The circle & the circle

Throughline is pleased to present the circle & the circle, with works by member artists Cindee Travis Klement and Sherry Tseng Hill, on view Friday, May 15th through Saturday, June 13th, 2026. An opening reception will be held on Friday, May 15th from 6-9pm.

the circle & the circleexplores the pull between the natural and built worlds — two realms long framed as separate, even oppositional.  The exhibition takes its name from China Miéville’s novel The City & The City, wherein two cities occupy the same space, but citizens are conditioned to unsee one another — a metaphor for how slowly we’ve learned to stop noticing. Klement approaches this through dismantling and unlearning habits of thought that have pushed nature to the margins of urban life, while Hill looks forward, imagining a future in which technology treats ecology as a partner rather than an obstacle. Together, their work asks viewers to confront what has been conditioned out of sight and to live attentively in our shared world.

Cindee Travis Klement makes art inspired by the interrelated workings of ecosystems. She works with welded steel, brick, paper, video, and the land itself, driven by one question: what does it take to restore a broken connection? That question grew from encountering scars of soil erosion in West Texas, Hurricane Harvey’s devastation in Houston, and the moment the first bee was listed as endangered. She researches natural history, economics, and human environmental impact, exploring how urban landscapes can be reimagined, and how the small and quiet can ripple outward in ways that matter. She makes art about possibility — drawing on real stories of restoration to remind us that repair, when we choose it, is already underway. Klement received the 2026 Houston Endowment Jones Artist One Person Show Award, and was named an Artadia Awards finalist in 2020 and 2021. Former Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner proclaimed August 24, 2021, as “Cindee Klement Day”. www.cindeeklement.com

Sherry Tseng Hill creates mixed-media works that move between abstraction and representation, where layered compositions shift between surface and structure, plane and volume. Blending two- and ]three-dimensional elements, she treats paper, fiber, and found materials as both framework and skin, exploring the porous boundaries between humans, nature, and human-made forms. Born in Taiwan and raised between cultures after moving to the U.S. at fourteen, her work draws on experiences of migration and displacement to reflect on in-betweenness, colonization, and the evolving meaning of home in the context of climate change. Working with mulberry paper alongside twigs, thread, and other found materials, she layers, felts, weaves, and stitches surfaces into tactile meditations on erasure, environmental fragility, and coexistence. Tseng Hill holds degrees in architecture from Rice University; teaches at the Glassell School of Art, MFAH; and is represented by Moody Gallery in Houston. www.sherrytsenghill.com

Scheduled Programming: 

• Opening Reception: Friday, May 15, 6:00 - 9:00 pm

• Artist Talk: Saturday, May 23, 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm
  Moderated by Frauke Josenhans, PhD, Deputy Director and Chief Curator, Dora Maar Cultural Center

• Fireside Chat: Wildlife is Technology: Art + Living Systems + The City
  Saturday, June 6, 1:00 pm - 2:00 pm
  With Cindee Travis Klement, Sherry Tseng Hill, Pete Den and Dr. Weston Twardowski

• CANCELED Closing Reception: What the City Can Be - An Afternoon of Tea, Conversation and Exchange
  Saturday, June 13, 1:00 pm - 4:00 pm