Dr. Oz Makes a Houston House Call, Promoting Mental Healthcare for Teens at Memorial Schmooze
Henry Clark
May. 3, 2023
MaryCharles Bennett, Dr. Oz & Jennifer Ducote
DR. OZ, ERSTWHILE U.S. Senate candidate and TV star, was the guest of honor at a cocktail party promoting HealthCorps’ mental health initiatives for teens, held at the home of CityBook Executive Publisher Lisa Holthouse and husband Michael.
A few dozen Holthouse friends gathered in the Memorial manse, readied for springtime with beautiful soft-colored florals, to rub shoulders with the good doctor, who was a renowned heart surgeon long before Oprah helped him become a household name.
As Lisa noted in her recent essay on HealthCorps, Mehmet Oz founded HealthCorps in 2003 to address health inequities in at-risk communities by empowering teens to take ownership of their health and well-being, “encouraging them to become change agents within their family, their school and their neighborhood.”
HealthCorps has programs in place in Houston at Jack Yates High School, Worthing High School, Wheatley High School, Welch Middle School, Wisdom High School, YES Prep Public Schools’ Eisenhower High School and Varnett Northeast.
Amy Braun and Lisa Holthouse
Kelli Weinzierl, Mary Kay Bowden, Andrea Eastham
Lyle Eastham
Dr. Nita White and Dr. Toron Wooldridge
John Weinzierl, Garry Tanner, Dr. Oz, Michael Holthouse
Charles & Tiffany Masterson
Dr. Oz, Martha & Richard Finger
Rosangela & David Capobianco
Dr. Oz, Aynesly & Palmer Letzerich, Amy Braun
Carolyn Tanner
Melissa Parigi, Dr. Oz, Palmer Letzerich
Tama & John Klosek, Amy Braun
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Palmer & Aynsley Letzerich, Jennifer & Doak Brown
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THE IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE is the subject of Houston-based Afro-Brazilian artist Ibraim Nascimento’s exhibit Reflections, on view at The Jung Center of Houston through May 13.
Born and raised in Cachoeira, Bahia — once a major port for slave labor for the country’s sugarcane plantations and birthplace to such highly regarded Brazilian musicians as Joao Gilberto, and the thundering Samba drum collective Olodum — Nascimento’s work is born out of his Brazilian heritage. It’s also inspired by the new connections he has made since migrating to the U.S. and finding kinship with Houston’s Black and Latinx art communities.
His brightly colored, sometimes surreal portraits of fellow Brazilians, including a series of paintings of children wearing various carnivalesque animal masks, hover in the Jung Center’s exhibition space like memories the artist is compelled to hold onto, with some works purposely left incomplete, as if the subject were hovering somewhere the new world and their native land, and in danger of fading from view.
Tellingly, some of the portraits include small mirrors, each one an “eye” looking at and providing a reflection of the viewer. (Although in one striking painting, “Pivete,” a Portuguese word used to refer to homeless kids, the subject is defiantly covering both eyes with his hands.)
In an artist statement, Nascimento writes, “One of the many struggles we face as immigrants is not being able to see ourselves in the eyes of the people we live with.” Reflections conveys that struggle and allows the empathetic viewer to imagine themselves as a stranger in a strange land. On Saturday, May 6, at 2pm, Nascimento will give an artist talk and tour of the exhibit.
Also on view is Seven, an installation of seven magical realist portraits of Black women by Houston artist Kristi Rangel. Rangel, a self-taught, Houston Coalition Against Hate emerging artist, includes the Ghanaian Adinkra symbol Funtunfunefu-Denkyemfunefu, which represents unity in diversity, in each mysterious, nocturnal portrait. Flowers, butterflies, and several species of North American birds bloom, flutter, and perch around each woman, celebrating the environmental and spiritual interconnectedness of humans and creatures of the natural world.
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