‘The Wheeler Brothers: Fresh' / 'The Wheeler Brothers: Now Even Fresher'’
In two Austin exhibits, Lubbock's Wheeler brothers offer another tour of burger joints, dry landscapes, girls, advertising signs, and references to famous paintings – mostly of girls – in the Americana narrative of Wheelerville
Reviewed by Rachel Koper, Fri., April 15, 2005
The Wheeler Brothers: Fresh/The Wheeler Brothers: Now Even Fresher
Fresh: Gallery 68, through May 6
Now Even Fresher: Eastside Art Palace, through May 6
Bryan and Jeff Wheeler live in Lubbock, where they have been collaborating on paintings that portray Tex-Mex motifs. The work is an oddly consistent collage of burger joints, vistas of dry landscape, girls, advertising signage, beers, and references to famous paintings – mostly of girls. Together these brothers create an Americana narrative I'd like to dub Wheelerville. Sonics are omnipresent in Wheelerville, as are circular pools of water, with various figures standing in them. This "girl by the water" motif is a rather classical posture for initiating a sexual discussion, and the imagery is always smutty, no matter how couched in plain language it is. The more overt references to cheerleaders and a couple of panty shots make it crystal clear what's often on the minds of these brothers.
The Wheeler brothers have created a visual lexicon that they toy with humorously. There are happy brook trout that swim through Wheelerville. Two smiley ones in the foreground of Warranty don't seem bothered by the presence of a pelican with a halo. What's refreshing about these stream-of-consciousness narratives is the respect that's paid to art history. The pelican's halo is properly gold-leafed, that is, with a dark red underpainting. This adds a clever monastic touch to a piece that also contains modern references such as a hotel swimming pool and a high school cheerleading team. The Wheelers also consistently use superflat pinstriping to segue between scales of objects. This is neat because it combines a graphic look with an oddly shifting perspective; it beats the heck out of the more typical Photoshop transparent fade for montages. The brothers incorporate historical art icons with commercial logos and fantastic images of alien worms or flower things. They seem optimistic about the future. The bright cheerful space-things are all coexisting cheerfully with regular strip-mall life.
The Wheelers' artwork makes the most sense when seen as a whole. For that reason, Austin is lucky to have two shows of their work up this month. Of the pair, I recommend seeing "Now Even Fresher" first. For the uninitiated, this exhibit features a couple of pieces made individually by Bryan and Jeff. Armed with this stylistic knowledge, you can try to analyze their collaborative process. The Wheelers have contemporaries: other artist brothers who work together, such as the Clayton Brothers in Cali; locally, the Sodalitas trio; and in San Antonio the husband-and-wife team of Liz and Maurice Trevino. I believe the intense workaholic pace of life these days can be stressful enough to convince artists to team up and produce art together.
When Gallery 68's Bale Allen talked about "Fresh," he called their style Tex-Mex. I think it is like some tacos: You eat it and it's good, but you shouldn't really examine the individual chunks of meat too closely. Individual images within the works are assembled fairly randomly, forced into good compositions. It's only after seeing a grouping of their work that their personal icons, respect for art history, and love of Texas pop kitsch themes emerge.
