TIME TO PAINT the town! This season, a trio of art fairs hits Houston, beginning with the Houston Art Fair (formerly the Houston Fine Art Fair), where nearly 50 local and international galleries exhibit Sept. 29-Oct. 2 at Silver Street Studios. On the same weekend, the Texas Contemporary event is held Downtown at the George R. Brown Convention Center. Opening-night festivities include a collaborative performance with the Houston Ballet’s Oliver Halkowich and multi-media artist Chris Doyle. And a week later, the semi-annual Bayou City Art Festival returns to the streets of Downtown with hundreds of outdoor booths.
THEY SAY WHERE there's smoke, there’s fire. Such is the case with the Southern Smoke dinner, during which five of Houston’s hottest chefs serve smoked meats. On Nov. 6, the HOUBBQ Collective — Underbelly’s Chris Shepherd, Oxheart’s Justin Yu, Coltivare’s Ryan Pera, and Seth Siegel-Gardner and Terrence Gallivan of The Pass and Provisions — join many other highly sought-after chefs at the second-annual fundraiser, in hopes of topping last year’s $184,000 till for the MS Society. The donation will be made in honor of Shepherd’s friend and former sommelier, Antonio Gianola, who was diagnosed with MS in 2014.
