Leigh Anne Lester: A Variety of Forms Recovering from Transubstantiated Clarity

San Antonio-based Leigh Anne Lester is the fifth artist to present work on this expansive entry wall in the AT&T Lobby. For her year-long installation, Lester premieres a monumental new assemblage that incorporates ideas and images with which she has worked for some time, developed here on a grand scale. Elements of the installation were prefabricated in the artist’s studio before she worked on-site for nearly a week with the museum’s installation team. While Lester's interests span drawing, sculpture, and design, they also encompass the world of science, and in particular botany and genetic modification. As the artist describes:

My work addresses the place between the genesis of genetic modification and its aftereffects. Genetic modification offers humans the resources and means to change the composition of species from the microscopic level to the macroscopic system; to change the composition of a species by deleting or adding an attribute to suit our own desires. Too often we don’t have a clear view of what the ramifications will be. The possibilities are as exciting as they are frightening, yet there is beauty in the unknown.

Leigh Anne Lester received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from The University of Texas at San Antonio. She exhibited her work at the McNay on two previous occasions: in 2006 she participated in the Artists Looking at Art series, and in 2015, was one of six artists to present work in the 60th anniversary weekend pop-up exhibition. In 2013, Lester filled the windows at Artpace with her sprawling installation, Cultivated Divergence, and in 2016, exhibited in a two-person presentation at Muriel Guepin Gallery in New York City.

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website