Art Lies, Volume 23, Summer 1999 Page: 3
60 p. : ill. (some col.) ; 28 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Conversat
ons
with Houston
Collectors
by Keith Marshall
Bob Card and Karol Kreymer
Bob Card and Karol Kreymer with James
Drake drawing, Robin Utterback painting and
David McGee's Lush Life.
Karol Kreymer with a painting by Kelly Allison."I'm living proof that an architect can like traditional things. All that Bauhaus and
Minimalist stuff in college just didn't take," laughs Karol Kreymer, lifting a glass of Merlot
to her lips as she surveys the gallery of her newly renovated home. "My mother's family
genes won out.
With a passion. The home that she and cardiologist husband Bob Card recently
expanded from 2,700 to 8,000 square feet by combining two adjacent houses flatly eschews
flashy Architectural Digest modernism and quietly serves as an elegant backdrop for their
burgeoning collection of Texas regional art.
Not that the house is ho-hum elegant by any means: there are
surprises around every corner. The two-story entrance foyer is
bathed in an eerie blend of lime and soft blue light from above,
not unlike the glow of the art-nouveau lamps that frame the fire-
place directly ahead. The lime color reflects off the walls of the
master bedroom through an open door; the blue radiates from
Glassell Core artist Robert Montgomery's light installation, For
Bob and Karol, a site-specific piece that the couple commissioned
before the artist's return to England.
"We wanted the effect of a sunset. The artist even provided
different color fluorescent tubes for the piece so we can change
the mood whenever we like."
It's hard to envision the elegantly-attired Kreymer changing
light bulbs, but she and her husband have been down-in-the-
trenches supporters of the arts since Card purchased his first work
of art as a Tulane University medical student to help a local artist
living in the same French Quarter building.
"It's an etching of the staircase by my room," he recalls. "I paid $50 for it 25 years ago."
It now hangs above the sofa in their new study, not far from an Italian card table and chairs,
Kreymer's first purchase, that dominate a corner of the home's media center.
But the collecting bug didn't strike until years later, when they purchased their first
work of art together in 1981.
"For a dozen or so years we'd been visiting galleries, drinking wine and just looking.
We liked a small work by Jimmy Kellough, Two Trees, One Sad, but were hesitant to make
the commitment, " Kreymer recalls. "A friend said, 'You like it? Why don't you buy it? That's
what it's there for."'
One cautious foot in the water, they soon found themselves in the deep end of
collecting-together. Each addition is a shared decision. They collect jointly and don't even
like to discuss the art without both present.
"For us, it's instantaneous, a purely visual decision. We don't have to be offended first
to want a work of art," maintains Kreymer. "We're not drawn to socio-political statements,
although that's certainly an important part of the David McGee self-portrait Lush Life, over
there." She gestures to the more-than-life-size canvas that dominates the stairwell leading to
the gallery room.
"It's based on David's Death of Marat," Card interjects, "but we didn't ask the artist
what it means. We just like it as a painting: including the monkey-one of McGee's recur-
ring motifs, fanciful balloons and all."
A large drawing by James Drake, a mural-size painting by Gael Stack, and a non-objec-ARTLIES SUMMER 1999
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Lightman, Victoria H. Art Lies, Volume 23, Summer 1999, periodical, 1999; Houston, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth228053/m1/5/?q=%22Bryant%2C+John%22: accessed May 25, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .