Dancers ranging through the 100,000-sq.-ft. former JCPenney at the West Oaks Mall — now known as the West Oaks Art House — “got pretty vigorous,” explains local art blogger Robert Boyd, who attended one of the inaugural performances in Houston’s newest, largest, and loneliest independent arts facility. One of them kicked the hole in the wall pictured at right. No grief from the free-range arts center’s laid-back L.A. landlord, though: “I kind of love the hole in the wall,” Pacific Retail’s Sharsten Plenge tells him. “It is like a souvenir of the energy that Suchu graced WOAH with.” (Yes, Plenge is an artist herself.)
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“This may say something about how she plans to let artists use the space. Artists would no doubt appreciate the flexibility to figuratively (and literally) knock holes in the wall,” Boyd concludes. But he wants to know how much effort Plenge will be putting into drawing Houston’s arts community 22 miles westward, to the intersection of Westheimer and Hwy. 6. And whether WOAH will be “doing any collaborations with Toby Keith.” Keith’s new I Love This Bar & Grill at the West Oaks Mall will be only about a quarter the size of WOAH, but its sign will likely be bigger. And inside, there’ll be a 95-ft.-long guitar-shaped bar.
- Safari to the Suburbs 2: Suchu Dance at West Oaks Art House [The Great God Pan Is Dead]
- Toby Keith to open bar in West Oaks Mall [Houston Business Journal]
- Previously on Swamplot: New Art House at West Oaks Mall Opens This Weekend with Vacant JCPenney Dancers, New Arts Complex Planned for Abandoned JCPenney at West Oaks Mall
Photos: Robert Boyd