"Crossovers: Materials and Metaphors" - Meredith Dean, curator, will lead us through this show concerned with the fragility of our environment expressed in very different ways by Italian artist Ivano Vitali and Joan Hall, artist and professor at Washington University in St. Louis.

Below are excerpts from Huffington Post's article written by Dan Goddard entitled "Celebrate the Holidays with the Current Top Shows in the Western U.S."

Avid sailor Joan Hall responds to the plastic trash she sees floating miles from the ocean shore with her wall-mounted sculptures that resemble fishing nets bulging with man-made debris. Her visual lamentation about the decline of ocean life evokes feelings of being damaged, trapped and insignificant. Working with Japanese-style handmade paper and printed digital imagery, she uses a scalpel to cut out the fish nets and laminates them with Mylar for a translucent effect.

Ivano Vitali's newspaper weavings that mix crafts traditions with that of Arte Povera are paired with Hall's recycled works under the title "Crossovers: Materials and Metaphors." Guest curator Meredith Dean brings together these distinct bodies of work based on shared handmade techinique and environmentalist concerns.
- Dan R. Goddard

Rex Hausmann is an outstanding painter who lives/works part time in New York City and San Antonio.

"When looking inward, true art is found. Art is not complex. It is the living of life. If you want to see my life, look at my paintings, and hopefully, you will see a bit of your life too."

Rex Hausmann's work and large projects often revolve around identities found in communal and domestic contexts, tracing their connections to religion and history. Hausmann credits his brother, Erik Hausmann, as a major influence.

Gallery visit to REM to see magical paintings by Laurel Bustamante entitled "Nightbirds" - Magnificent, intricate small works about imaginary birds. Astounding painting technique...... not to be missed.

Nightbirds

"I began this body of work in 2007 during a six-month stay at the Majestic Ranch Arts Foundation in the hill country of Boerne, Texas. Due to the constraints of the small studio at the Ranch, I reduced the scale of my work to miniatures. I see these paintings as tiny dioramas of dreams, or stage sets for an unknown play. As I work, I often feel as if I were a child looking at an antique toy theater in a darkened room or into an aquarium full of tiny creatures that drift in and out of my field of vision."