Emerging Legacies: The 19th Annual New Generations Student Showcase

In the same trip as South of Market and Botticelli to Braque, I came across a really wonderful exhibit. Divergence: Emerging Legacies was a three day juried new generations student showcase that included student work from northern California art schools and universities.  The event also included an undergraduate art history symposium which I would have loved to attend, but sadly could not make it to.  I was blown away by the inventive spirit and energy in this small exhibit.  It was crowded, the artists bunched together around their works to take pictures on what I am sure was a momentous day for them.

The piece below, Mass of Dignity, is what initially drew me to the room.  The painting is captivating, yet I haven't been able to figure out exactly why.  The figure is staring blankly out at the audience, yet I feel like it is also imploring.  Paint runs down the canvas, over the composition starting from the figure's left eye, which strongly reminds me of the work of Hung Liu.  Without context I can ponder, but I wonder if there is a link between Hung Liu's theme of making good work and the "dignity" expressed in the title.

Yi Shin Chiang, Mass of Dignity, 2014, Oil on Canvas.

Another work that really interested me was the sculptural work by Alyssa Eustaquio, pictured below.  On a tall, pink, sparkly base small, silver high heeled shoes lay inside a clear box. The heels are cast silver, and as the artists titled her work, Barbie I Can Be...Standard Heels, the heels represent the standard heel of the american Barbie. The artist is literally putting these tiny heels on a pedestal and behind glass.  (Though the work does not actually note whether the clear box is made from plastic or glass, the symbolism is still there.  In fact, if the box is actually made from plastic, that could say something interesting about the idea of the female ideal.)  Putting the Barbie shoes on a pedestal glorifies them, gives them the importance the idea of "Barbie" often has for young girls.  If Barbie represents the female ideal, then this artist is showing that in all of its absurdity.  It's even more interesting to me that these shoes were cast, hand made, in metal, making them even less attainable.  But perhaps that is why the artist puts the shoes on this girly pedestal behind a glass box, to show the complete nonattainability of Barbie and all that she represents.

Alyssa Eustaquio, Barbie I Can Be...Standard Heels, 

2015, Cast Silver, sparkle and pink.

Jizhi Li exhibited extraordinary face adornments at the show.  I noticed on her business card that she is listed as a jewelry designer, which I think is interesting considering the relatively unwearable nature of her pieces.  Truly wearable or not, they are quite magnificent.  Pictured below is her eye adornment, which resembles a steampunk-looking fractured masquerade mask, from her Look at my Face set.  The other piece is a teeth adornment that covers the mouth.  While fascinating on a purely visual level, the title of the work also makes me wonder about feminist ideas connected to the pieces.  

Jizhi Li, Look at my face:  Eye adornment, 2014, Silver, brass, bronze.

Another piece that attracted me was Junyan Huo's Rorschach Hou Test I.  This piece is obviously meant to resemble a Rorschach Test, but what interested me the most was how all the figures look like women flailing or dancing around.  The intensity of the contrast of the black and white adds to the appeal of the piece, making your attention completely hone in on the black composition.  I do not know what Huo is saying with this piece, but if a Rorschach Test is supposed to show your inner self and how you perceive the world, I think this piece could speak of the artist's desire to be free.

Junyan Huo, Rorschach Hou Test I, 2015, 

Archival pigment inkjet print.

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Janet Delaney at the de Young

This weekend after a disastrous attempt to attend a lecture at the San Francisco Art Institute, I visited the de Young hoping to view the museum's featured Botticelli to Braque: Masterpieces from the National Galleries of Scotland and Janet Delaney's South of Market exhibit.  Botticelli to Braque was exquisite, a wonderful survey of the major periods of art in the renaissance to modern eras.  I highly recommend seeing it while it's so readily available.  South of Market is very much worth seeing as well.  Janet Delaney deals with the issues of gentrification in a very interesting, observational and often subtle way.

I first became aware of Janet Delaney through a lecture at this year's Art History Symposium, held at Sacramento State.  When I realized that one of the works that was heavily referred to in the talk by Bridget Gilman was being featured so close to home, I had to see it for myself.

South of Market explores the South of Market district in San Francisco in the late seventies and eighties.  During this time period, South of Market was under redevelopment.  Delaney documents the effects of gentrification on the people living and working in the South of Market area during this time.  Delaney photographed new buildings that were built, like the office building pictured below, and the massive Moscone Center.  The Moscone Center displaced people from their homes, and had a large impact on the people who lived in the region.  It seems to me that the issues surrounding the Moscone Center, built in 1981, reflect some of the same issues the citizens of Sacramento have had about the new downtown Sacramento Kings arena.  Though, of course, a difference is that in 1981 people were being kicked out of their homes, but there's still a connection to be made there.

First Office Building in the Redevelopment Zone, Lapu-Lapu Street, 1980.

Delaney's series of photographs also depicts small businesses and business owners, like the photograph below, which shows an all-female car repair shop.  These photographs seem to glorify the small business owner somewhat, while also showing businesses that would not be allowed to thrive in a big-business situation.  The photographs are clear, crisp with a more muted color palette, which seems to give them a seriousness and an importance.  

Labyris Auto Repair, "Complete Car Care by Women," 240 Sixth Street, 1982.

Another major theme of the work is evictions.  In Eviction, a family is being forced to leave their home, while a crew of painters makes the house look new, high class even.

Eviction, 158-160 Langton Street, 1980.

The wall in the photograph below reads, "Tim O'Shea: How many people are you evicting this month? How many next month?"  It clearly shows the distress of the people in the region and the effects that gentrification was having on the public.

Saturday Afternoon, Howard between 

Third and Fourth Streets, 1980. 

South of Market is a really interesting way to experience this time period in San Francisco's history.  It also makes the viewer aware of and question the merits of tearing down something in order to build something else up.  Overall, the series of photographs is not overly pessimistic or hopeful.  Whether Delaney was trying to get something across to the viewer about gentrification as a whole or not, the work comes across as mostly purely observational.  Any conclusions drawn are up to the viewer.

South of Market will be on view at the de Young in San Francisco through July 19th.   

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Revisiting the Feet of Pistoletto

Last month I reviewed Lumpen, an installation by Julia Couzens and Ellen Van Fleet.  Julia Couzens' work, Standing on the Feet of Pistoletto, Memory Conspires to Mobilize a Blanket of Dreams was still yet unfinished at that point, according to the artist.  On April 15th, the day before the exhibit closed, I revisited the gallery to see how the installation by Couzens had changed.

Standing on the Feet of Pistoletto, 

Memory Conspires to Mobilize a Blanket of Dreams.

In my previous review I theorized that the objects were climbing the wire and binding themselves together, to create this blanket of dreams flying off.  But, in Couzens' revised installation, the items seem to create some sort of vehicle.  The shape of the installation reminds me of some sort of air craft, the stacks of covered bricks and wooden planks acting as wings.

Detail of Standing on the Feet of Pistoletto, 

Memory Conspires to Mobilize a Blanket of Dreams.

Julia Couzens uses many of the same objects as she did earlier in the installation, but there seems to be a different kind of energy exuding from the piece now.  There is something more joyful and free to the installation now, which I feel fits with title.

Detail of Standing on the Feet of Pistoletto, 

Memory Conspires to Mobilize a Blanket of Dreams.

The way that the bricks are stacked here brings them more to the focus of the piece, instead of just being the foundation of the 'bed'.  They still act as foundation, as they underlying ground pieces.  But, the higher stacks and mix of brightly colored bricks brings more life to them.

Detail of Standing on the Feet of Pistoletto, 

Memory Conspires to Mobilize a Blanket of Dreams.

One of the newest and most fascinating features of the installation are the bundles attached to the wall, pictured below.  They are anchored to the piece by chains, but their attachment to the wall makes them appear to be floating in the air instead of being weighed down.

Detail of Standing on the Feet of Pistoletto, 

Memory Conspires to Mobilize a Blanket of Dreams.

I am very intrigued by Couzens' revisions to her piece and I would be very curious to know whether the artist believed that the work was done and if she was happy with the results, if she felt like it had revealed itself to her.

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Here As Everywhere, Sac State's 11th Art History Symposium

On April 11th, the art department at Sacramento State held it's eleventh annual Art History Symposium.  This year's symposium, titled Here as Everywhere: Art of the Sixties and Seventies in Northern California, dealt with re-looking at regional art in Northern California in the post World War II decades and the relation of Northern Californian artists to the entire world of art.  The symposium consisted of five speakers, including a keynote by Michael Schwager.


The keynote speaker, Michael Schwager of Sonoma State University, spoke on the fifties and early sixties in a lecture titled Don't Hide the Madness: Bay Area Art in the 1950's and 60's, named after the Allen Ginsberg poem, On Burrough's Work.  For much of his talk, Schwager concentrated on the California School of Fine Arts, now San Francisco Art Institute, and specific artists who he thought were paramount to understand art in the bay area at this time.


After talking about some of the stereotypes of the 1950's, Schwager started off by speaking about the widespread peace movement in art at the time and how San Francisco artist, Wally Hedrick, painted Peace Flag in 1953, a year before Japer Johns' famous Flag.  Hedrick took the fatalities of the Korean War personally, according to Schwager, and was vehemently anti-war.

Wally Hedrick, Peace Flag, 1953.

The California School of Fine Arts, Schwager explained, was the center of abstract expressionism in the bay area.  It was also home to some prominent female artists, notably Deborah Remington, Jay DeFeo, Joan Brown and Sonia Gretchoff, and African American artists, like Hayward King, making it seem more accepting of diversity in the fifties, unlike its New York counterparts.

Schwager emphasized artists like Peter Voulkos, the revolutionary ceramic sculptor, Bruce Connor, Richard Diebenkorn, Manual Neri, and Joan Brown.  These artists were of the Beat generation and often dealt with isolation, depression, and fears of nuclear destruction.



Dr. Makeda Best, an associate professor at California College of the Arts, gave a talk on political posters during the sixties and seventies, titled Radicalizing the Artistic: Production Models, Techniques, and Forms of the Political Poster in the 1960s and 1970s.  Dr. Best spoke about the history of using posters to show concern, for college students to protest, and for civil rights activists to promote their message.  She concentrated on the posters by Garcia and Montoya, two artists of the Chicano Movement.  Best is interested in how these artists work in with print work on a national scale, opposed to a regional one.

Mike Mandel and Larry Sultan, Cornucopia, 1974.

Next on the roster was Bridget Gilman who spoke about responses to gentrification through art in the late seventies in San Francisco in a lecture titled Urban Transformation and Aesthetic Experimentation: Responses to Gentrification in 1970s San Francisco.  Gilman concentrated primarily on billboards that represented the shifting landscape of San Francisco.  Mike Mandel and Larry Sultan experimented with billboards as shown in their Cornucopia from 1974 and their Oranges on Fire billboard that resulted after their billboard was covered by a Sunkist advertisement in 1975. Their Ties billboard, 1978,  moved to the financial district after being in a more industrial area representing the shift in San Francisco. Gilman also focused on artist, Janet Delaney, who worked against the ideas of gentrification.  Gilman sees landscapes as a complex, critical tool.

Mike Mandel and Larry Sultan, Oranges on Fire, 1975.

Matthew Weseley spoke on Robert Colescott's Search for Identity.  After a trip to Egypt, Colescott fully realized his non-European identity and began to paint satirical, comic inspired paintings on the theme of racist stereotypes.  Paintings like The Green Glove Rapist and Aunt Jemima's Pancakes featured minstrel figures and dealt with sexual harassment, racism, and commercialism. 

The final speaker of the event was Nicolas Rosenthal, who spoke on Native American art in a talk titled, Painting a Cultural Resurgence: California Indian Artists in the 1960s and 1970s.  According to Rosenthal, New Mexico and Oklahoma are most well known for being the narrative of Native American art, but there was a vibrant scene in Northern California in the sixties and seventies as well.  California art was less hindered by the idea that Native American art had to be what was considered traditional Indian art.  Rosenthal discussed artists like Frank Day, Frank LaPena, Jean LaMarr, Brian Tripp, and Harry Fonseca to show California's colorful, rich history of Native American art. In Frank LaPena's Bear Dancer, Native American oral history and research was interpreted.  In Harry Fonseca's Coyote works, the artist commented on modern culture and Native Americans.  According to Frank LaPena, who was in the audience, the message of Indian art is universal to all indigenous peoples on a global scale.

Frank LaPena, Bear Dancer, 1983.

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Award Winners: Sac State's Student Purchase Awards

Currently on view in the Union Gallery at Sacramento State are the results from the university's Student Purchase Awards.  The artworks selected for the awards are chosen by art professionals and then are purchased by the university to put into the gallery's collection.  The artworks are not united in theme, method, or style but in quality.  Some of my favorites and discussed below, but I hope you will go see the exhibition for yourself.

Dawn Kwan-Nam Chan, Van Gogh's Blue Period, 

Acrylic on Canvas.

Van Gogh's Blue Period is quite obviously a homage to Van Gogh's famous portraits.  However, Dawn Kwan-Nam Chan seems to be connecting Van Gogh to Picasso's highly melancholic Blue Period through the title. The painting seems to be bleeding paint.  There is a smudge off-white, peach colored paint over his ear, which could be a reference to Van Gogh famously slicing off his ear.  The dark blue paint dripping off the canvas invokes blood, but it also reminds me of Van Gogh's dependent relationship with paint.  It is like the paint has become his blood.

Angelina Sorokin, detail of Topographic Map of Heaven, 

Acrylic and Spray Paint on Canvas.

The colors and movement of Angelina Sorokin's painting are fascinating, but it is even more so when combined with the title, Topographic Map of  Heaven.  This is a case when the title gives a rich context for the mind to play in.  

Evan Purdy, detail of Apache Man, Charcoal on Paper.

Apache Man, which holds third place in this year's awards, is incredibly detailed and emotional.  I was first struck by the look on this man's face.  It is something like sadness, or maybe dejection.  The size and monochrome nature of the artwork adds to the overall melancholy of the drawing.  I was shocked to find that this drawing was in charcoal.  This drawing must have been very difficult, yet it transcends just technical expertise and relays powerful emotion.

Caiti Chan, detail of Anonymous, House Paint on Canvas.

In my previous post on Commune, a previous exhibition in the Union Gallery, I  discussed Caiti Chan's Grandmother.  The technique is very similar in Anonymous, but the way the paint is packed on seems to refer to a different sort of person and personality than that of her grandmother.  I really enjoy the way Chan's paintings are both abstract and representational.  Though there is a face, the character of the individual is not shown so much in expression but in the color and application of paint.

Catherine Suan, detail of Transcendence, Oil on Canvas.

I really respond to Catherine Suan's portrayal of this young girl in Transcendence.  It is abstract in a way, overlaying these cubist shapes over her portrait.  But the triangular shapes seem to act more like ice or glass breaking away from the girl.  It is as if the girl was encased in ice and she is finally breaking free, transcending.  The colors of the painting make this transcending process feel light, gentle, and ultimately illuminating.

Mustafa Shaheen, Omar F., Oil on Canvas.

Of what I've seen of the artist's work so far, Mustafa Shaheen consistently makes these incredible, multi-color portraits.  In Omar F., the subject is shaving his face, a simple, everyday task made reverent.  The bright colors and luminous shine to the lighter color values brings the beautiful to the mundane.  Omar F. placed first.

Steven Berroteran, The Body, Ink Set Photos.

The Body, by Steven Berroteran and second place winner, is utterly fascinating.  Different parts of the nude body are photographed and displayed, but the contortions, the views and the crops are done in a way that distorts the body.  All that is visible then is the beauty of line, texture and movement.  You can look at the photographs and try to map out what each photograph is portraying (is it a knee, a hip, an arm?) but when it comes down to it, that is not what is of true importance here.  The beauty of the human body is at its peak here.

The Student Purchase Awards will be on view at the Union Gallery at Sacramento Sate until April 23.

Me, gazing at Green Spring by Tammy Helenske.

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You Must Be This Tall: Disability Access and the Pursuit of Art

I have only been disabled for about a year and a half.  After an accident that left me unable to walk for the better part of six months, I now walk with a cane and am unable to stand or walk for long periods of time or distances.  That's the context I live in.

It has become increasingly obvious to me that people do not really know what 'disability access' means.  If there is a ramp or a parking space with a plaque attached it, that must be access.  The truth is so much more complicated than that.  People with disabilities are foremost people, and so they have different needs.

I don't think forms of disability are given much thought in the art world.  Sure, you can go to a museum and it will be perfectly accessible and somewhat accommodating.  But, a large portion of art and the art experience as a whole is not in the museum.

Even institutions, like university galleries, et cetera, claim to be disability friendly but if you have to walk a figurative mile to get to that gallery, whether it has stairs or not, it is not accessible.  There are different kinds of disabilities, and a large majority of the people who have them do not use wheelchairs, even though the disability symbol may claim otherwise.

Smaller art spaces, like galleries and artists' studios, are much less likely to be accessible to a person with physical disabilities.  I am not condemning artists for having spaces that I can't enter, or even saying that they should have to worry about me at all.  But I think there's a discussion to be had about the disabled person's place in the art world.

Is there some set of physical requirements to be able to fully experience art?

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Ai Weiwei's @LARGE

As you may well know, Chinese contemporary conceptual artist and activist Ai Weiwei's @LARGE has been on view at Alcatraz in San Francisco for the last several months.  Finally, after many trials and tribulations, I made it to the exhibit this weekend.  And let me tell you, it was incredible.

@LARGE plays on the dynamics between the somber, oppressive architecture of the decaying penitentiary and the bright, often delicate sculptures of the installation.  Ai Weiwei also layers symbolism and real, consciousness raising stories of those who have been imprisoned for their beliefs and their expression of those beliefs.

Detail of With Wind.

The first part of the exhibit that I experienced was in the New Industries Building, titled With Wind.  The first thing you encounter is this magnificent, bright, joyful Chinese dragon that floats through the large room.  Each part of the body is painted, with sections quoting words about freedom throughout.  Normally a signal of imperial power, here the dragon represents the forceful, exuberant will of the prisoner to be free.  On an even larger level, the dragon seems to represent humanity's perseverance and will to obtain and keep liberty.

Detail of With Wind.

Scattered throughout the room are smaller bird and flower themed kites, representing countries that restrict their citizens' liberties.  If you look closely,  there is a theme of chains on the kite pictured below, and on the wings, a subtle pattern of handcuffs.  These birds and flowers also relate back to the setting of the installation.  Alcatraz is well-known as a bird habitat and has lush gardens on its rocky exterior.  Ai Weiwei seems to use flowers and birds in this exhibit as symbols to juxtapose freedom and hope with captivity.  This idea is expanded on even more by the sunlight that streams through the barred windows, bathing the kites in brightness.

Detail of With Wind.

Leaving the room that With Wind is installed in, you immediately encounter Trace.  Trace features portraits of people that have been imprisoned for their beliefs, or frankly, just because their country felt like it.  The piece is entirely constructed from Legos and in person the dimensions of the portraits are fascinating.  There is a sense created by the Legos that even though these individuals are the ones being imprisoned, we all share in these incarcerations.  One representing many or many representing one.  It reminds me of the quote by Ai Weiwei from With Wind, above, about all of us being potential prisoners.  In books on podiums, the portraits are listed with their 'crimes', punishments, and beliefs.  

One of the most interesting things about this installation that I found was that it is so much easier to condemn other countries and their arresting policies.  Whether it's a sense of shame or self-preservation it's much more difficult to acknowledge things about your own country than a country a world away.  And I think that this is part of Ai Weiwei's point in Trace.  He's not only raising awareness about civil liberties in non-American countries, but he asks us to re-evaluate and question our own systems.

Trace.

 Though I saw pictures of and read about Refraction, the last installation in the New Industries Building, I was not able to physically experience it myself.  It was not disability accessible, but the people I went with assured me that it was amazing and that the installation truly resembled a trapped animal, like the prisoners may have seemed to the guards in their position of power.  I also understand that the piece represents the tensions between China and Tibet, which I find very compelling.

Blossom.

In the hospital of the prison, there were two installations:  Blossom, sculptures that overtook spaces in bathtubs, toilets and sinks in the hospital rooms, and Illumination, an audio experience in the psychiatric observation rooms.

In Blossom, small, delicate, porcelain sculptures of blossoms overflow in the utilities of the hospital rooms.  Similar to With Wind, the blossoms seem to represent hope flooding out of the pipes and crevices of the hospital.  Also similar to With Wind, Blossom draws from floral and Chinese imagery, repeating the themes started in the first installation.

According to the exhibition catalog, Blossom could symbolize giving comfort to the prisoners through 'bouquets'.  It could also bare reference to China's brief Hundred Flower Campaign from the 1950's which promised tolerance of expression.

Detail of Blossom.

In Illumination you step into these small rooms with glass bricks on the back wall.  All around you, you hear the chants of Tibetan monks and Native American tribes.  It is powerful to stand in those small cubicles and have those vocals all around you, especially with China's past with Tibet and Alcatraz's famous conflict with Native Americans.  By putting these voices in the psychiatric observation rooms, Ai Weiwei seems to be drawing a line between ableism and the dismissal of people with mental illness and the oppression of Native Americans and the Tibetan people.

Stay Tuned is installed in cell block A.  The cells are small, and in the middle of each one is a stool.  When you sit on the stool you are surrounded by the voice or music of a prisoner detained for artistic expression.  I sat in the cell designated for Ahmed Shamlu, a Persian writer, and as he read the poem, In This Dead-End Street, it was like his voice was seeping from the walls. Across from the cell, an English translation of the poem is hung on the wall.  "They remove smiles from lips, and songs from mouths, by surgery.  Happiness must be hidden at home in the closet," it reads.

Me, listening to the voice of Ahmed Shamlu, Stay Tuned.

The last portion of the exhibit was Yours Truly in the dining hall of the prison.  Yours Truly is an opportunity to write post cards to individual prisoners.  It allows the attendees to participate in what Ai Weiwei has been building in the viewers throughout the exhibit.  The post cards are designed with birds and flowers, the motif continuing to even this last stop.

@LARGE is truly an incredible experience to partake in.  It will be on view at Alcatraz until April 26th.

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