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Work by former Beaumont resident Teresa Baker is included in the Whitney Biennial 2026.<\/p>\n
Photo by Andy Coughlan<\/p>\n
Teresa Baker is shown in a portrait.<\/p>\n
Photo courtesy of Teresa Baker<\/p>\n
An installation photo of Teresa Baker’s work in the Whitney Biennial.<\/p>\n
Photo courtesy of Teresa Baker<\/p>\n
NEW YORK \u2014 When Teresa Baker moved to Beaumont in 2014, she was already an established artist with a growing reputation.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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After moving to the area, the hometown of her soon-to-be husband Michael Mason, she settled into the creative scene, working and hosting exhibits at her studio on Orleans Street.<\/p>\n
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Now she is showing on one of biggest arts stages as part of the 82nd edition of the Whitney Biennial in New York through\u00a0Aug. 23.<\/p>\n
The North Dakota native said in a phone interview that curators from the Whitney Museum of American Art spend two years traveling the country visiting hundreds of artists\u2019 studios to make their selections.<\/p>\n
\u201cI went to\u00a0undergrad in New York City, so truly this has been kind of a dream to be in the Whitney Biennial since my early 20s,\u201d she said. \u201cAs a younger person, I used to go and learn about artists that way, and it’s always a very, very exciting thing to witness.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was just completely thrilled to be a part of it, to be invited. They came for a visit at some point, and then you don’t really hear it, so you’ve no idea until later.\u201d<\/p>\n
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This year\u2019s exhibition highlights the work of 56 artists. The museum\u2019s website states that it, \u201coffers a space for contemplating the shifting currents of art in the United States, asking not only what is being made but also what it means to name something \u2018American\u2019 at all.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Baker was in Beaumont \u2014 where she had solo shows at The Art Studio, Inc., as well as a first museum exhibition at the Art Museum of Southeast Texas \u2014 a visit to the hardware store led her to discover something that took her signature abstract textile works to a higher level \u2014 Astroturf.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnytime I give lectures or talks, I always focus on sort of Beaumont’s influence in many ways, of just being in that place,\u201d she said. \u201cIt was really about being there, and is the reason I work with Astroturf. I often wonder, honestly, had I not gone, would I be working on Astroturf? I really don’t know. It came at a certain point in my practice where I was still searching for my canvas.\u201d<\/p>\n
Moving to Texas from California, where she had lived prior, changed the way she looked at things and opened her up to different possibilities, she said. In a big city one can feel like it\u2019s the center of the universe, with large, specialized art stores offering infinite possibilities. But she found her direction at the hardware store.<\/p>\n
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\u201cMany artists love going to a hardware store, it’s always exciting,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I had to really lean into what was around me and learned that there was a real adventure in that, and sort of continue to be curious and interested in what resources I had locally.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think Beaumont was a reminder of that, and Beaumont is really, you know, forever in the story of my practice, because that’s where I started working with Astroturf.\u201d<\/p>\n
Baker was struck by the different variety of Astroturf available.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhere I was coming from in California, I don’t even think they carry the type of a strip I found in Beaumont,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is a little bit specific to the place, because I know some of that marine blue is used for bottom of boats, and so it is a little more specific to Southeast Texas in that way, and the culture, and what these materials are used for.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Seeing Baker\u2019s works at the Biennial, one is taken by the scale. They are perfect in the large space and one can lose oneself in the expanse.<\/p>\n
In an interview for her show at The Art Studio in 2017, Baker said landscape, such as in the Romanticism of Casper David\u00a0Friedrick, is important in her life and work, as well as her Native-American heritage.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was raised in a culture where objects have meaning, they hold a lot of weight,\u201d she said in 2017. \u201cBeing raised with that reverence for materiality, that definitely comes into play in the concepts for me while I\u2019m working.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Baker\u2019s time in Southeast Texas may have been relatively short, but Beaumont had a lasting effect on her career. And those who knew her then will not be surprised at her growing success.<\/p>\n
For more, visit\u00a0whitney.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Work by former Beaumont resident Teresa Baker is included in the Whitney Biennial 2026. Photo by Andy Coughlan…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":764138,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[449,458,459,64,63,460,134],"class_list":["post-764137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-design","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/764137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=764137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/764137\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/764138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=764137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=764137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=764137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}