NPR for North Texas
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Best in class: Dallas Contemporary exhibit aims to boost graduate students’ careers

Shafkat Anowar | Dallas Morning News
Attending crowd learns about the art exhibit of Narong Tintamusik of UNT during Dallas Contemporary's inaugural graduate student exhibition, on Friday, Jan. 24, 2025 in Dallas.

The show and a new program will connect artists with collectors and the community.

In New York City and Los Angeles, MFA thesis shows are swarmed by collectors hoping to identify the next big talent.

In Dallas, Denton and Fort Worth? Not so much, said Lucia Simek, interim director for Dallas Contemporary.

“When Columbia or Yale or UCLA are mounting those student exhibitions, that's like a feeding frenzy for the artists that are coming out of those programs,” she said.

“When the grad programs in North Texas mount their exhibitions, you're lucky if your friends drive from Dallas to Fort Worth to go see your show.”

Simek hopes that a new initiative called the Dallas Contemporary North Texas Graduate Student Program will change that.

Curator Matthew Higgs talks about Dallas Contemporary's inaugural graduate student exhibition, on Friday, Jan. 24, 2025 in Dallas.

Open University

Every year, the museum will enlist a new visiting curator to tour artist studios at six North Texas graduate arts programs. The curator will select up to 15 students to highlight in an exhibition at the museum. One student from the exhibition group will win an $8,000 award each year. The program is funded for 5 years.Matthew Higgs, director and chief curator of White Columns, an alternative art space in New York City, is the program’s first curator. He toured 29 studios and selected 13 artists for the program’s inaugural exhibition “Open University.”

The show is on view at the Contemporary through March 9.

Higgs said he felt no pressure to make sure students from each program were represented, but he was happy it turned out that way. “I think that the exhibition is a testament to just how different the individuals were. There was really extraordinary diversity in terms of their personal histories, their backgrounds, their ages, their intentionality, their thoughts and ideas about their work and how it really might relate to the world,” he said. “That struck me as really exciting, interesting, unexpected. It wasn't like a kind of cookie-cutter MFA student.”

Shafkat Anowar | Dallas Morning News
Art exhibit of Verónica Ibargüengoitia of UNT during Dallas Contemporary's inaugural graduate student exhibition, on Friday, Jan. 24, 2025 in Dallas.

Walking on eggshells

One student, Veronica Ibargüengoitia, 54, is from Mexico City. She juggled her passion for art while raising a family, then enrolled in graduate school at University of North Texas after both of her sons finished college. Her installation, Otherness, is near the end of the exhibition. A pile of pillows invites viewers into a sparse structure. But to get inside, you must pass through a barrier of eggshells.The piece was inspired by her memory of driving to the United States with her family from Mexico City, having left many of their possessions and support systems behind.

“As an immigrant … you are very aware of your steps, of your movements, of what you are. You're very conscious of your words when you're speaking,” she said. “Also you feel very exposed.”

The inevitable cracking of eggshells is symbolic of the tenuous feeling Ibargüengoitia experienced moving through the world.

Shafkat Anowar | Dallas Morning News
Art exhibit of Vajihe Zamaniderkani of UTD during Dallas Contemporary's inaugural graduate student exhibition, on Friday, Jan. 24, 2025 in Dallas.

Caught in a kaleidoscope

Toward the other end of the gallery, a collection of bud vases and plant cuttings spreads out beneath three paintings from Vajihe Zamaniderkani. The Iranian painter is a student at the University of Texas at Dallas.

At first, the geometric shapes on the canvas are similar to the end of a broken kaleidoscope, with more negative space than one might expect from the classic toy. But the images are the artists' abstractions of a geranium, begonia and family members.The gaps mirror Zamaniderkani’s experience trying to find wholeness while feeling caught between two worlds.

“Sometimes I have to think for two days to find the Farsi word that I want to say to somebody, even in my native language,” she said. “I didn't fully learn English and I'm forgetting my native language as well. It's really sad, and I'm trying to show all these struggles that I'm dealing with in my artwork.”

After years of working retail and putting her art practice aside, Zamaniderkani was excited to return to painting and is grateful for the opportunity to participate in this show. “I believe if you work hard, it's going to get you somewhere. And, well, I want to be able to contribute to the Texas art community,” she said. “I want to stay here and keep doing my practice.”

Shafkat Anowar | Dallas Morning News
Part of the art exhibit of Sharmeen Uqaili of SMU during Dallas Contemporary's inaugural graduate student exhibition, on Friday, Jan. 24, 2025 in Dallas.

Bridging the gap

Like many of the students in the exhibition, the Contemporary’s Simek was a nontraditional graduate student. She got her Master of Fine Arts from Texas Christian University while raising her children. She understands the struggles art students face and wants to generate more opportunities for artists across North Texas. “The impetus was really to bridge some gaps, create some friction — both inside the schools and between the various groups in the city that I'd like to pay attention to these students — and make some healthy competition,” she said. “There's some pressure to really rise up and make the best work that they can and create the best artists that the universities can.

Higgs said the exhibition seems to be a success, but the true measure of the new initiative will come later. “I think that'll be an interesting thing to look at, say in five years time about the legacy of this exhibition and whether these are to stay in the area and how they participate culturally in the area,” he said. In the interim, one unofficial measure might be how many people are wearing the program’s swag - crewneck college sweatshirts emblazoned with “SMUTCUTWUUTDUNTUTA,” cheekily celebrating each of the participating schools.

“Open University” runs through March 9 at Dallas Contemporary, 161 Glass St.

For just over seven years Marcheta Fornoff produced a live morning news program on Minnesota Public Radio. She covered everything from politics to pop culture and breaking news