Artpace
Hudson (Show)Room

Outline
June 28–August 26, 2001

Coinciding with San Antonio’s Contemporary Art Month, ArtPace presents Outline, an exhibition in the
Hudson (Show)Room featuring three Texas artists, Emily Joyce, Hills Snyder, and Matthew Sontheimer.
Linking the artists’ work is reliance upon contour and silhouette to form images. This emphasis on the edge
results in refined images in which detail is removed, so that the reference is at once recognizable and
abstract. Indeed, the artists, whose authorial mark-making seems far from their concerns, find their sources
in existing material: a signature (Sontheimer), craft stencils (Joyce), or newspapers and flags (Snyder).
In this manner the artists both hint at a narrative and deny a conclusive interpretation. The enigmatic
results can be read formally, with sly references to pop art and minimalism, but also accept narrative
interpretation. For the exhibition each artist will present a major wall-bound work accompanied by a
selection of smaller works.

Emily Joyce forms her colorful compositions from adhesive vinyl cut in the shapes of craft-store stencils.
By presenting only a fragment of the figure or by layering multiple pieces, Joyce stalls viewers’
recognition of the images. With her particular stencils, Joyce creates a system that allows her to
subtly reveal a quality of innocence and wonder.

In Empire, Hills Snyder cuts four rectangular forms into the wall. The geometric outlines are in fact based
upon the flags of the Netherlands, France, Texas, Germany and The United Arab Emirates. Stripped of
their color and lone star, the flags appear as minimalist abstractions. Recognition occurs only
after time or perhaps after noticing the San Antonio Express News and newspapers from the other countries
lying on the floor marked with dust from the wall cutting. Snyder’s work quietly evokes historical
associations.

Matthew Sontheimer etches a cryptic script directly into the wall, only to cover his marks with a coat of
house paint. He diligently inscribes his messages in a specialized alphabet he created using sections of
his father’s signature. The text meanders in an erratic ribbon across the wall, resembling not language
as much as a graph-reading gone wrong. Sontheimer reworks one language to create another which is literally
self-contained. His private considerations and questions are readable to the viewer only as hints of
tension and ease.

 
Emily Joyce was born in 1976 in Arlington Heights, Illinois. After receiving her BFA from the Rhode Island
School of Design and studies at the Glasgow School of Art in Scotland, Joyce was invited to participate
in the Core Artists-in-Residence Program at the Glassell School of Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX
(1999-2001). Last year through the Core program, she was awarded the Eliza Randall Prize. Her work
has been recently featured at the Inman Gallery, Houston, TX; Donna Beam Gallery, University of Nevada,
Las Vegas, NV; Galveston Art Center, TX; and the Lawndale Art Center, Houston, TX. She made her New York
debut last year with a solo exhibition at sara meltzer gallery. Joyce currently resides in Houston, TX.

Hills Snyder was born in 1950 in Lubbock, TX. A tenured Texas artist, Snyder has exhibited widely throughout
the state with recent solo shows at Angstrom Gallery, Dallas; Finesilver Gallery, San Antonio; and James
Gallery, Houston. His work has also been featured in New York and Europe, including his 1998 exhibition,
Gloville, at the Casino Luxembourg, Forum d’Art Contemporain. He was the recipient of an Art Matters
fellowship in 1996 and 1990, and a Mid-America/NEA fellowship for sculpture in 1995. In 2001, Snyder
was awarded the first ArtPace Travel Grant. His work is found in numerous public collections including
the Austin Museum of Art, Austin, TX and The Microsoft Collection, Redmond, WA. Snyder currently
lives and works in Helotes, TX.

Born in 1969 in New Orleans, LA, Matthew Sontheimer currently lives and works in Houston, TX. He received
his BFA from Stephen F. Austin University, Nacogdoches, TX and was awarded an MFA from Montana State
University, Bozeman, MT. His work has been shown throughout Texas and the United States including
exhibitions at Arthur Roger Gallery, New Orleans, LA; Dunn and Brown Contemporary, Dallas, TX; Galveston
Arts Center, Galveston, TX; Lawndale Art Center, Houston, TX; and the Contemporary Art Center, New
Orleans, LA, among others. This year his work was featured in the Subject Plural: Crowds in Contemporary
Art at the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TX, and two of his drawings were acquired for the permanent
collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY.

Hills Snyder reading given at the reception: