Dripping honey, a disembodied blonde ponytail and a luna moth accompany recordings of the natural sounds of Texas in Virginia L. Montgomery’s “Pony Cocoon,” showcased alongside two other video pieces at the Blanton Museum of Art.

“You say art and most people think of an oil painting of a bouquet of flowers,” artist Virginia L. Montgomery, also known by the moniker VLM, said. “They don’t necessarily think of raising a luna moth from an egg to a cocoon.” 

Montgomery, who graduated from UT with a BFA in 2008, works as an artist and graphic facilitator, displaying ideas through visual components like diagrams and images. Expressing feminist motifs and themes of rebirth through a surrealist lens, Montgomery’s short film “Pony Cocoon” (2019) will be on display at the Blanton through July as a part of “Day Jobs”, an exhibition opening Feb. 19.

“When I made some of those video artworks a few years ago, I had no idea, at the time, that it was going to end up in a museum,” Montgomery said. “I was just a person waking up at six in the morning and turning on my camera to film a cocoon.”

After a visit to Montgomery’s studio several years ago, Veronica Roberts, former curator of modern and contemporary art at the Blanton, said she thought the avant-garde videos would be a perfect fit for “Day Jobs”, which explores how many artists in the U.S. require day jobs to support their creative careers.  

“We often want to keep art in the sort of rarefied sphere, separate from day-to-day life,” Roberts said. “Artists are working with the same practical concerns that the rest of us have, both supporting themselves and drawing inspiration.” 

Roberts said Montgomery’s work brings a new perspective to UT’s in-house art museum. 

“(Montgomery’s) work is really strong, compelling and different from anything I’ve seen out there in the world,” Roberts said. “I love that she’s often making her videos in hotel rooms while she’s working as a graphic facilitator and flying across the country.”

Montgomery said one of her favorite attributes of fine art includes its freedom to merge  the uncanny with objective sciences like biology. 

“Most people are unfamiliar with the lifecycle of a butterfly,” Montgomery said. “By discussing that biology and bringing it into an academic, fine art space, I become the de facto teacher of biology in that moment. I enjoy being the bridge between art and science.”

During a recent trip to the Blanton, biology sophomore Ira Kondap said the VLM exhibition struck her with beauty, finding similarity to other science-based works on campus. 

“They’re putting art in Welch,” Kondap said. “The sciences aren’t lacking creativity, but it could have some art incorporated into it. I think it’s a helpful thing for people to see.” 

Exhibited internationally from Moscow to Copenhagen, Montgomery said she appreciates her beginnings in the Austin art community, which continues to celebrate and uplift young artists.

“One of the wonderful attributes of fine art is it has the ability to hold ideas in many different fields,” Montgomery said. “When you’re an intermediate artist, you are given creative freedom to borrow ideas from biology, philosophy or historical, mythological narrative.”