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BOX 13 ArtSpace is pleased to present four new exhibitions opening Friday, October 30, 2026 6–9 PM. In the Front BOX gallery, “Slow Season,” a dual exhibition by Heather den Uijl and Hillaree Hamblin, explores introspection, adaptation, and stillness through nature and abstraction. The exhibition considers the quiet spaces we carve out for ourselves and the transformative power of self-reflection, inviting us to find strength, solace, and resilience in the slow and soft moments of life. “In Lands’ Brooches”, Dongyi Wu brings together ”No Longer Human” and “The Black in Dark” at the Back BOX gallery , tracing a shift from constructed scenes and imagined landscapes toward the conditions that shape boundaries, perception, and place. Drawing on her background in contemporary jewelry, Wu explores the “brooch” as both object and spatial logic-a way of marking a field within a larger land. In the Box 13 Window BOX Gallery, Lauren Hope Walker presents “The Portal of Blood, Sweat, and Beers” , a large-scale wall installation where the artist uses squishy pink paper pulp and glazed ceramics to depict a cosmos of symbols and marks that frequent her practice. Walker invites viewers to consider the space as an immersive painting, transforming the medium into one that they can experience bodily. Moving to our Upstairs BOX gallery, ‘Like Apple Pie’ uses soft sculpture, video, and collage to explore the intersections of Christian evangelicalism, harmful white Southern culture, and American consumerism. Inspired by objects associated with an ‘American spirit,’ Wicker combines denim, clothing, food, license plates, hot dogs, blue jeans, and camouflage to create a chimeric portrait of American identity. Themes of absurdity, exhaustion, and piety emerge through these repeated images and material processes.
The exhibitions continue through December 5, 2026. An Opening Reception will be held on Friday, October 30, 2026, 6–9 PM at BOX 13 ArtSpace, 6700 Harrisburg, Houston, TX 77011.
These events are funded in part by the City of Houston through the Houston Arts Alliance. Additional support is provided by The Brown Foundation, Saint Arnold Brewing Company, Giant Texas Distillers, JP Morgan – Nancy O'Connor Fund, and all who help make our programming possible.
Slow Season | Heather den Uijl and Hillaree Hamblin
Front BOX gallery
Slow Season is a dual exhibition of the work of Heather den Uijl and Hillaree Hamblin exploring themes of introspection, adaptation, and stillness through the lens of nature and abstraction. The exhibition highlights moments, both large and small, that occur in the quiet spaces we carve out for ourselves and the transformative power of self-reflection that is brought about within them. Hinging on the belief that we can find ourselves and our purpose in slow and soft moments, Slow Season asks us to tune in to a gentle steady hum of the world around us to find strength, solace, and resilience.
Heather den Uijl
Heather den Uijl is a contemporary artist and educator who lives and works in Houston, Texas. den Uijl received her MFA from the University of Texas at Austin and her BFA from the University of Houston. Her work has been exhibited throughout the United States including solo exhibitions “Off-Kilter” at San Jacinto North Gallery in Houston, Texas and participation in the Tiny Pedestal Project at Dream Clinic in Columbus, Ohio. Group exhibitions include, The Lawndale Art Center, Jonathan Hopson Gallery, the Visual Arts Center in Austin, Texas, Box13 Art Space, Women and their Work, Anya Tish Gallery, Soft Times Gallery in San Francisco, California, 82 Parris in Portland, Maine, Dodomu Gallery in Brooklyn, New York, The Nook in St. Louis, Missouri, and the Bibliowicz Gallery at Cornell University. Selected publications include New American Paintings West Issue #150, and Space on Space magazine Issue #3, Collect.
Website: heatherdenuijl.pb.studio/
Instagram: @heatherden_uijl
Hillaree Hamblin
Originally from southern California, Hillaree Hamblin is an artist, professor and community organizer currently based out of Houston, Texas. She is one of the original founders of the Houston art collective OpenMFA and has exhibited her work in Germany, London, and various art spaces around Houston, including Lawndale Art Center, The Tank Space, and Flatland Gallery. Most recently, she unveiled a solo exhibition at Lonestar College-CyFair titled Soft Bloom and had work featured in Lines & Other Forms at dodomugallery in Brooklyn and in the New Texas Talent Exhibition at Craighead Green Gallery in Dallas. Hillaree continues to work and teach as an adjunct professor within the Lonestar College system and is the Director of the MFA program at Houston Christian University. She maintains studios both at HCU and at home where she works alongside her dying house plants and two clingy cat sons, Harvey and Grey Baby.
Website: https://www.hillareehamblin.com
Instagram: @hamblinhillaree
Email: [email protected]
TItle | Dongyi Wu
Back BOX gallery
This exhibition brings together No Longer Human and The Black in Dark, tracing a longer
development in Dongyi Wu’s practice: from constructing situations and placing figures within
them to investigating the conditions that make those situations possible. Across the exhibition,
the “brooch” emerges as a spatial logic beyond adornment: a way of setting apart a field within a
larger land.
In No Longer Human, Wu constructed three imaginary landscapes-a beach, street, and park-each forming a distinct field. A discarded strip of salmon becomes the central character within these recognizable yet unreal environments, while also becoming part of the landscape itself. Rather than illustrating its source novel, the scenes shape how the salmon is seen and overlooked. Fragmented viewpoints and low perspectives-elliptical or elongated-reconstruct the scene from the salmon’s position.
The Black in Dark developed from a poem Wu wrote after a night road trip to Marfa, Texas,
where the landscape disappeared into darkness. Rather than constructing a scene, Wu turns to the conditions through which a landscape becomes perceptible in darkness. Black becomes not
emptiness, but a field where positions and relationships lose stability; headlights briefly return
fragments to visibility before they shift again. The work examines how boundaries, positions,
and points of reference allow distinctions within a field to emerge and be temporarily re-formed.
Dongyi Wu is a Chinese-born artist currently based in Bakersville, North Carolina, United
States. Working across wearable art, soft sculpture, installation, and image-based practice, Wu creates sculptural works between body, image, and space. Rooted in fashion design, metalsmithing, and art jewelry, her practice explores perception, spatial relationships, and the conditions that shape how bodies and objects are encountered.
Wu is currently an artist-in-residence at Penland School of Craft. She has recently completed artist residencies at Houston Center for Contemporary Craft; University of Arkansas at Little Rock; Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts; and Contemporary Craft. Wu received her MFA in Metal and Jewelry Design from Rochester Institute of Technology in the United States, her BA in Jewelry Art Design from Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology in China, and a dual degree in Fashion Design and Engineering from the same institution. Wu’s work has been shown nationally and internationally, including at JOYA 2020 in Barcelona and Schmuck 2018 in Munich, and in eight solo exhibitions. She was winner of the Preziosa Young Design Competition 2020 in Italy. Her work is held in the collection of Le Arti Orafe Jewellery School & Academy in Florence and in private collections.
Website: https://www.dongyiwu.com
Instagram: @dongyi.w or @dongyiwu.wearable.systems
The Portal of Blood, Sweat, and Beers | Lauren Hope Walker
Window BOX gallery
The Portal of Blood, Sweat, and, Beers transforms Box 13’s Window gallery into a tactile, immersive environment. Upon entering the space, viewers are confronted by a wall of materially rich, squishy, pink paper pulp populated with glazed ceramics that depict symbols and marks that frequent Walker’s practice: checkered patterns, purple bathtubs, teardrops, hearts, hairbrushes, and blood droplets.
Walker invites viewers to consider the space as an immersive painting; a queering of the medium that challenges the traditional boundaries of painting as a flat, contained object. Instead, the painting becomes something viewers can enter, navigate, and experience through disorientation.
Lauren Hope Walker is a visual artist currently living in the Houston/gulf area. She works across mediums of painting, sculpture and ceramics to investigate her queer femme identity through imagined, absurd narratives. Walker received her MFA in painting from Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas in 2024 after receiving her BFA in painting from Stephen F. Austin State University in Nacogdoches, Texas in 2021. Walker has participated in multiple solo and group shows across Texas including Arts Fort Worth, Moudy Gallery, Easyside, Stinson House, Blind Alley Projects and was granted a fellowship to attend Vermont Studio Center in summer 2026.
Website: https://www.laurenhopewalker.com/
Instagram: @laurenhopewalker_art
Like Apple Pie | Chris Wicker
Upstairs BOX gallery
Like Apple Pie uses soft sculpture, video, and collage to continue Wicker’s exploration on the intersections between Christian evangelicalism, harmful white southern culture, and American consumerism. Taking inspiration from the idea that items like apple pie and baseball are imbued with an “American spirit,” Like Apple Pie specifically stitches together multiple recognizable elements of Americana. Denim pieces are physically stitched together, and scans of Wicker’s clothing are blended digitally. References to food, clothing, and car license plates collide. Ultimately, what remains is a chimeric understanding of entities that are categorized as “American.” Hot dogs, blue jeans, and camouflage material are all examined through this process. Themes of absurdity, exhaustion, and piety present themselves in the work through the repeated depiction of figures and specific material process.
Like Apple Pie was supported by the Let Creativity Happen Grant and is funded in part by the City of Houston through the Houston Arts Alliance and Houston MOCA.
Chris Wicker is a New Media artist from Texarkana, TX. Chris received his BFA from
Stephen F. Austin State University in 2018 and his MFA from Texas Christian University in 2021.
Chris has had solo exhibitions in spaces across Texas including Blind Alley in Fort Worth, and in
the New Media Gallery at the Louise Hopkins Underwood Center for the Arts in Lubbock, TX.
His work has also been included in multiple group exhibitions in Chicago, Ruston, LA, and
Dallas among others. Internationally, Chris has been a part of exhibitions in Hiroshima, Moscow,
and The Netherlands. Currently practicing in Houston, TX, Chris maintains his role as the
Exhibitions Manager for FotoFest.
Website: https://chriswicker.com/
Instagram: @chris.m.wicker
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