Perry House "Happyville"

. Speaking with the artist on Houston, his career, and Happyville (scroll down for exhibition instalation) . . . . . . Born in Orange Texas in 1943, Perry House graduated from the California College of Arts, Oakland, CA in 1970 and has been living and working in Houston for the last 30 years. As Houston's art scene was coming of age, House was one of the early pioneers of abstraction, showing with some of the most historically notable galleries in Houston,  including William Graham, Davis/McClain, and Inman galleries. In the collection of the Houston Museum of Fine Arts,  the artist received an NEA fellowship award in 1990 and mounted solo efforts at Diverse Works in 2000, curated by Susie Kalil, and 2004 at the Galveston Arts Center curated by Clint Willour. Perry House's earlier bodies of works from 1987 and 1994 (ill. 7 and 8 below) defy as much convention as possible while still being able to refer to the finished art object as a painting. The artist in these works strips away decoration, narrative, sex, politics, and even perspective, while at the same time evoking the passage of time, weight, depth, and our mortal coil. Artists in early Houston of Perry House's generation, Dick Wray, Don Foster, and Lucas Johnson, hung out together, had to hang together, and had to hang tough in a provincial backwater. They were the few, but remained undaunted until the culture in Houston caught up. Well now it's time to celebrate. Perry House and a few others survived, and are doing quite well in the new millennium. House arrives in "Happyville" with a more or less optimistic perspective as well as metaphorical overview of who, what and where we are going. "My art has always been about some particular opposites. Elegance and violence, humor and horror, the sacred and the profane. Things are sectioned, distorted and exploded. That's been my artist's statement as long as I can remember. I have it tacked to the wall"

House quotes the late great and boisterous Los Angeles artist of the 1950 and '60's John Altoon. " I'm drawing a picture in my mind of what's on your mind. I'm a little confused in my mind, but your mind is coming in clear as hell." For Perry House the Happyville series is another version of Vanitas. "The neighborhoods are still-lifes in a way. They are in transition like everything in our lives."  The traditional vanitas painting was popular in the Netherlands in the early 1600's and contains collections of objects symbolic of the inevitability of death and the transience and vanity of earthly achievements and pleasures. In Perry House's latest body of work the colors are indeed joyful, there is plenty of perspective, with recognizable architectural elements not evident in earlier works even while the world and worldly things are floating away and the happiness precious but fleeting. (courtesy DMA  Nau-haus 2009)

images of Happyville instalation: for individual works please scroll down

individual works below:

Happyville series, acrylic on canvas, 48"x 60" y.2009
 

Happyville series, acrylic on canvas, 36"x 36" y.2009

Happyville series, acrylic on canvas, 48"x 96" y.2009

Happyville series, acrylic on canvas, 48"x 48" y.2009
 

Happyville series, acrylic on canvas, 24"x 72" y.2009
 

Happyville series, acrylic on canvas, 36"x 36" y.2009
 

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Perry House 1987 series on canvas (ill. 7)
 

Perry House 1994 series water media on paper (ill. 8)