About Artists on Site

Asia Society Texas developed the Artists on Site project in 2020 as an initiative that transforms the galleries into studio and project spaces for Houston-based artists. The idea emerged from conversations starting in early 2020 with many artists in Houston and throughout the country to develop ways that Asia Society Texas could support them and their practices. Through studio visits and related programs, visitors can connect with these artists and the critically important insights they contribute.

About the Artists

Farima Fooladi was born in Tehran, Iran, in a transition period from monarchy to the Islamic Republic and theocracy. She lives in Houston, Texas. She teaches at the University of Houston.

Fooladi's paintings depict spaces using memory, compressing architecture and landscape from her upbringing in post-revolutionary Iran with those surrounding her as an adult after emigrating to the United States. She combines details from Southern Iran's arid environment with luscious flora and other specifics of her current home in Houston, Texas. Water appears as a motif in pools, waterfalls, and lakes. In Iran, a scarce resource and abundant in Houston, water plays a significant role in Fooladi's work. It is a texture and a symbol, referencing specific yet undocumentable recollections and shifting availability due to climate change.

Growing up in post-revolutionary Iran, Fooladi remembers how urban spaces and people changed gradually. She remembers how architectural open spaces became covered with materials and transparent windows became matte. She mentions the apartment she grew up in had a communal swimming pool, which didn't come to fruition. Due to the regime change, they turned it into a garden to make it more conservative. All the abandoned and repurposed swimming pools inspired the confused swimming pools in her paintings, which she and many of her generation didn't swim in while growing up in Iran.

Fooladi completed her MFA and taught at Penn State University before moving to Houston, Texas. Fooladi's painting titled "Mirage" was purchased with the Mayor's Office of Cultural Affairs (MOCA)'s support for Houston Airports in 2020 to add to the Civic Art Collection at Houston Airports. Fooladi is fascinated by the lasting impact of collective trauma caused by invasion, migration, and displacement. The transformation of civic spaces caused by social and political changes particularly interests her. Fooladi's 8th solo show opened on January 15, 2022, at Smack Mellon in Dumbo, Brooklyn, New York. After her solo show in Dumbo Brooklyn, she was interviewed by the BBC. Her recent painting has been published in New American Paintings, No 162. Fooladi was awarded the Pollock-Krasner Foundation grant for June 2023 to June 2024.

Artist Website | Instagram

Alexis Pye (born 1995, Detroit, MI) explores the tradition of painting as a way to express the Black body outside of its social constructs, to evoke playfulness, wonder, and blackness, as well as the joys amidst adversity. Pye received her BFA in Painting from the University of Houston in 2018. She was selected as a Summer Studios Resident and for Round 51: Local Impact II at Project Row Houses, both in 2018. Her work was exhibited in a group show of young artists at the David Shelton Gallery for Everything's Gonna be Alright in 2019, curated by Robert Hodge. Pye received the "Juror's Choice Prize" for the 20th Annual Citywide African American Artists Exhibition held at Texas Southern University in 2019, selected by Kanitra Fletcher.

She was included in the group show Animal Crossing at Inman Gallery in 2020, and presented her first solo show, The Real and the Fantastic/The Irrational Joys of the Axis, at Inman Gallery in July 2021. In 2021, her work was included in the group exhibitions My Mirror Is Fine, curated by Miles Payne at the Community Artists Collective, Houston and Honor Thy Self at Martha's Contemporary in Austin. Her work was also in the MFAH staff art show at the Museum Fine Arts, Houston in 2021 and she has collaborated with the Houston Rockets x CAMH at the Contemporary Arts Museum Houston in 2022. She is a Round 16 "Lawndale Artist Studio Program" Participant for the 2022-2023 season.

Alexis Pye lives and works in Houston, Texas.

Artist Website | Instagram

This program is organized by Asia Society Texas Center. Exhibitions and their related programs at Asia Society Texas Center are presented by Nancy C. Allen and Leslie and Brad Bucher. Major support comes from Chinhui Juhn and Eddie Allen and Mary Lawrence Porter, as well as The Brown Foundation, Inc., The Hearst Foundation, Houston Endowment, and the City of Houston through Houston Arts Alliance. Generous funding also provided by The Anchorage Foundation of Texas, The Clayton Fund, Texas Commission on the Arts, National Endowment for the Arts, Wortham Foundation, Inc., Olive Jenney, and Ann Wales. United Airlines is our official airline partner. Funding is also provided through contributions from the Exhibitions Patron Circle, a dedicated group of individuals and organizations committed to bringing exceptional visual art to Asia Society Texas Center.

Presenting Sponsors

Nancy C. Allen
Leslie and Brad Bucher
Chinhui Juhn and Edward Allen

Program Sponsors

About Asia Society Texas

Asia Society Texas believes in the strength and beauty of diverse perspectives and people. As an educational institution, we advance cultural exchange by celebrating the vibrant diversity of Asia, inspiring empathy, and fostering a better understanding of our interconnected world. Spanning the fields of arts, business, culture, education, and policy, our programming is rooted in the educational and cultural development of our community — trusting in the power of art, dialogue, and ideas to combat bias and build a more inclusive society.