MEDIA CONTACT:

Vanessa Ormsby, RCA Communications Manager

(361) 320-2064 / vanessa@rockportartcenter.com

WATER’S EDGE TO MAKE A SPLASH AT ROCKPORT CENTER FOR THE ARTS

Larry Graeber exhibition runs April 6-May 26

ROCKPORT, Texas (March 27, 2024) — Whether salt or fresh water, river, lake or ocean, Water’s Edge, features the work of painter and sculptor Larry Graeber, depicting the boundary between land and water where their distinct properties, solid and fluid, meet.  

Graeber’s work will be on view and available for collection April 6–May 26, 2024, in the McKelvey Charitable Fund Gallery with a public artist reception on Saturday, April 13, from 5–7 p.m., to coincide with the monthly Austin Street Art Walk a free, alfresco, walkable art experience featuring RCA and other galleries located in downtown Rockport. The shows and reception are free and open to the public.

“Water’s Edge will be right at home in Rockport,” said Catey Arnold, The Barrow Foundation Curator of Exhibitions for RCA. “Looking at Graeber’s artwork is like looking out our windows at the bay and over Austin Street, right down to the striking shared color palettes reflected throughout the exhibition.”  

Graeber’s work continues to be about convergences, both subtle and consequential, with his paintings, drawings and sculptures frequently drawing on regions featuring the convergence of land and water. Whether vast like the Rockport coast or intimate as a small pond, he finds places where land and water reach one another to be profound and influential to his worldview.

“I love the phenomena of three or more elements spurring a reaction that settles into a new condition,” said Graeber. “That it can be familiar or unfamiliar, subtle or remarkable, and that it is going on all the time is intriguing. As confidants, my paintings, sculptures and works on paper are about weaving a tale descriptive of these experiences. Ignited by imagination they become memories and symbols evoked by these convergences as the journey resumes.” 

Whether painting on canvas or foam board, his medium can include oil, enamel, foil leaf, tape, and the use of such tools as trowels, sticks and squeegees, even the conventional brush. When making sculpture, all sorts of ingredients often considered debris may be involved, including wood, cardboard, tape, paint and twine. His work on paper is mostly collage-instigated, using miscellaneous materials such as foil wrappers or even portions of other drawings to get a work started, which then might include oil stick, graphite or felt tip with no particular rules or limits.

Raised in Austin, Texas, Graeber has early ties to the Texas Coastal Bend, including one of his father's first architectural projects, the now Motel 6 across from the Rockport Harbor Marina, and his grandfather owning a waterfront property on nearby Indianola Bay. As a youngster, Graeber spent many evenings red fishing from the slip into the bay and listening to short-wave radio transmissions of distant ships at night. Dark and remote with only small and few far-away lights and the short-wave radio traffic connecting them to distant places, he gained an appreciation for the coastal waters and their connection to the planetary scheme.

Although Graeber originally intended to become an architect like his dad, his college studies at Southwest Texas State University quickly changed direction as he began studying printmaking, jewelry, painting and sculpture — even a little filmmaking. By his second year, he had already found a studio in downtown San Marcos that he devoted to painting.

Graeber began exhibiting in 1971, curated into Texas Painting and Sculpture Exhibition, Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, with his first major one-person exhibition following in 1974, Works from a Small Duplex, hosted by the McNay Art Museum, in San Antonio. After a brief hiatus, he acquired gallery representation in Houston and Dallas spending subsequent years devoted to area venues and some sizable steel sculpture making.

In 2011 Graeber turned his attention to curating as well, mounting the Margins exhibition, featuring six artists and a catalog with an essay for The University of Texas at San Antonio campus gallery. In 2016 he was invited to participate in Meet the Future, the first pop-up exhibit at the McNay Art Museum, and in the fall of 2019, just before the pandemic, he and sculptor Sterling Allen collaborated on Formal Proof in the project room of Contemporary at Blue Star, San Antonio, featuring an exhibit of wall and floor sculpture with an accompanying catalog and essay by Anjali Gupta. Graeber has also appeared in numerous articles and publications including two books: “Art at Our Doorstep” (2008), and “Texas Abstract: Modern/Contemporary” (2014).

Graeber currently works in San Antonio and Marfa, Texas, studios. 

For more information on Water’s Edge, visit rockportartcenter.com follow RCA on Facebook, or call (361) 729-5519.

About Rockport Center for the Arts

The new 1.2-acre Rockport Center for the Arts is located a block away from Aransas Bay in the heart of the Rockport Cultural Arts District. Designed by the award-winning team at Richter Architects, the state-of-the-art campus features a two-story, 14,000-square-foot, visual arts and education building with four galleries and five classrooms (204 S. Austin St.); a one-story, 8,000-square-foot conference and event center, known as The ROCC, (106 S. Austin St.); with a 16,000-square-foot Sculpture Garden serving as a visually inspiring transition space between the two buildings. The hours of operation for the showroom, galleries, and gift shop are Tuesday–Saturday from 10 a.m.–5 p.m., and Sunday from noon–4 p.m. Admission is always free. For information on event space, or to book an event, call (361) 450-8033. For general information and to become a member, visit rockportartcenter.com, follow RCA on Facebook, or call (361) 729-5519.

About Austin Street Art Walk

Austin Street Art Walk is a collective effort of the Rockport Center for the Arts and Moon Over Water Gallery in partnership with Rockport galleries, restaurants, and businesses located along Austin Street in the Rockport Cultural Arts District. Scheduled the second Saturday of each month, April through December, from 10 a.m.–6 p.m., Art Walk is a free, alfresco, walkable art experience featuring an ever-changing mix of participants and art mediums such as paintings, ceramics, jewelry, photography, textiles, as well as live music, artist demonstrations, food and more. Follow us on Facebook for more information.

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