Courtesy Chris Sauter shows what a uterus might look like if it were lined with plaid wallpaper and covered with wood. It’s a handyman’s uterus.

ARTIST: Chris Sauter, 36

MEDIUM: Mixed media

BEST KNOWN FOR: Making recognizable objects out of other recognizable objects. He’s especially known for going into galleries or museums, cutting out pieces of the walls and using them to build objects. The first time he did this, Sauter built a replica of his parent’s dining room table out of the walls of Artpace in San Antonio. When he cut into the walls, Sauter said his goal was to show connections between nature and culture. “Eating is a natural thing. Dining is a cultural thing of eating,” Sauter said. He also wants to play with the idea of the museum or gallery space, which usually does not invite people to touch objects, much less cut through walls. To Sauter, reconfiguring the structure of a building makes the space more organic.
 
PAYING THE BILLS: Sauter is an art instructor at Palo Alto College year-round and at the Southwest School of Art and Craft.

“Teaching is important because there’s so much bad work out there,” Sauter said. Students must learn everything from self-criticism and the history of art, he said. Sauter pays the other half of his bills by selling artworks and through grant funding.

CURRENTLY: Sauter has constructed a workshop in the center of the Blue Star Contemporary Art Center in which he builds uteruses using materials, such as plaid wallpaper, from his house renovations. He uses the space to do everything, including saw, sketch and document his work and ideas and doesn’t remove anything from the space. “Workshop” plays on themes of origins and the relationship between biology and culture.

It also allows viewers a peek inside Sauter’s brain and how he thought through this project.
“For this piece, I wanted to have the process totally opened up to the viewer. So the viewer is invited to come in and look through my sketchbooks to see the thought process,” Sauter said.

Some viewers may even find the artist building uteruses in the gallery until the exhibit comes down.

BACKGROUND: Sauter grew up in Boerne and received his bachelor of fine arts from the University of the Incarnate Word in 1993. He received his master of fine arts from the University of Texas San Antonio in 1996.

CHECK HIM OUT: “Workshop,” a part of Blue Star 23: Playing with Time, is up through Sunday, Aug. 17, at the Blue Star Contemporary Art Center, 1906 S. Flores St. The gallery is open noon-6 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday. For more information, call (210) 227-6960.

Emily Messer | 210SA contributor