0.1 Introduction  (Page 4/5)

The CAA entered the 1950s operating out of a small building designed by Mackie&Kamrath, on land leased for $1.00 per year. The Association’s first secretary, Ava Jean Mears, remembers working at a card table in lieu of a desk, and working with Preston Frazier as security guards at the association’s Van Gogh show a few years later. Contemporary art in 1950s Houston was not widely accepted, and the CAA drew tremendous energy from its sense of being part of the avant garde. It was an exciting time for the “burlap crowd,” so named because the exhibitions were often mounted on burlap-covered walls by volunteers who spent countless hours conceiving, organizing, installing, and promoting provocative exhibitions.

Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, the CAA struggled to find its identity, moving back and forth between a virtually all-volunteer organization to a more staid institution with full-time management in place. Tumultuous as those years were, they were also marked by spectacular CAA events, as the association shifted focus from perpetuating its own collection to staging exhibitions and other programs. From 1955 to 1959, CAA Director Dr. Jermayne MacAgy installed a series of brilliant exhibitions giving contemporary art a historical context. Her successor, Robert C. Morris, hired in 1959, attempted to broaden the focus of the CAA to include performing arts, film, and other media. His successor, acting director Donald Barthelme,

Subsequently, the Contemporary Arts Association changed its name to the Contemporary Arts Museum and board president Carrington Weems brought Sebastian J. Adler to Houston from the Wichita Art Museum to give CAM an expanded presence in the Houston arts scene. Under their leadership and that of Pierre Schlumberger, CAM launched a building campaign that—with a significant matching grant from the Brown Foundation—resulted in a new building near the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. In 1972, CAM opened its new doors with a controversial show, Exhibition 10, highlighting experimental work by young artists. The show quickly became the talk of the town and was later described, depending upon who was asked, as “bewildering,” “offensive,” “provocative,” or “exciting.”

Adler’s successor, James Harithas, determined that Texas had come enough of age artistically to justify his resolve to “beat the drum for Texans,” and his first CAM exhibition was a showcase for regional artists. Entitled 12 Texas Artists, it included works by John Fleming, Woody Gwyn, Dorothy Hood, Louis Jimenez, Raffaele Martini, William Petty, Sandra Stevens, James Surls, Michael Tracy, Robert Wade, and Mack Whitney.