Houston’s Very Own MacArthur // Magical Musical Morning

Art enthusiasts convened at the party celebrating the recent naming of Houston-based artist and co-founder of Project Row Houses, Rick Lowe, as a MacArthur Foundation Fellow (widely known as the Genius Grant). Supportive friends Penelope and Lester Marks, Jonathon Glus, Cindy Clifford, and Mayor Annise Parker chaired the affair at the Markses’ abode, which boasts one of the top 200 collections of contemporary art in the world (according to ArtNews, Summer 2004). Among the congratulatory crowd: Victoria and Marshal Lightman, UH president Renu Khator, Rice president David Leebron, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston’s Gary Tinterow, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston’s Valerie Cassel Oliver, Janet Hobby, Laura Bellows, and The Menil Collection’s Josef Helfenstein.

A gold-standard holiday (and fund-raising) tradition, the Houston Symphony Magical Musical Morning — Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow, chaired by Kim Lucas and Lilly Andress — welcomed more than 400 holiday-best-dressed to the River Oaks Country Club ballroom. Honoree Sybil Roos, along with the cadre of music lovers, noshed on a River Oaks Country Club-prepared feast while Houston Symphony violinist Rodica Gonzalez and her seven-year-old son, Matthew, performed live.