The Grace Museum and Emily LaCour cordially invite you to “the table” this holiday season.
Emily LaCour’s paintings remind us of the power of in person human interaction. An oil painter from Dallas, Texas, she was trained in the observational style of the old masters. Her first art lessons were taught by her grandmother, a Louisiana landscape painter. Today, LaCour delves into relational themes inspired by her own life experiences – family, motherhood, friendship, grief and fellowship. Central to each one of her paintings is the image of a table; a seemingly ordinary setting where the foundations of our most intimate relationships often begin and develop.
Emily LaCour began her series of table paintings during Covid, when gathering with friends and family came to an abrupt halt. For LaCour, the table became charged with quiet gravity: a place where memory, longing and connection could assemble in place of the people who could not. LaCour began pulling from memory all the people she longed to see during that time and put them into her paintings.
“My ‘At the Table’ series explores the table as a site of convergence,” the artist explains. “The table itself becomes both anchor and stage. It stabilizes every painting while all else around it remains fluid. It is a place of nourishment, ritual, equality and ambiguity — something to push against. It asks, ‘What is offered, what is taken and what lingers?'” While most of LaCour’s work happens on a large scale, her smaller paintings show peripheral acts of care. “I like to reveal what is going on in the next room or what happens when the table clears.”
The deep layers of emotion reflected through each painting can be found in the details: the physical application of the paint, the scale of the canvas and the range of color. Figures are often painted in and later smudged back out. The narrative shifts like a lucid dream. Her search of balance between figures and their environment comes through the physical process of pushing, pulling, drawing and carving directly into the oil. Each painting suggests a deep atmospheric space, centered around events that take place when friends and family gather in times of joy and in times of solace. Much like a dream sequence of layered images, the story remains elusive and a mere suggestion of what is taking place. The interpretation is up to the viewer’s personal experiences.
The Grace Museum is honored to host Emily LaCour’s first solo museum exhibition. “Emily LaCour: At the Table” invites you to find emotional resonance and to consider the shared experiences that bind us together. Visitors can meet the artist at a special exhibition reception on November 5, 2026, at 6 p.m.
Contributed By The Grace Museum
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