Studio Tour brings local artists, San Marcans together

The San Marcos art scene is diverse and robust and composed of artists of all ages that work with a variety of mediums. Mothership Studios provides a unique opportunity to experience a large chunk of the local art scene across the span of one weekend. During the second annual San Marcos Studio Tour, artists opened up their studios for the public to peruse at their leisure on April 6 and 7. The event began on April 5 with a kickoff party at Mothership Studios that included an exhibit filled with impressive sculptures, paintings and a multimedia projection.

The San Marcos Studio Tour was organized by Mothership Studios Owner Jacqueline Overby and Project Managers Alicia Philley and Chris Gwillim.

Overby modeled the tour after the Austin Studio Tour and believes it's important to showcase local artists because art is a catalyst for social change.

“If you’re not taking care of your artists and your scene, then you’re missing a big part of your community health and the overall ecosystem,” Overby said, adding that this opportunity is unique because “there’s not very many events where you get to see all of the artists in one town.”

Gwillim noticed an energized community of artists that were excited to be involved with one another.

“There aren’t that many fine art galleries in San Marcos and not a lot of spaces for artists to show their work,” Gwillim said. “I think this type of event is a really great way to take down the barriers to access to art, and a lot of the art in the showcase is really affordable too.”

Philley increased her involvement in this year's tour and focused on fundraising and gathering sponsors, which would allow Mothership Studios to keep an affordable fee for the artists involved. She said the tour is unique in that there are very few restrictions on who can participate.

Of the 63 participating artists, each had their own unique flare and were all equally impressive in their own right.

Overby does Needle Felting Soft Sculpture in her personal art practice, which often take the form of the various shapes of the human reproductive organs with brightly colored tufts of felt in place of hair. She captures the free spirit of human sexuality in a way that exudes a fun and open minded quality.

“It’s nice because it’s very solitary, and it’s kind of like a break,” Overby said, adding that it’s a retreat from the more public- facing work she does with Mothership Studios.

Philley is one of the three artists, including Topher Sipes and Jasna Boudard, responsible for Alignmentality, which was the immersive art piece that was projected onto her sculptures at the exhibit on April 5 and the facade of the Hays County Historic Courthouse on April 6 and 7. Philley's art uses wood and follows the natural movement of the grain adding pops of color throughout to capture the feeling of a single moment in nature.

“The linework is about how the place felt and the kind of movement that it had,” Philley said. “I take the plant or the space and break it apart into the colors and signifying shapes and forms and pull it back together in my painting.”

Sipes creates art that develops at the intersection of drawing and virtual reality. It is dynamic and colorful and is inspired by a background in environmental education and “the movement of liquid, gasses and solids” through space. Being immersed in Sipes’ virtual realities would be like watching rays of light and color dancing and rippling through the cosmos.

“I carry a sketchbook everywhere I go,” Sipes said. “That eventually led to digital drawing and painting and eventually VR, [which I] used for not only making new work but also doing performances with live musicians. But now [that has led to] installations and collaborations with other artists.”

Boudard is a photographer and projection artist that works with themes of “movement and the elements as well as our connection to the divine.” Some of her work has a plethora of patterns moving and interacting with each other similar to a kaleidoscope. While other pieces seem to mimic water, smoke and wind with further movement created by the various materials that the pieces are projected onto giving an almost celestial characteristic to the work.

“In the past ten years or so I’ve pivoted to not just doing photography that lives on a screen but wanting my imagery to live in space. So working with installations and projectors specifically,” Boudard said. “I travel a lot, so I pull a lot from the natural world and get inspired by not creating from my imagination but creating from what already is. ... So it’s a lot more interactive in that sense.”

Paul Murray, a.k.a. Big Bunce, paints with acrylics on canvas or on recycled materials, and recently, he’s branched into oils, but that’s the outer boundary for his traditional approach; his subject matter is anything but. Murray paints pop culture portraits — from Smeagol to Mr. Miyagi and pretty much everything in between. He also paints koi fish and lizards, parrots and rats, all with vivid pops of color and a mixture of masterfully- textured brush work.

Murray and his family moved from South Austin to San Marcos in 2019. Murray works out of a backyard studio space, full of leafy trees, anoles and butterflies. His two young children paint alongside him, and Murray said he learns as much from them as they do from watching him.

“Last couple years, I’ve been ramping back up to the amount of art I was doing compared to before moving out of Austin,” Murray said. “It's nice to be creating again in the local art community.”

Diana Scheunemann has had an incredibly successful photography career, shooting for Glamour, Levi’s, Elle Magazine, Maybelline and many other equally recognizable names and publishing several photography books. She currently owns her own photography studio, You by Diana Contemporary Boudoir Photography, in San Marcos. When gazing at her vast portfolio, one thing is clear: Scheunemann loves to celebrate the human form, with or without clothes, in a way that is tasteful, alluring and artistic.

The transition from high fashion photography to boudoir was not immediate, but Scheunemann said she was fed up with the industry’s need to pressure people to be skinny or shaved in addition to the high amount of product waste and lack of recycling that occurs at fashion week. With boudoir photography, the client is celebrated just as they are, appreciating that all shapes, ages and sizes can be sexy.

“She walks you through everything. You just feel comfortable. You’re able to just be versus pretend to be sexy or be someone else,” said Michelle Wilson, fellow studio tour artist and one of Scheunemann’s boudoir clients. “She pulls that sexy part out of you as well as every part that you want … I wanted to show depression and anxiety. I wanted the book to tell a story, and it did.”

Wilson is known for watercolor paintings of “broken butterflies” but also likes to create sculptures and weld. Sometimes Wilson will mend the butterfly wings using gold leaf or gold thread similar to the Japanese style of ceramic repair Kintsugi in which a piece with even more strength and beauty arises from the damaged one.

“I was like, ‘people like butterflies, so I’ll paint butterflies, but how do I make them me?’ So I started ripping the wings,” Wilson said. “They're damaged, but they’re still beautiful. They’re still capable.”

Found-objects and assemblage artist Lisa McPike Smith started out at Southwest Texas State in the 90s, where she studied ceramics. Over the years, she extended her education by taking classes at Eye of the Dog. While still in college, McPike Smith made skull beads for Paper Bear, which kept her in classes and supplies so that she could keep making her art.

“I was a ceramics artist,” McPike Smith said. “But ceramics take a long time to cure or to finish, so I started doing these lost objects pieces. They're assemblage, but with found objects or things that I have collected.”

McPike Smith’s sculptures feature porcelain dolls recovered from World War II Germany and silver serving dishes her antiques-dealer mother shares with her.

“I fell in love with these little old German Bisque dolls,” McPike Smith said. “There’s a place in Germany that had porcelain doll factories. During World War II, of course they were obliterated. But there are people that go over there and dig up these little dolls that are broken and fractured. I fell in love with the idea of bringing those broken dolls back to a place of artistic merit.”

Cuban artist Osmani Leyva embraces sustainability through his art. Inspired by the Taino tribe and Afro-Cuban ancestors, Leyva hand makes jewelry out of coconut shells. In the process, Leyva uses 100% of the coconut in an environmentally safe and ecologically friendly way.

“The most important thing for me is protecting the environment,” Leyva said. “You have to use everything. That’s what nature has taught me.”

With Leyva’s earrings and bracelets, he sands and smooths the coconut to achieve a natural dark sheen that develops a deeper luster the longer it’s worn.

“It’s just the coconut oil,” Leyva said. “I never varnish it. I never paint it. The oil from your own body makes it glossy.”

Anna Rodriguez believes in the energy and power of hand sewing. As a sewer, knitter, collage artist, gardener and teacher, Rodriguez creates soul-nourishing art and healing through her hands.

Rodriguez’ sewn creations use repurposed or recycled fabrics, relying on the Austin Reuse Center for material. Inspired by vintage designs, Rodriguez has been experimenting with collage that incorporates pieces of old magazines, textiles and mailers that would otherwise end up in landfills. In this way, Rodriguez’ creations bring utility to discarded things, giving them new life and purpose.

“I try to reuse as much as I can,” Rodriguez said. “Sustainability is very important. We know about fast fashion, so we can try to create a local economy around clothing, changing some of those systems that are not sustainable.”

Easily recognizable and effortlessly fun, Furly’s Furly Birds have become a San Marcos icon. These colorful human-sized wooden standees welcome visitors at The Porch on the Square, and they greet guests to his inhome studio on San Antonio Street.

Furly is a local painter working exclusively in acrylics. His use of bold, vibrant color and whimsical animals and shapes reflect the sense of wit and humor that defines his style. When he’s not painting, Furly is also a musician and an actor, working on local indie films. But Furly still paints almost every single day.

“It’s very hypnotic,” he said. “Meditative. Sometimes I just zone out. It feels so good.”

Overby said the San Marcos Art Scene is rich and tends to get overlooked.

“I think it has a lot of potential,” Overby said. I think it is going to grow even more in the next 20 years.”

Gwillim described the art scene in San Marcos as “kind,” displaying both an excitement to be included and a lack of pretentious attitudes characteristic in some of the larger art markets.

“Folks are really just willing to engage with one another,” Gwillim said. “As a lot of different things are creating divisions between people, I think it’s a great opportunity for folks to come together across many different walks of life.”

Philley knew very little about the San Marcos art scene until last year’s studio tour, but has realized there are a lot of people making art that’s incredibly affordable.

There’s so much really cool art being made, but also really important art,” Philley said. “I love that there are a lot of artists here that make their work about conservation and the river.”

Though Murray is relatively new to San Marcos, it wasn’t long before he found the arts community.

“It’s small, but it's actually more connected than it seems at first,” Murray said. “The more you meet with artists here, the more you realize they know the other artists. ... And the Studio Tour being brand new has helped a lot. I feel like it has a lot of potential.”

Sipes said the San Marcos art scene has definitely grown in the decade since he moved from there to Austin like the downtown market going from an annual market to a monthly market and the fact that there has now been two studio tours.

“There’s also been some heavy hitters involved in the scene for decades like Eye of the Dog Art Center [created by] Billy Ray and Beverly Mangham,” Sipes said. “Also, the city has supported more of the arts over the years where they are sponsoring/cutting grants for public art opportunities.”

Wilson said the San Marcos art scene is “doing a damn good job” and the studio tour really highlights all of the talent that is out there.

“People don’t realize that there’s this much of an art scene,” Wilson said. 'You kind of see some of the same things just because somebody’s louder or more popular or they show in more places. That’s not all we have. There’s a lot of artists that are just hiding, and they just do their own thing.”

McPike Smith has been a part of the San Marcos arts community for 35 years, working out of her studio, Hep Cat Art, since 1989 and putting on yearly exhibits at Wake the Dead Coffeehouse since they opened 13 years ago.

“I can’t even believe I lucked into such a wonderful, accepting, growing community of old artists and new artists,” McPike Smith said. “We're all just feeding each other's dreams, just making them come true. Here, we’re still small enough. We are all creating, all starting somewhere, and all have to grow.”

Furly has been an active part of the San Marcos art community for over twenty years, so he’s been able to watch it evolve and grow.

“It’s more accepted to be an artist in San Marcos. Back in the day, they didn’t want to put art anywhere,” he said. “It’s nice to see it now all over the place. That brings joy to my heart.”

There were too many talented individuals to include in one article, but a full list of participating artists and sponsors may be found here studiotoursmtx. com/map. The artists’ social media pages can be found on instagram @mothershipstudios. smtx where the artists are conveniently listed and linked in a series of posts.