Last year's 20th anniversary show was a break from the past. Amy Monier, the show's founder and curator, suspects that that change, and a pared advertising campaign, reduced the number of applicants this year to 50, from the usual 70 to 90. Houston's Ketria Bastain Scott canceled because of her advanced pregnancy. Of the remainder, six are from Texas, and the others hail from California, Connecticut and Utah.
Some works are among the most ambitious seen at the meadow in recent years.
Californian Pat Warner placed her giant Octagonal Cord for Connemara facing west so the light of the setting sun will play in the gaps between logs. In the half-buried houses of Steward, Sally Packard of Denton reacts to suburban sprawl and environmental degradation. Elaine Taylor of Fort Worth built a limestone Terrace Wall to lead the eye, and the mind, toward natural concerns. Other pieces are more delicate, including Houstonian Kelly Pike's Gathering , made of plaster spheres and reeds, and The Clearing House , two arched entryways made almost entirely of dead branches, by Anitra Blayton of Fort Worth. Tell us what you think.