PORTRAIT AS SELF-PORTRAIT:
Intimate images from the life of James Dowell

One of the most ancient and basic impulses to create art grows out of the desire to depict those around us. James Dowell is a Texas artist who has spent half his time over the last 30 years in New York. This exhibition explores his world through the images of his friends. None are commissioned works, but instead they are penetrating character studies that, taken as group, reveal something of the character of what it means to be a Dallasite or a New Yorker. These are the faces that populate the art and literary worlds of the two cities, including distinguished artists, writers and dealers, as well as pictures of Dowell's intimate friends and family.

Each portrait is accompanied by a written biographical sketch that gives context to each personality. Among the Texans included are the artist Roger Winter, the critic and artist Tom Sime, the independent curators Murray Smither and Paul Roger Harris, the artists Gail Norfleet and Mary Vernon and the screenwriter Gary Mc Donald.

Included in the exhibition are a group of portraits related to the documentary film Sleep in a Nest of Flames, of which Dowell is co-director. It is a view of the 20th-century art and literary worlds as seen through the eyes of the American Surrealist poet Charles Henri Ford. As well as Ford's, portraits of the composer/diarist Ned Rorem, the film critic Elliott Stein and the cultural historian Steven Watson are included. The film has been shown in museums from London's Tate Modern to Hartford's Wadsworth Atheneum. Attached is more information about the film. Greater detail, as well as samples of Dowell's portraits, can be found on www.sleepinanestofflames.com.

James Dowell's work will be the subject of a mid-career overview at the Tyler Museum of Art, May 2003.