“So for people who are inquisitive, there is a journey in which you can have great and challenging experiences through art. I want to bring people into this experience and to move beyond a kind of shopping mindset, and introduce this to people that are starting to buy art. You’re not born with an eye. You develop the eye, and then get in touch with the essence of what you are looking at.”
Founding Principal, Barbara Davis Gallery
For 39 years, Internationally known Barbara Davis Gallery has brought groundbreaking contemporary art to Houston. Driven by her intuitive sensibilities and perennially fresh vision, Barbara Davis has championed a generation of significant contemporary artists. In the process she has challenged a generation of art collectors, both seasoned and aspiring, to see the beauty and value in their work through dialogs and panel discussions with prominent museum curators and artists from across genres. She has launched the careers of international artists such as Julie Mehretu, one of the most important contemporary artists of our time, and Mie Olise Kjærgaard, a rising star from Denmark discovered in a Saatchi Sensations exhibition, having given Mehretu her first gallery exhibition and Olise her first U.S. exhibition. She was also one of the first to bring to Houston the influential names of Joseph Beuys, Kiki Smith, Jonathan Borofsky, Allan McCollum, and Gilbert & George among many others. She brought progressive international exhibitions such as Leipzig Select, artists from the New Leipzig School, and exhibitions for Beijing East Village artists Zhang Huan and Li Wei. Barbara Davis Gallery was one of the first Texas galleries to be included in the influential and prestigious Art Basel Miami Beach art fair. The gallery’s exhibitions have been reviewed in international publications such as ArtForum, Art in America, Art News, Flash Art International, The Art Economist, and The New York Times among many others. Her passion for exhibiting innovative contemporary art and her commitment to educating her collectors and the community has driven the focus of the gallery for 39 years.
