Terry Allen (artist)
Terry Allen | |
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Terry Allen at the 2010 Texas Book Festival | |
Background information | |
Born |
Wichita, Kansas | May 7, 1943
Genres | Outlaw country, alt.country, Texas country |
Occupation(s) | Vocalist, painter, conceptual artist |
Instruments | Vocalist |
Years active | 1970s–present |
Terry Allen (born May 7, 1943 in Wichita, Kansas) is a country music singer in the outlaw country/Texas country genre, painter, and conceptual artist from Lubbock, Texas. He lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Early life
Allen's father was Fletcher ("Sled") Allen (born August 23, 1886 in West Plains, Missouri – died October 16, 1959 in Lubbock, Texas) a catcher in 1910 for the St. Louis Browns, who continued his career as a player-manager in the Texas League.[1]
Allen attended Monterey High School[2] in Lubbock, Texas. His contemporaries at Monterey High School included Butch Hancock, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Joe Ely, Jo Harvey Allen and Jo Carol Pierce. Trained as an architect, he received a B.F.A. from the Chouinard Art Institute in 1966.[3] After briefly teaching at his alma mater (1968-1969) and the University of California, Berkeley (1971), Allen served on the faculty of the California State University, Fresno as a guest lecturer (1971-1973), associate professor (1974-1977) and professor (1978-1979) of art before resigning his appointment to pursue other opportunities.[4] His art has been supported by three National Endowment for the Arts grants and a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship. His work Trees[5] (the music, literary and third trees) is installed on the campus of the University of California, San Diego as part of the Stuart Collection. His artwork has been featured at the L.A. Louver art gallery in Venice, California.
Visual artist
Allen is represented by Gallery Paule Anglim[6] in San Francisco, California. His works are represented in the collections of many international museums including the New York Museum of Modern Art, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City, the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, Espace Lyonnais d'Art Contemporain, Musée Saint-Pierre, Lyon, France, the Houston Museum of Fine Arts, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Dallas Museum of Art, and the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art.
Kansas City, Missouri is home to both his controversial public sculpture "Modern Communication"[7] as well as The Belger Collection[8][9] which features Terry Allen as one of their seven "core artists."
Music
Allen recorded eight albums during the years 1975 to 2004 and collaborated with David Byrne on the soundtrack for Byrne's movie True Stories. Allen's music is far from traditional. A quotation attributed to Allen states, "People tell me it's country music, and I ask, 'Which country?'" Allmusic calls his 1979 release, Lubbock (On Everything), "one of the finest country albums of all time" and a progenitor of the alt-country movement.[10]
Allen made a cameo appearance on the track "Ghost of Travelin' Jones" from Ryan Bingham's 2007 album, Mescalito.
Discography
- Juarez (1975)
- Lubbock (On Everything) (1979)
- Smokin' the Dummy (1980)
- Bloodlines (1983)
- Pedal Steal (1985)
- Amerasia (1987)
- Silent Majority (Terry Allen's Greatest Missed Hits) (1992)
- Chippy (1995)
- Human Remains (1996)
- Salivation (1999)
- Live at Al's Grand Hotel. Recorded May 7, 1971 (2012)
- Bottom Of The World (2013)
References
- ↑ Sled Allen Statistics and History – Baseball-Reference.com. Retrieved 2010-01-11.
- ↑
- ↑ http://www.lalouver.com/html/gallery-history-images/artist-biographies/terry-allen_biography.pdf
- ↑ http://www.lalouver.com/html/gallery-history-images/artist-biographies/terry-allen_biography.pdf
- ↑ Stuart Collection – University of California, San Diego. Retrieved 2010-01-11.
- ↑ Terry Allen at Gallery Paule Anglim. Retrieved 2010-01-11.
- ↑ Controversial statue finds new home near police headquarters – The Kansas City Star
- ↑ The Belger Arts Center – Kansas City Contemporary Art Gallery and Collection
- ↑ Modern Day Renaissance Man Terry Allen's "Tables and Angels" at the Belger – KCUR 89.3FM
- ↑ Stewart Mason, "Review: Lubbock (On Everything)", Allmusic. Retrieved 2010-01-11.
Further reading
- Robert Faires, "Tale of a Tale spinner:How a ballplayer, a piano player, beatnik poetry, and Lubbock shaped Terry Allen as an epic storyteller", Austin Chronicle, December 19, 2003.
- Jason Gross, "Terry Allen Interview", Perfect Sound Forever, May 1998.
- Chris Oglesby, Chris Oglesby Interviews Terry Allen above the Caravan of Dreams, Ft. Worth, virtualblock, March 26, 1998.
External links
- Booking and tour information (music) from Davis McLarty Agency, Austin, Texas.
- Art exhibitions and sales from Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, California.
- Dugout, a multimedia, multi-venue art exhibition and theatre program in Los Angeles. February – May 2004.
- Terry Allen's bio page at LA Louver gallery.
- Oral history interview with Terry Allen, 1998 Apr. 22 from the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.