Traces of Being

Traces of Being, the third exhibition of the 2024 Jones Artist Awards Program, reflects how our personal and collective legacies evolve over time and across generations. How do inherited family relics or less tangible things such as memories and cultural heritage shape our identities? And what does that transfer between generations reveal, particularly in a city like Houston, where the experiences of immigrants are so deeply woven into our cultural fabric?

Installed October 2024

Images: Nicki Evans Photo

Featured Artists

Jean Shon’s series Ahppa’s Songbook presents a charming portrait of the artist’s father through photographs of his handwritten lyrics to popular songs. As a non-native English speaker immersing himself in a new culture, her father made transcription mistakes, which Jean finds endearing and highlights to reflect on the beauty of imperfection and the fluidity of meaning. Each photograph serves to document and preserve her memories while also expressing a child’s affection and admiration for her father, connecting with his experience from decades earlier.

Jean Shon is originally from Galveston County and currently lives in Tallahassee, Florida.

Featured Works

Ahppa’s Songbook: I Love You More Than I Can Say / Scarborough Fair; 2022; Inkjet print; 24” x 33”

Ahppa’s Songbook: West Virginia / All For the Love of a Girl; 2022; Inkjet print; 24” x 33”

Ahppa’s Songbook: You Mean Everything to Me / Happy Together; 2022; Inkjet print; 24” x 33”

Kaima Akarue creates immersive collages from personal photographs. She uses irregular borders and sharp angles to distort and reassemble images into fragmented, dreamlike compositions. Her large-scale works explore her family history, featuring recurring images of her father and depictions of home, both interior and exterior. While deeply personal, Akarue’s work captures the emotional weight of memories, transforming lived experiences into something more elaborate, evocative, or grand — often through the lens of childhood. Her collages remind us how memory reshapes itself, becoming more vivid and complex over time.

Kaima Akarue is originally from Houston, where she currently lives and works.

Featured Works

From Federal to Hopetown; 2023; Collage; 40” x 30”

A Privileged thrown for my Oyibo Peking; 2023; Collage; 38” x 61’

Get in the waters fine; 2023; Collage; 48” x 58”

Kim Le created Combination Pho to capture what she describes as her “naive yet prideful” connection to her Vietnamese roots as a second-generation American. Her playful and heavily ornamented ceramic pots intertwine cultural fragments from her Vietnamese background and American pop culture, with the design spilling over into the carved wood table that holds them. The tone is fun and inviting; it’s a kind of seek-and-find of references to consumer goods: Cheetos, egg tarts, rice bags, and more. Kim articulates her experience of Vietnamese identity as “second hand,” stating, “I inherited a love for sour-smelling fish sauce and pungent durian all while immersed in Cartoon Network and blasting Spice Girls. I am Vietnamese but can’t speak it; I eat the food but can’t cook it; I celebrate it but barely know it. Yet I know how to spell Mississippi and [can recall] every single episode of SpongeBob SquarePants.”

Kim Le (aka Komie) is originally from Houston, where she currently lives and works.

Featured Works

Combination Pho; 2023; Ceramics and Wood; 53” x 55’ x 20”

Stanley Bermudez’s Family of Origin series is a heartfelt tribute to his family. He composes with geometric slices of color without any blending. This style of hard-edge painting is inspired by Venezuelan masters Carlos Cruz Diez and Jesús Rafael Soto as well as Guajiro tapestries. His paintings focus on tender moments between his parents, exemplified in Barbershop of Love, which captures his mother cutting his father’s hair — a cherished ritual from their 64 years of marriage. For this exhibition, Stanley created two smaller works: a portrait of his father using old business cards and IDs as a background, reflecting on his legacy two years after his passing, and a portrait of his parents that highlights their distinct personalities. The poignancy of these portraits is heightened by the recent passing of his mother, who saw these paintings in progress.

Stanley Bermudez is originally from Venezuela and currently lives and works in Houston.

Featured Works

Barbershop of Love; 2016; Acrylic on canvas; 84” x 54”

Legado de un Padre; 2024; Acrylic on mixed media on canvas; 36” x 24”

An Inside Joke, 52?; 2024; Acrylic on canvas; 24” x 36”