CIVIC tv
PRESENTS
9
ARTIST INFORMATION
Latifa AlBokhari
Latifa AlBokhari is a Saudi Arabian multimedia artist born in the Middle East and
raised in Texas. Her bicultural experiences challenge her to observe beyond the
obvious to fully engage with the vigor and uniqueness of every subject. Her work is a
visual testament of her lifestyle and experiences as a young Brown woman in
America. The purpose of her work is to explore the complex feelings of being an
immigrant and woman of color in Texas. Through her work she is learning to own
the privilege of intersecting identities and redefine what it means. Her visuals
communicate what she fails to voice through words.
Sebastien Boncy
Boncy Is all six members of the Pugilist Press collective. MFA from the University of North Texas, BFA from University of Houston, currently doing the adjunct shuffle in the city of syrup. He takes pictures daily, distributes them freely, does it for the culture.
J Bilhan
For J Bilhan, a personal search for beauty and the sublime is at the root of his practice. Informal anthropology is another way to see it. With interest based in sound design, literature and print, earth landscapes, the experience of being human, and social-engagement; his work is evolving from visual arts to long-term experimental projects. Being home-schooled within an afro-mexicano, texan, evangelical christian family as a queer boy came with distinct social challenges which eroded his identity. In him, there is an idea that he is an outsider looking in, living a reality that is not his own on a foreign object called earth, and so he exist as an observer. Conceived in 2018, “variable embrace” is a social research project which aims to widen our understanding of sexuality, primarily through photography and conversation. Since 2014, he has been exploring “temporary sculpture” which seeks to challenge traditional ideas of material value. Between 2014-16, he was a co-founder and art director of tenativ, a company making products to combat the homelessness crisis.
In 2017, he established the collective cyberlarge who has since worked with Victoria Beckham,
warner music, and art review magazine among others.
Currently, j is studying music theory and piano in houston. Directed by his desire, seeking to uncover honest visions of beauty and the sublime will remain the skeleton of Bilhan's work as an artist.
Erin Carty
Erin Carty is a German-born, multidisciplinary artist currently based in Houston, Texas. She received her MFA from University of Houston and her BFA from Texas State University. Her work has been exhibited in cities and countries such as Houston, TX; Austin, TX; Marfa, TX; Alexandria, VA; and South Korea. She also participated in a residency with the University of Houston’s D.U.S.T. program in Marfa, Texas.
Growing up as a biracial woman, I have always been interested in finding out more and connecting the ties between my two histories. Through this discovery, I want to create my own worlds and histories, but also collapse realities. Recontextualize and recreate a new past and a new future and to figure out where I fit in with these realities.
Colby Deal
Colby Deal is an artist from Houston, Texas who has worked for many years documenting Houston's third-ward, the oldest historically African American neighborhood in the city. His large scale photographs depict the rich history of his deep family roots in the third-ward, reflecting at times the work of his father who also spent much of his life documenting this community.. HIs photographs, often framed in a deceptively simple manner, are covered in resin often trapping small bugs, hair, and detritus add a physicality to the works, and connect them in very real ways to the environments they were created in.
Cary Fagan
"Cary Fagan
Soft spoken Visual Connoisseur, Artist, Hero
More so one of the most important artists of our time.
Operating under the realm of the Batman trope Cary Fagan doesn’t say too much but his
presence however provides a deep sense of emancipation.
His twitter is a database of existential thought, His Instagram a database of studio experiments and
unprecedented endeavors in artistic revelation.
He is the walking personification of a Jazz Saxophone solo--An ambiguous serene enigma of
purity that creates fluid optical trance.
In February Cary, ahead of two huge landmarks in his career, gifted me the opportunity to have
a conversation with him. He was rounding up his third solo show in Nizhni Tagil Russia and
preparing for another, his homecoming, in his native Arizona.
We talked about a lot--from Pho to Jazz, to Tickets to Outer Space.
- STAMM Radio
Ronald Llewellyn Jones
Ronald Llewellyn Jones is a multidisciplinary artist based in Houston, Texas whose artistic practice incorporates photography, video, drawing, printmaking and sculptural installations.
Community acknowledgement and building are foundational elements of Jones’ artistic practice. Hisworks hint at a fabric that defines human beings, manifesting through project-based explorations of loss, connectivity within the community and the perceptual experiences of our everyday lives.
Lovie Olivia
“Architecture helps guide our thoughts and impulses. I’m interested in the history that spaces reveal, the clues and memories that are left behind. I am interested in Black spatiality, domestic memory, aesthetics and how the Black queer body fits into these spaces. I guess you could say that I am always working from a ‘If these walls could talk’ lens.”
- Lovie Olivia in an Interview with Emily Hynds
Jamie Robertson
Jamie Robertson is a visual artist and educator from Houston, Texas. She earned a BA in Art from the University of Houston and an MS in Art Therapy from the Florida State University. She is a former recipient of the Pearlie Roberson Award for her joint Frenchtown Mural project. As an educator, Jamie is interested in cultural community development through creative youth development. Her creative practice explores history and identity in the African Diaspora through photography, printmaking and sculpture. Her work was featured in the 18th Annual Citywide African American Artists Exhibition at the University Museum at Texas Southern University and FAMU Foster-Tanner Fine Arts Gallery Through the Lens: Identity, Representation & Self-Presentation. She is currently pursuing an MFA in Studio Art with a concentration in photography and digital media at the University of Houston.
