Kristin Lucas's "Whatever Your Mind Can Conceive" at And/Or Gallery

. . . in Dallas, Texas -- one of the best shows I've seen anywhere in the last twelve months; smart and insightful, expressing archetypal yet urgent concerns in the idioms of today.

There are two, thematically-related parts. In the front gallery is her "contemplative installation including video, light box prints, cast rocks, and laser cut comets" featuring, among other things, fragments of a narrative including sessions the artist undertook with a real hypnotherapist to treat a grotesque eruption on her face that she purports to believe enhance her job performance as a bingo caller. In the back of the gallery is her related, "Refresh group exhibition [comprising the legal documentation and courtroom sketches from when] she legally changed her name from Kristin Lucas to Kristin Lucas as a kind of re-awakening, [plus portraits] she had her colleagues produce . . . of her before and after the change."

The work in the front gallery is shown in the picture but looks better as installed at And/Or. There are three channels of video, one screening on a boxy, older computer monitor that's been painted with a finish similar to that of the fake "rocks," and two screening wholly or partly on beautifully-knotted plywood -- a last-minute decision that may sound weird but looks fantastic and works well with the Western setting of the narrative.

See the show if you can; more info on And/Or's site.