MARY JENEWEIN
Born in Franklin, Tennessee in 1933 to a Korean father and a Caucasian mother, Mary Jenewein grew up in Savannah, Georgia, keenly aware of her multicultural heritage. In the artist’s own words, she “became aware of the unfairness of things early on and when late in life started making art, the subject was laid out for me.” Because of Georgia’s anti-miscegenation laws, Jenewein’s parents’ marriage was considered illegitimate in their home state, and the family moved to Houston in 1956. Jenewein attended the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill where she graduated with a BA in political science in 1955, started a family, and returned to Houston in 1965. After a divorce in 1979, she briefly found work as administrative support in the dean’s office at the University of Houston, where she learned she could take classes for free. She revived her interest in drawing and painting in courses taught by Chuck Dugan and Richard Stout, and set up a studio at the original Lawndale Annex. She began showing her work in such group exhibitions as the Fourth Annual Texas Sculpture Symposium at the Ney Museum, Austin (1983); A Salute to Houston Artists at Midtown Art Center, Houston (1984); 6 Painters at DiverseWorks (1985); Self Images at Midtown Art Center, Houston (1985); and Messages from the South at Sewell Art Gallery, Rice University, Houston (1989). In the decades since, her works exploring various aspects of social justice have frequently been shows at such Houston venues as the Art Car Museum, the Glassell School of Art, Redbud Gallery, DiverseWorks, and Lawndale Art Center. Far From Home, her 2015 exhibition at the Station Museum, presented some of the most powerful work of her career: an installation of drawings and delicate wire sculptures depicting unflinchingly the tragedy of systemic homelessness.
Notes: Pete Gershon interviewed Mary Jenewein at her home in Houston on July 30, 2019. Jenewein discusses her family background; her experience studying at the University of Houston in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s including her experience at the original Lawndale Annex; and the trajectory of her career and art in the years since. Video and audio for this episode are about as good as it gets for this project. Archival images still to be added.
Further Resources:
Mary Jenewein, Far From Home, Station Museum, January 17 - June 21, 2015
This project was funded in part by the City of Houston through Houston Arts Alliance