Havel Ruck Projects (Dan Havel and Dean Ruck) is an artist collaborative that works in public and quasi-public environments to repurpose architectural structures and remnants of no perceived market value into works of art. By reorganizing the physical construction of unremarkable spaces and places, their interventions bring attention and recognition to under appreciated and ordinary buildings and their histories. Beginning informally in 1994 with Project O House, in collaboration with Kate Petley, the duo came together again in 2004 to create Inversion and Apt. Suite and through 2008 they also completed Scatter Boats and a series of “trespass” works. In 2009 they formalized their collaborative as Havel Ruck Projects, LLP. That same year they executed the dual-site project Give and Take as part of a group show at Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston. HRP projects have garnered broad attention from the public and media and the artists are honored to have received grants and awards from American Institute of Architects, Art League Houston, Houston Arts Alliance, Texas Society of Architects.

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Open House
House, photographs, pvc, paint, hardware

Commissioned by Downtown Houston and located in Sam Houston Park next to the Heritage Society and its ten historic 19th-century buildings and exhibits exploring the city’s history.

The photo-lined interior was filled with images sourced from family, friends, and local resale shops representing the city’s people, places, and past.

Open House gave visitors an architectural gaze of both the city’s modern skyscrapers of Downtown and surrounding landscape through holes carved out of the house.

Photos by Morris Malakof and Christina Sullivan, Texas Architect Magazine