dso luisi ring wagner recording concerts music symphony