Sala Diaz, the non-profit exhibition space in San Antonio, has announced that its 2019 resident is Heyd Fontenot. Located in the heart of the San Antonio Cultural Arts District, Sala Diaz runs the Casa Chuck residency, where Fontenot will reside.
Fontenot, an artist and curator Glasstire would happily call a “super-connector,” was most recently at the Tulsa Artist Fellowship, and we reached him via text to ask about his stint at Casa Chuck. “Super excited to be back in San Antonio,” writes Fontenot, a former resident at Artpace San Antonio. “Some really wonderful people to reconnect with here, and I feel like it’s the perfect community to embrace the notion of the lodge and its activities.” (More on the lodge below.) Heyd’s five-year run as Director and Chief Curator of the CentralTrak artist residency in Dallas (2011-2016) saw a lot of dynamic programming, which is anticipated for his stay at Casa Chuck. Between now and fall 2020, when there will be a culminating exhibition at Blue Star Contemporary, Fontenot plans a series of artist-driven events and community building activities in lieu of traditional studio visits.
The Lodge of Saint Reborlaro is Fontenot’s framing of the residency, inspired by the urgency for artists and thinkers to intimately interact. It’s fashioned after artists’ salons, fraternal orders, service organizations and country churches, and provides a space for casual but meaningful exchange.
The invitation to participate is framed in a press release from Sala Diaz:
Firmly existing within the Bible Belt, much of San Antonio’s population find solace and fellowship at their various houses of worship. Citizens without a particular attachment to religious dogma or affiliation are now offered, through this project, a comparable invitation to regularly gather, sharing the company of both like-minded and challenging individuals. As the nature of experiments go, the benefits and successes born of this shared physical space (contrasting social media’s virtual interactions) will be revealed throughout this multi-season project. Your participation—great and small—is both welcomed and essential. As a resident or visitor to San Antonio, you are hereby solicited to make The Lodge of Saint Reborlaro a part of your own artistic, intellection, social and spiritual practice. You may choose an activity from the list below or do something entirely of your own impulse.
The invitation comes with a few rules:
1) in accordance with camping rules, respect “The Lodge” by leaving the space as you found it before your visit (or better)
2) take responsibility for your guests
3) obey the laws of the State of Texas
4) do no harm
Some of the suggestions for participation are prompts, such as: host a weekly film screening; organize a discussion on contemporary art with a guest speaker or multi-person panel; start a book club; dramatic readings from the Mueller Report; and others.
To participate, simply email Fontenot here.
The Sala Diaz non-profit exhibition space, is an experimental venue for contemporary art established in 1995. Located in the heart of the Cultural Arts District, Sala Diaz provides a unique venue for the exhibition of new and challenging work and fosters lasting exchange between our city and creative communities abroad. Housed in the same residential structure as the gallery, The Casa Chuck Residency is an invitational program through which Sala Diaz provides critics, curators and writers a haven for varied creative pursuits.
5 comments
Congratulations, Heyd! Looks like it’s going to be a great thing for artists and the community in San Antonio!
Woo hoo! Making SA a much better place for sure. Congrats my friend!
Fabulous and fantastic!! Love it for Heyd and all of us
Yes, Congratulations! Looking forward to finding out more about the Lodge project
San Antonio is so lucky to have you!