Retrospective at Rubin Center looks back at Borderland artist Laura Turón’s work

Samuel Gaytan, El Paso Times
·2 min read
El Paso-based artist Laura Turón works on one of her installations in the Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center for the Visual Arts exhibit, “Laura Turón: Immersive Abstractions,” which looks back at nearly 10 years of her work. The exhibit opens Thursday and runs through March 10.
El Paso-based artist Laura Turón works on one of her installations in the Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center for the Visual Arts exhibit, “Laura Turón: Immersive Abstractions,” which looks back at nearly 10 years of her work. The exhibit opens Thursday and runs through March 10.

Art lovers are invited to a retrospective of El Paso-based artist Laura Turón’s work beginning Thursday.

From 5-7:30 p.m., the Stanlee and Gerald Rubin Center for the Visual Arts, 500 W. University Ave., will have an opening reception in the Project Space Gallery for “Laura Turón: Immersive Abstractions,” which looks back at nearly 10 years of work by the artist.

“It will be a free event and in the Project Space Gallery there is a miniretrospective of my work showing drawings of when I started over at UTEP, a large tape mural I just finished and two art installations, including a new one,” Turón said.

She added, “We are trying to promote and get more people to go to the event as sometimes people feel a bit intimidated to go to the gallery at UTEP and we want to welcome everyone.”

Visitors to the University of Texas at El Paso visual arts center, which is between Sun Bowl Stadium and the Fox Fine Arts Center off Dawson Road, will be able to take in towering works by the artist.

“I installed a large tape mural 128 inches across and 294 tall,” she said in a message. “A small hallway art installation room (is) 8x4x8 feet.”

Turón said there also is a tape-art community installation, the projection art installation “Imperfectly Aligned” and a few drawings that are 6 feet by x 52 inches.

Visitors can take photos, videos and selfies, as well as interact with the art installations, she said.

There will be a cash bar and a DJ set by Iris Diaz. Visitors can park in the lot next to the gallery for free, Turón said.

The show is the first in the Genius Loci exhibition series supported by a grant from the Mellon Foundation. Genius loci is defined as the pervading spirit or tutelary deity of a place.

Turón’s “organic and geometric abstractions have included immersive installations, community-based collaborations, the deconstruction of drawings, and experiments in mark-making,” according to the Rubin Center’s website.

The show will be up through March 10.

UTEP Faculty Biennial

Also opening Thursday is “Study is What You do with Other People,” the 2023 UTEP Faculty Biennial, in the center's Rubin and L Galleries. The exhibit will be up through April 7.

Included are recent works by 21 faculty members in UTEP’s Department of Art.

It is the first faculty biennial since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the center’s website. It includes posters, prints, drawings, paintings, sculpture, jewelry, video, sound and historic photographic techniques.

The Rubin Center is open from 10 a.m. to 5p.m. Wednesday through Friday and by appointment. More information: 915-747-6067 or rubincenter@utep.edu

This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: Retrospective at Rubin Center looks back at artist Laura Turón’s work