Artpace is open from 12 to 5pm Wednesday through Sunday. As always, we are free and open to the public.

Please join us in welcoming Amada on Wednesday, November 28, between 5-7pm at downtown’s historic Esquire Tavern. Let’s give her a Texas-sized welcome that exhibits San Antonio’s knack for warm hospitality and cold, refreshing beverages.

Image credit: Photo by Wendi Kimura

Here Mat Kubo discovers radio frequency interference on our speakers, while simultaneously doing his best theramin virtuoso Clara Rockmore impression.

Come visit Artpace sometime and ask for a live demonstration. Public hours are Wednesday through Sunday, 12-5pm. Free parking at 513 N. Flores.

“I was a student at San Antonio College when Artpace was being built,” he muses, adding that he used to drive by during his breaks to see the 1920s building (once a Hudson automobile dealership) at 445 N. Main Avenue progress into a contemporary art institution that would house a world-renowned artist residency program.

A sculptor—he works primarily with cast bronze—O’Brien spent seven years at a foundry in Bastrop, and continues to create as a practicing artist. “Here at Artpace, I’m looking forward to meeting all the different residents from everywhere,” he says. “And getting back into a high-art setting.”

Since his arrival at Artpace, O’Brien has been working with resident artists Dor Guez (Tel Aviv, Israel), David Benjamin Sherry (Los Angeles, California), and Sarah Sudhoff (San Antonio, Texas), whose exhibitions will be unveiled on Thursday, November 15, at our International Artists-in-Residence Public Opening, including an Artists’ Dialogue moderated by guest curator Heidi Zuckerman Jacobson, Director and Chief Curator at the Aspen Art Museum.

Image credit: Photo by Chris Castillo

I’ve known Amada to be an enthusiastic visionary who’s innovative approach is revered by artists and her peers, which is why I was so thrilled to learn she’d be joining our staff. Not to mention that her long history with Artpace—first as a guest curator for an International Artist-in-Residence selection panel, then as a member of the Board of Visitors and Board of Directors—gives her a keen understanding of the uniqueness of our program. Claire Ruud of fluent-collaborative recently conducted an interview with Amada for …might be good. When you read it, I know you’ll be excited too!

One of Artpace’s best and brightest is moving on and taking a position with small design build group to focus on his passion—contemporary architecture. Building Coordinator Anthony Talerico has been key to some of the most successful installations at Artpace and he will be missed. Best of luck to our friend and his family, wife Janell and their 9-and-a half-month-old daughter Olive.

Image credit: Photo by Wendi Kimura

Artpace: Your work has taken you all over the world—and particularly the United States—with stops in global cities such as Washington, DC, Chicago, New York, and currently Los Angeles, where you serve as Program Director at United States Artists. What challenges and opportunities most excite you about coming to a smaller, yet robust, artistic community in South Texas?

Cruz: I’m particularly excited about becoming a part of the cultural community of San Antonio. It’s always been such a welcoming and strong art town. Its more manageable size (as opposed to a sprawling Los Angeles, for example) means that you encounter people more often and then get to know them pretty well. I’m hoping that this can lead to opportunities for more collaborations with artists and organizations as well as for a more sustained engagement with audiences. The relationships can be almost familial.

Artpace: What do you think distinguishes Artpace’s International Artist-in-Residence program from other residencies around the world?

Cruz: Artpace’s residency program is unique in the way that it integrates the local and the global. From the beginning, the guest curators, who come from all over the world, have been asked to do studio visits with artists in Texas and include them in the residencies with artists working elsewhere in the US and abroad. That mix is one of the strengths of the program and gives a broader and more realistic view of creativity. Too often, cultural institutions with high ambitions neglect the talents within their own communities, and Artpace has never done that.

Artpace: As an Artpace “alum” yourself, how do you see Artpace’s relationship with its legacy—the artists and curators that have participated in its program, the works that have been created as a result of the residency program—playing out in the organization’s future?

Cruz: I’ve actually been thinking about how to incorporate Artpace’s curator and artist alumni into its future. Those are loyal folks (like me!), who all have such affection for the organization. Why not ask them back to contribute programmatically in some way? Artists as curator? Curators doing public programs? Some things to think about.

Artpace: What’s the first thing you and your husband Rick want to do or see when you arrive in San Antonio?

Cruz: We’re arriving in SA via a road trip from LA, which somehow seems appropriate. We’ll be stopping in Tucson and Marfa, and then arriving in SA and going straight to Artpace, where my husband’s never been. After that, we’ll probably want some good Tex-Mex food and beer. Any suggestions?