Giveth and Taketh

Giveth and Taketh

Feb 7–Aug 2, 2020

• Featuring Sarah Welch
• February 7 – August 2, 2020 (extended!)

Sarah Welch’s exhibition Giveth and Taketh expands the world of comics Holdouts and Holdouts Giveth and Taketh into a reading room installation. Visitors can sit and read two chapters of the narrative set in the Gulf Coast. In addition the publications the reading room includes prints, sculptures, a mural, and the installation Rosie’s trailer, which brings to life the living space of one of the characters of the narrative. Welch’s distinctive illustration and color palette evoke whimsy, banality, and melancholy set in place close and familiar to the geography of coastal east Texas, particularly her native Houston.

Sarah Welch is an artist, illustrator, and comics-maker based in Houston. She is a regular collaborator with letterpress and risograph print service, Mystic Multiples, and a co-organizer with Zine Fest Houston. In an effort to expand the world of her comics, Sarah creates installations that function as reading rooms for her books. These installations contain objects and imagery lifted from the comic narratives. The stories she tells chronicle the present and speculative future of the Gulf Coast with a focus on women’s solidarity and climate change. Self-publishing is an important facet of Welch’s practice and allows her to make art easily accessible to others in viewing and ownership. This DIY ethos guides how she makes and participates in contemporary art.