Texan Mosaic

Photos by students in COMM 1318 Photography 1

It’s tough to decide what catches your eye first.  Is it the name of the exhibit?  Or the bronze cowboy that stands watching on a pedestal nearby?  Both appear to say a lot about Matt Rush. 

The exhibit is called “The Great Pivot, from motivational speaker to artist and author.”  It’s on display now, until Friday, in the South Plains College Main Gallery in the Christine Devitt Fine Arts Center on the Levelland campus.

Dozens of Rush’s bronze sculptures are featured here.  They perch on stands throughout the gallery space shared with paintings from the Marjorie Merriweather Post Art Collection.

The single sculpture that stands near the title of the exhibit is called “Big Sky,” and it depicts a cowboy peering up at one of Texas’ iconic features.

The ranch and cowboy spirit comes to life in all of Rush’s sculptures.  Detail is etched in faces, feathers, and manes.

The description of the exhibit on the SPC website explains Rush’s artwork draws inspiration from his upbringing in the farm and ranch life of Eastern New Mexico.

Rush now lives in Levelland.  And some of that grit and determination reflected in his artwork, appears to live in his career path as well.

“Matt Rush, he’s a public speaker, and he speaks mostly to farmers and agriculture groups,” says Scotty Hensler, assistant professor of fine arts and gallery director at South Plains College.  “He’s a great public speaker too. And during Covid that dropped off a lot. And he’d never done art or sculpture, and he started doing this.”

That means Rush has only been doing bronze art sculpting for a couple of years now. “He’s really got a knack for it,” Hensler says. 

“Since I did not take my first art lesson until August of 2020,” Rush says, “at the age of 46, I hope people take away that it is never too late to try something new. Life is going to throw us all curve balls along the way. It is a matter of how do we pivot and make changes to move forward in the midst of uncertainty.”

And that’s an understatement.  It certainly does not look like an easy process.  And, as Hensler explains, it’s not.

Pieces that show how to make a bronze sculpture are on display in Rush’s exhibit too. 

Each bronze sculpture starts with clay, Hensler says. Then, he says, the artist makes a mold of the clay, usually out of wax. When bronze is poured into the mold, it melts out the wax, flushes it out. Then the bronze has to be polished.

Hensler says Rush, like many bronze sculptors, collaborates with a foundry master who helps turn the original object into the metal piece shown.

A card next to Rush’s molds explains Chris Martinez is the foundry expert who helps him put his pieces together.  The card includes a quote from Rush that says, “Chris has to recreate my piece in metal, every time one is ordered.  My name is on the artwork, but Chris deserves just as much credit, if not more.”

Rush has also collaborated with an SPC designer to write cowboy books for kids.   These are on display in the SPC exhibit too along with action figures.

Rush’s other exhibits have included a feature at the National Ranching Heritage Center’s Summer Stampede Art Show.

“I believe that art is an emotion,” Rush says, “captured in a medium that connects an inanimate object with a human soul. I hope students will always remember that they are not creating art, they are creating an emotion. It will make all the difference in their world.”

The SPC Main Gallery is open weekdays, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. 

A reception with the artist is booked for tomorrow night, Tuesday, Nov. 12, from 5 to 7 p.m.  Rush’s exhibit will be on view through Friday, Nov. 15.

All are open and free to the public.