The Menil Collection’s 2019–2020 season of Artist Talks debuts with Robyn O'Neil, whose drawing Studies in Suffocation I (2016), recently acquired by the museum, is currently on view in the permanent collection galleries.
O'Neil, who spent her formative years in Texas and lived in Houston from 2002 to 2011, will present a survey of her 20-year career, which has been dedicated to the medium of drawings. From her early black-and-white works of everyday men facing hardships in meticulously drawn landscapes, to recent work in which human life has disappeared and narratives are more enigmatic, O'Neil explores themes of the human condition and the beauty and fragility of the natural world.
About the Artist:
Robyn O'Neil was born in 1977 in Omaha, NE, and currently lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. She received a BFA from Texas A&M University-Commerce in 2000 and attended graduate school at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She is the recipient of numerous grants and awards, including a Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant, an Artadia grant, and the Hunting Prize. She has had solo exhibitions at the Des Moines Art Center; Kohler Arts Center in Wisconsin; Contemporary Arts Museum Houston; Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell University; and Frye Art Museum in Seattle. A 20-year survey of her work will be presented at the Museum of Modern Art, Fort Worth, from October 18, 2019–February 9, 2020. O’Neil hosts the weekly podcast ME READING STUFF.
This program is free and open to the public; seating is available on a first-come first-serve basis. Further information regarding accessibility and parking can be found here.
Major funding for Artist Talks is provided by Franci Neely.