A Famous Artist’s Hoop Dreams Come to Life at CAMH — Including a Fully Playable Roundball Court!
Mar. 17, 2023
THE CONTEMPORARY ART Museum, Houston has a basketball jones.
(Courtesy of Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston)
CAMH COURT, a fully playable basketball court conformed to the dimensions of the CAMH’s Brown Foundation Gallery, designed by internationally renowned Houston artist Trenton Doyle Hancock, opens to the public this Saturday, March 18, at 11am. The day includes a Spring Community Celebration from 1-6pm and a reception following the CAMH’s Teen Council’s Fashion Show from 4-6pm.
Born in Paris, Texas, and a Houstonian since 2000, Hancock has said he believes artists possess superpowers. The pantheon of complexly rendered mystical creatures who populate his paintings, drawings and three-dimensional works — a population as varied as that of the Marvel universe — certainly attests to that statement.
Combining his fascination with action figures, board games and other children’s toys with the tropes and dogma of abstraction, Doyle’s art is intensely autobiographical and even brutal in its depiction and critique of racism, war and anti-intellectualism. It’s colorful and often very funny but pulls no punches.
In contrast, CAMH COURT is all about joy, a celebration of physicality and community, where visitors, including those under the age of 18 accompanied by a parent or guardian, are invited to check out an Adidas basketball from the museum’s front desk and dribble, pass and hook shot as Doyle’s wide-eyed, black-and-white-striped “Brickback” characters observe all of the action from baseline to baseline.
Throughout the exhibition’s run, which is timed to coincide when the NCAA Men’s Final Four lands in Houston this spring, the CAMH, Adidas and community partners will activate the court with special programming and events, including the CAMH BALL on April 29, the museum’s annual gala and art auction. (The dress code this year requires sneakers. No, we’re not kidding.)
CAMH COURT will be on view, and playable March 18-April 27.
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SURE IT'S A bit chilly, but have you noticed the butterflies are back? On Saturday, March 18, beginning at 10am, Houston Botanic Garden celebrates the iconic and endangered monarch butterfly with March for Monarchs, an interactive family-friendly “march” through the Garden that mirrors the over 3,000-mile spring-to-summer migration of monarch butterflies from Mexico to the northern U.S.
For Houston Botanic Garden Education Manager Erin Mills, monarchs are a “gateway bug,” as they are typically the first butterfly species people are able to recognize. “The monarchs’ lengthy migration spans multiple generations and encompasses most of the continent,” says Mills. “There really isn’t anything else like it in the world.”
Beginning at Woodland Glade, the Garden’s outdoor event space, participants will learn about the symbolic meaning of butterflies in Mexico and saddle up with supplies for the hike, including a proboscis (straw) for sipping complimentary nectar (punch or tea). The first stop is the Culinary Garden which features an “egg station” with information about how monarchs, upon their arrival in Texas, lay eggs and then die, leaving the following leg of their migration to the next generation.
Next up is an oak grove overlooking Sims Bayou, where participants will learn about “citizen science projects” created to help monarchs. From there, the group will cross the Garden’s Bayou Bridge, and traverse an obstacle course designed to evoke the challenges and threats monarchs encounter during their migration. Finally, at the Susan Garver Family Discovery Garden, hungry humans will celebrate the end of their arduous journey with sweet treats, drinks, music, a community mural, crafts, and games.
Even cooler, participants will receive a native milkweed plant from Mustard Seed Farms to take home and use to start a pollinator garden. “With migratory monarchs recently classified as endangered, and their decline an indication of trouble facing other pollinators, there has never been a better time to plant native milkweed,” says Mills.
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