Sedrick Huckaby lives and works in Fort Worth. His paintings are in the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Those are two of the most important art institutions in the country. He is a nationally significant artist and I'd bet 95% of DFW residents have never heard his name.
This is the DFW art scene problem in a nutshell. We have incredible talent here and we don't celebrate it because everyone's looking at Austin or Houston or literally anywhere else.
Other DFW creatives that deserve more attention:
Jeremy Biggers — if you've walked through Deep Ellum or Bishop Arts you've seen his murals. The one on Main Street is iconic. He's been painting Dallas for years and his work IS the visual identity of Deep Ellum at this point. @jeremybiggers
Abraham Alexander — Fort Worth singer-songwriter. His album "SEA/SONS" is one of the best things to come out of DFW musically in the last decade. He's toured internationally. Go listen to it right now.
500X Gallery has been artist-run since 1978. Nineteen seventy-eight. It's one of the oldest artist-run galleries in the entire country and it's sitting right here in Dallas and most people drive past it every day.
The Bishop Arts galleries are always free to walk through. Artspace111 in Fort Worth does excellent contemporary shows. These aren't pretentious gatekept spaces — they're regular rooms full of art made by people who live here.
We need to stop acting like DFW is a cultural wasteland. The talent is here. We just don't pay attention.
Who are you following locally? I want to know.
Jeremy Biggers has done more for the visual identity of Deep Ellum than any single person alive. Those murals define the neighborhood.