Joseph Havel

Installation Images

Selected Works

Joseph Havel
Neighborhood 2, 2022
Bronze
24 x 80 x 16 inches installed
Joseph Havel
Floor Plan 1, 2021-2022
Wood, oil stick and graphite on paper
6h x 6w inches
Framed: 9 1/2h x 9 1/2w x 1 1/2d inches
Joseph Havel
Floor Plan 3, 2021-2022
Wood, oil stick and graphite on paper
6h x 6w inches
Framed: 9 1/2h x 9 1/2w x 1 1/2d inches
Joseph Havel
Floor Plan 6, 2021-2022
Wood, oil stick and graphite on paper
6h x 6w inches
Framed: 9 1/2h x 9 1/2w x 1 1/2d inches
Joseph Havel
White Curtains, 2001-2002
Bronze, unique
97h x 37w x 25d inches
Joseph Havel
Thistle 1, 2015-2016
Bronze with patina, unique
37 1/2h x 37w x 39 1/2d inches

Biography

Joseph Havel’s sculptural practice is rooted in an exploration of the quotidian. Domestic objects such as shirts, books, bedsheets, and curtains are cast in bronze and polyurethane resin, taking on neoclassical forms that suggest the human body and social histories of use without dictating any particular reading to the viewer. Rather, the works evoke open-ended visual poetry: their significance comes from their form, materiality, and presence. His series of shirt-label paintings interrogates the boundary between objecthood and the illusionist space of the picture plane, approaching minimalism and geometric abstraction with a post-modernist’s critical stance. Unifying Havel’s various bodies of work is his distinctive post-minimal aesthetic, marked by a sense of quiet gravity and open-ended investigation of critical questions.

Joseph Havel (b. 1954, Minneapolis) earned his BFA from the University of Minnesota in 1975, and his M.F.A. from Pennsylvania State University in 1979. Havel is the recipient of numerous awards including the 2013 Texas Visual Artist as recognized by The Texas Commission for the Arts and Texas State Legislature; the 2010 Texas Artist of the Year as recognized by Art League Houston; the 2008 Dallas Contemporary Legends Award; the 2004 Artadia Fellowship; the 1999 Cultural Arts Council of Houston Artist’s Award; the 1998 American Institute of Architects, Houston, Artist’s Award; the 1995 Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award; and the 1987 National Endowment for the Arts Artist’s Fellowship. Havel’s sculptures and drawings are included in the permanent collections of the Centre Pompidou, Paris; the Laumeier Sculpture Park, St. Louis; The Menil Collection, Houston; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the Contemporary Arts Museum, Honolulu; the Dallas Museum of Art; the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth; Musée Arte, Roubaix, France; S.M.A.K. Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst, Ghent; and the Whitney Museum of American Art.  The artist lives and works in Houston, Texas.

Exhibitions

On-site and Individual Works

Joseph Havel

Flight Paths and Floor Plans
Talley Dunn Gallery
May 14 – June 25, 2022

Joseph Havel

Mend
Talley Dunn Gallery
March 10 – April 21, 2018

Joseph Havel

Spill
Talley Dunn Gallery
January 16 – February 20, 2016

Joseph Havel

Stacks
Talley Dunn Gallery
February 22 – March 29, 2014

Off-site

Joseph Havel

Parrot Architecture
Dallas Contemporary
April 16 – August 21, 2022

Joseph Havel

Art on the Lawn
Contemporary Arts Museum Houston
July 19, 2013 – April 30, 2015

Videos

Press

Artforum

“Michael Corris on Joseph Havel”
by Michael Corris
October 2022

Glasstire

“Carving Out Time: A Conversation with Joseph Havel”
by Caleb Bell
June 28, 2022

Houston Chronicle

“Museum of Fine Arts’ Joe Havel is retiring after 30 years as Glassell School of Art director”
by Amber Elliot
May 16, 2022

New York Times

“A Panorama of Design”
by Arlene Hirst
April 21, 2022

Texas Monthly

“Texas’s Newest Master Sculptor Is a Parrot Named Hannah”
by Molly Glentzer
April 8, 2022

Patron

“Full Circle: Joseph Havel Returns to Talley Dunn Gallery with Spill” 
by Shelby Gorday
January 6, 2016

Arts and Culture Texas

“Review: Joseph Havel” 
by Patricia Mora
February 8, 2012

Artforum

“Joseph Havel: Museum of Fine Arts, Houston” 
by Michael Odom
September 2006