Houston's Art Car Museum will close for good in April

Houston's Art Car Museum will close on April 28 following the deaths of its founders, Ann and James Harithas, in 2021 and 2023 respectively.

The closure was announced in a statement posted to the Art Car Museum's site. "Discussions are in progress with local and regional arts organizations to continue and evolve the Art Car Museum's presence, legacy, and mission in the future. The details of those discussions and plans will be shared further as and when they take shape," the statement read in part.

Art Car Museum officials did not respond to emails from Chron last week inquiring about the future of the museum. However, the statement was posted to the museum's site shortly after those inquiries were made. Houston's Art Car Parade, set to take place April 13, will not be affected by the closure, according to Jonathan Beitler, director of communications for the Orange Show, which organizes the parade.

The museum, fondly known as "The Garage Mahal," opened in 1998, founded by the Harithases, a power couple in Texas' alternative arts scene. The building at 140 Heights Blvd was designed by art car artist David Best, and is known for its distinctive scrap metal exterior, including spikes, spires and hubcaps as decor. The couple also founded the now-shuttered Station Museum of Contemporary Art in Houston and the Five Points Contemporary Art Museum in Victoria, Texas.

In 2001, the duo opened a second private art institution in Houston, The Station Museum, which focused on contemporary art that "questions our society's morality and ethics," including works that dealt with political, aesthetic, economic, and spiritual issues. The museum often hosted challenging and controversial works, including, in 2017, Andres Serrano's "Piss Christ." In 2016, the couple opened the Five Points Museum, which also focused on contemporary art and hosted its own Art Car Parade. 

Ann Harithas died in December 2021, and less than a year later, in November 2022, The Station Museum went on an "indefinite hiatus," effectively closing for good. The building, at 1502 Alabama Street, is now listed for sale.

James Harithas died in March 2023. In addition to co-founding several museums, he also worked as director of the Contemporary Arts Museum from 1974 to 1978 before leaving over disagreements with the museum's board.

In an October story in Texas Monthly, Ann's daughter from a previous marriage, Molly O’Connor Kemp, said that the Harithases disliked bureaucracy so much that they hadn't even established a foundation, or left instructions for their heirs, to keep their museums going in perpetuity. After Ann's death, Kemp and her siblings established a small trust to pay for two years' worth of programs at Five Points and the Art Car Museum that Ann planned before she died, including the current exhibit at the Art Car Museum, a retrospective of Ann's work as an artist. It's unclear how much of that funding is left.

Even after the Art Car Museum is closed, Houstonians will still be left with James Harithas's Art Car Manifesto, a call-to-arms of sorts in favor of individuality and creativity, and against commercialism and capitalism.

"The art car movement is part of the growing attempt to renew our commitment to ourselves by reducing the control that the government and the corpora­tions have over us. At the same time, it is on the cutting edge of a significant change in popular consciousness because it implies a transfer of power to the individual," the manifesto reads.

"Get into the left lane and aim high, but keep one eye on the rear view mirror for the black and whites. Art cars are a grassroots movement. Change your ve­hicle, improve it, personalize it and make your own statement with it so that you can once again become one with it. Art cars are an expression of your freedom and above all, of the God-given American right to be yourself and flaunt it on the highways and byways of America."