For those of you aching to know more about Graham Reynolds’ opera Pancho Villa From a Safe Distance, check out our new website! Panchovillaopera.com features a full list of the collaborators and some new videos, with more to come. Pancho Villa From a Safe Distance is the third and final chapter in Reynold’s epic Marfa Triptych. Tickets for Pancho Villa‘s public premiere on November 12 are now sold out.
To be added to the waitlist, please email [email protected].

  Don’t miss your chance to see After Effect, a group exhibition on view at Ballroom until Sunday August 21. If you can’t make it out to Marfa, check out this video walkthrough video directed by David Fenster. Ballroom’s next exhibition, This is Presence, part of Artists’ Film International 2016, opens September 23, 2016.

“It’s one thing to spend a long weekend in Marfa,” writes Leigh Patterson in Apiece Apart, “and another entirely to live and work there.” Patterson traveled to Marfa along with stylist Alexa Hotz and photographer Michael A. Muller to interview three Marfa women, including Freda owner Susannah Lipsey, ceramicist Mimi Dopson, and Ballroom Marfa Executive Director Susan Sutton. Sutton holds forth on minimalism, her changing self-perceptions, and other women that she admires. “Going into your fear is the only way forward,” she says.

Ballroom Marfa is excited to announce the launch of our Kickstarter campaign for Graham Reynolds’ experimental chamber opera, Pancho Villa From a Safe Distance,

the third and final installment of The Marfa Triptych. Join us in supporting this extraordinarily ambitious collaboration through Kickstarter today! Click here to visit the campaign page and find out more about the project and the unique rewards available to all Pancho Villa backers.

Ballroom Marfa is pleased to host Dengue Fever, the second of four exhibitions conceived for Arturo Bandini’s year long installation in the courtyard, a perfect copy of their iconic Los Angeles gallery. As a worm in an apple, or a tongue licking a psychoactive toad, or more to the point a wet willy, works by Kelly Akashi, Marten Elder, John Finneran, S Gernsbacher, Drew Heitzler, Sarah Manuwal, Calvin Marcus, and Roni Shneior surround and infuse the building (both inside and out), saturating it with meaning. Arturo Bandini is a collaborative project/gallery by artists Michael Dopp and Isaac Resnikoff. The gallery occupies a small building designed by Joakim Dahlqvist that fluidly transposes interior and exterior space, mirroring Bandini’s promiscuous curatorial sensibility. Documentation of the exhibition follows. All photos by Alex Marks courtesy the artists and Ballroom Marfa.

Ballroom Marfa recently hosted a lecture by artist Mary Weatherford, “Agnes Pelton and the American Transcendental” to complement After Effect, the current exhibition on view in Ballroom’s galleries. The lecture took place at the Crowley Theater in Marfa, TX on May 21, 2016. A painter herself, Weatherford speaks here on the work of Agnes Pelton, a member of the historical Transcendental Painting Group active in New Mexico in the 1930s and ’40s.
The Transcendental Painting Group’s manifesto identifies their aim as carrying “painting beyond the appearance of the physical world, through new concepts of space, color, light and design, to imaginative realms that are idealistic and spiritual” in an effort to “widen the horizon of art.” Watch Weatherford’s lecture below or visit Ballroom Marfa’s Vimeo page.

Thanks to everyone who came out for the opening reception of Arturo Bandini’s Dengue Fever. We had a blast and are so grateful for everyone’s support. Dengue Fever was made possible in part by the generous support of National Endowment for the Arts, Texas Commission on the Arts, the Ballroom Marfa Board of Trustees and Ballroom Marfa members.
Big shout outs to Vicente and Ramona for the amazing tacos; Nick Fisher for driving from L.A. to serve his Marfa Pale Ale and delicious cocktails; Don and Linda Shafer for artist accommodations; SAVED Wines for continued support of Ballroom programs; and Michael Dopp and Isaac Resnikoff, the brains behind Arturo Bandini.
Here are some images from the opening, courtesy of Emma Rogers. More photos after the jump.

Opening reception for Arturo Bandini’s Dengue Fever,

Vapegoat Rising, the micro-exhibition from Los Angeles-based artist collective Arturo Bandini, is only on view here in Marfa for a few more weeks, closing on May 29, 2016. Find updated images of the installation on Bandini’s website, and stay tuned for more information about their upcoming micro-exhibition, Dengue Fever, coming to the Ballroom Marfa courtyard on June 3 and on view until August 21. This upcoming program, also part of Ballroom’s ongoing After Effect exhibition, will include work from Kelly Akashi, Marten Elder, John Finneran, S. Gernsbacher, Drew Heitzler, Sarah Manuwal, Calvin Marcus, and Roni Shneior. Do Easy Art recently spoke with Michael Dopp and Isaac Resnikoff of Arturo Bandini about “the origin of their collaboration and their aspirations for the two-part exhibition” …

Was the desert landscape a big influence on your curatorial decisions?

We used the curatorial premise of the show inside the main gallery space as our organizing principle. Although we did enjoy the idea of imagining our friends works out there in the Texas landscape.

How do the two shows connect to each other? Is the second show a denouement or does it play a counterbalancing role?

Maybe it’s counterbalancing? Mostly we wanted to be able to have two shows. To ephasize that Arturo Bandini functions as a gallery, not a singular installation. It also allowed us to include the works of more people we like. We came up with two shows both reflecting different types of landscape. The first one, Vapegoat Rising, is rock and fog, so it’s a desert show of sorts, but a foggy dessert. The second show is jungle. Dengue Fever, is denser and more colorful. The work is less austere.

Keep reading at Do Easy Art, and find Fredrik Nilsen’s documentation of Vapegoat Rising in our After Effect photo archive.

Agnes Pelton
Ascent (aka Liberation), 1946
Oil on canvas
32 x 21 inches
Courtesy of Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, LLC, New York Ballroom Marfa Presents
“Agnes Pelton and the American Transcendental”: A lecture by artist Mary Weatherford
May 21, 2016 at The Crowley Theater in Marfa, TX
Doors at 6pm, lecture at 6:30pm
Free Ballroom Marfa presents a lecture by artist Mary Weatherford, “Agnes Pelton and the American Transcendental”, to complement After Effect, the current exhibition on view in Ballroom’s galleries. As a painter herself, Weatherford is particularly interested in the work of Agnes Pelton, a member of the historical Transcendental Painting Group active in New Mexico in the 1930s and ’40s, and will lecture on Pelton’s work, milieu and historical context. The Transcendental Painting group’s manifesto identifies their aim as carrying “painting beyond the appearance of the physical world, through new concepts of space, color, light and design, to imaginative realms that are idealistic and spiritual” in an effort to “widen the horizon of art.” The resulting works were created using methods simultaneously scientific and metaphysical. A classically trained painter, Pelton was co-founder, first president, and the eldest and most experienced member of the group. Born in Ojai, California, Mary Weatherford lives and works in Los Angeles. Weatherford earned her B.A. at Princeton University in 1984 and was a Helena Rubinstein Fellow in the Whitney Museum of American Art Independent Study Program in 1985. She earned her M.F.A.

Photo by Alex Marks

Ballroom Marfa invites the community to join us at The Capri in Marfa on Thursday, April 21 from 6-7pm for drinks and conversation. The Capri will be unveiling a specially-prepared cocktail for the occasion, and they’ve generously offered to get the first round of drinks for current, renewing and first-time Ballroom members. This gathering is free and open to the public, and we would love to take this opportunity to welcome you in person as a member of Ballroom Marfa. Ballroom Marfa needs you. Your support allows us to continue to bring invigorating visual art, performance, music, and film to our remote high-desert community. Contributions from Ballroom members allow us to host banner weekends like After Effect and Marfa Myths, as well as intimate programs such as last year’s Desert Surf Films series and this weekend’s free Bitchin Bajas show. Members also enable Ballroom commissions, such as Pancho Villa From a Safe Distance, the next installment in Graham Reynolds’ Marfa Triptych. Your enthusiastic participation at our events is a huge part of this support, but your financial contributions are also crucial to our efforts. Sign up for a Ballroom Marfa membership anytime online, or call us at 432.729.3600.