A View From the Easel

DIXIE FRIEND GAY, Houston, TX

My career spans four decades as a full time artist and includes sculpture, painting, mosaics, and drawings. Since 1997, I have focused on public art. Commissions include mosaic murals for Dallas Love Field, George Bush Intercontinental and Indianapolis International airports, the Port of Miami, and Washington State Public Art collection.

In 2017, Hurricane Harvey pushed two feet of water into my Houston home and studio. Soggy sheetrock, insulation, furniture, and appliances went out. Snakes, lizards, frogs, spiders, and insects came in to stay. The bayous, the creeks, the rain that nurture both my garden and my art, devastated my space. As I create plans to re-build eight feet higher in the same location, I live and work in a deconstructed site with all the amenities of a campground. But wild nature is still my muse — its mystery and primordial energy are intrinsic to my art.

Resilience and perseverance are essential to being an artist and making a home. With kayaks tied to the porch, eaves and sandbags in reserve behind the garden shed, I am grateful to friends and collectors who are helping to re-build while I continue to work.

- Hyperallergic.com

An Oasis in the City.

"Walking into Dixie Friend Gay's studio is complete immersion into her magical world. The paintings on the inside, so lush and exotic, reflect her just as luscious garden-on-the-bayou that lies just outside the floor-to-ceiling glass doors. Dixie works in many mediums, so a studio visit offers a cross-section of paintings, prints, sculpture, and drawings. The compound includes a "dirty" studio where you will find the latest creatures, from animals to birds to microbes, cast in ceramic clay, fired or waiting their turn in the kilns. These creatures and botanical flourishes are hand sculpted pieces that accentuate and personalize the public work projects. The studios offer a glimpse into the process of making public art, drawings and installation photos tell the stories of the monumental works."

- Victoria Lightman, Looking At Art