SFMOMA Artists Gallery

Amid A Space Between: Irish Artists in America

2012-03-06T13:46:00.000-08:00

March 8-April 19, 2012

Opening Reception - Saturday, March 10, 1-3 p.m.
Storytelling Evening - Thursday, March 22, 5.30-7.30 p.m.

Helen O'Leary: Construct - Destruct

Helen O’Leary, a County Wexford native, recently completed a Guggenheim fellowship in Paris. Her desire is to make unconventional paintings that “stand up without the usual structures of support.” For her, making art involves, “looking at my own life, the history of Sean-nós (in the old way) singing, (Samuel) Beckett's pared-down language, and the currency of need found in most houses when I was growing up.”

Born into an agrarian working class family, Helen O’Leary has successfully incorporated the simple humility of common Irish life into her work. By weaving together language, music, and art O’Leary deconstructs the conventions of provincialism into an informal and personalized statement of her heritage.

O’Leary’s combine-like structures subvert the conventions of form and stability inherent in the narratives of history. Influenced by colloquial Sean-nós, a form of spoken word lyrically composed into ornamental verse recounting love and loss, O’Leary’s pieces whimsically communicate similar odes to her past collections. By deconstructing her previous works and then reassembling them into assemblages of panels, canvas, and wood O’Leary is able to recount her story using new forms. In essence, although the new form has lingering remnants of past stories it is altogether reborn.

Richard Mosse: A Lighter Shade of Photography

Limerick-born Richard Mosse, is a graduate of Yale and Goldsmiths College, London. His Infra series was featured at Dublin Contemporary 2011. The series comprises large-scale photos created using film that sees an invisible spectrum of light. Mosse uses this film, which renders greens in a range of vivid pinks, to photograph rebels – some of them mere children – fighting in the Congo. He describes his project as an attempt to make visible what can’t be seen – for example, how the lush equatorial jungle quickly “swallows up” traces of the violence.

Colonel Soleil's Boys, North Kivu, Eastern Congo, 2010

Photography, a not very well celebrated medium in Ireland, allows Richard Mosse to interrogate the delicate boundary between objective realism and phantasmal aestheticism in current events. Mosse’s most recent work Infra tarries alongside adolescent rebel militias through the war ravaged countryside of the Congo. Mosse remarks; “I arrived in the Congo I had crossed a threshold into fiction, into my own symbolic order” (Mosse, Aperture Magazine).

By negotiating a path through these politically charged landscapes, Mosse stares directly in the face of conflict leaving both sides of the story excavated.

- Edgar B. Ramirez is a graduate student of Philosophy at San Francisco State University interested in topics centered on aesthetics, visual theory, and contemporary ethics. He is currently seeking to integrate his analytic background with the subjective field of art criticism and sensory perception.

Ian Padgham & Claire Pasquier - SFMOMA Windows Installation

2012-02-16T14:51:00.000-08:00

IN THE SFMOMA MINNA AND NATOMA STREET WINDOWS

7 ans de moirage // 7 Years of "Moirage"

Ian Padgham, Claire Pasquier
February 16 – August 31, 2012

Ian Padgham and Claire Pasquier,
7 ans de “Moirage”, 2012; photo: courtesy the artists

moiré noun \mȯ-ˈrā, mwä-\ an independent usually shimmering pattern seen when two geometrically regular patterns (as two sets of parallel lines or two halftone screens) are superimposed especially at an acute angle.

Artists Ian Padgham and Claire Pasquier are partners in art and life. Padgham is an American and Pasquier is French. A play on words, their installation entitled 7 ans de "Moirage" presents seven scenes using moiré patterns and refers to the seven years the couple has been married. Each vignette is also associated with a place where they lived—from Paris and the French countryside (Creuse) to San Francisco and the California coast.

The phenomenon of the moiré pattern is significant here because it is a product of interference. It is a result of alteration, modification, even disruption from another source. A moiré is created when two grids are overlaid at an angle, or when they have slightly different mesh sizes.

The moiré effect can be undesirable, as in a distorted half-tone print; or desirable, as in the pleasing flourishes that mark silk taffeta.

As Pasquier describes: “A couple is two people interacting, in the same set in the same time. Two people together create new stories and future memories.” The couple has also likened the work to weaving a tapestry, as they have painted and followed the lines on the canvas at the same time, intertwining and overlapping to re-create moments from their lives together.

The Windows installations can be viewed around the clock, so swing by and check out all seven pieces!

Valentine's Day Portrait Event - Claire Pasquier

2012-02-11T18:23:00.000-08:00

SFMOMA Artists Gallery

Now Taking Reservations for the 4th Annual Valentine's Day Portrait Event

Tuesday, February 14, Wednesday, February 15,

and Thursday, February 16

Make your Valentine's Day picture-perfect
at the fourth-annual Valentine's Day Portrait Event at the Artists Gallery.

Book your reservation today for a portrait painted by artist Claire Pasquier.
Call the gallery for an appointment: 415.441.4777 (prepaid reservations required).

Who: The SFMOMA Artists Gallery at Fort Mason Center and Artist Claire Pasquier
What: Valentine's Day Portrait Event
Where: SFMOMA Artists Gallery, Bldg A., Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA 94123
When: Tue. Feb 14, Wed. February 15, and Thurs. February 16, 2012.

Only 2 appointments available each day, one at 10 am and one at 2 pm by appointment only.
How Much: A $300 pre-paid reservation is required. Space is very limited. Call for an appointment: 415-441-4777.
More info: Web: http://www.sfmoma.org/artistsgallery

Gallery artist and Claire Pasquier will paint your portrait as a unique gift for your significant other.

The portrait sitting fee is $300 and includes one unframed original painting on paper approximately 12 x 12-inch to 15 x 15-inch depending on paper chosen . Please allow two hours for your session.

Custom mats and framing also available at an additional cost. Prepaid reservations required.

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery is located in Building A at Fort Mason Center.

Gallery hours are 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays.

Admission to gallery exhibitions is free of charge.
Representing Northern California artists, the SFMOMA Artists Gallery offers a diverse selection of original artwork for sale and rent.

Visit our website at www.sfmoma.org/artists_gallery or call 415/441-4777 for more information.

Become a fan of the Gallery on Facebook and follow us on twitter.

My Mom is Making Pancakes on Friday for the Family

2012-02-04T14:21:00.000-08:00

SFMOMA Artists Gallery Participates in International Interior Design Association’s

Mid-Market Display Windows.

Event Raises Awareness and Funds for Raphael House in San Francisco.

SFMOMA Artists Gallery Window Entry Location: 1155 Market Street, San Francisco.

Exhibition Dates: February 3–March 25, 2012

The Windows Reveal Party: Thursday, February 9, 5:30–8:30 p.m, International Art Museum of America, 1025 Market St., between Sixth and Seventh streets. Tickets are $15–30 and may be purchased online at http://www.thewindows.org/.

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery at Fort Mason will be creating an entry for the International Interior Design Association’s (IIDA) The Windows Mid-Market Display. By dressing up vacant storefront windows along San Francisco’s Market Street, the IIDA hopes to invigorate downtown San Francisco, promote public art, and showcase the vibrant creativity of the design community.

This event raises awareness and funds for Raphael House, a shelter for children and families experiencing homelessness. Proceeds from the designer entry fees and ticket sales for the Reveal Party will go toward the renovation of the third floor at Raphael House, providing much-needed transitional housing.

Each design team participating will draw inspiration for their window from a piece of artwork and an accompanying personal story contributed by a child living at Raphael House.

Artwork that inspired the window design.

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery design team includes museum staff members Michelle Nye and Renée de Cossio, and local artists Jennifer LaPierre and Michael McConnell. The drawing that they received, “My Mom Is Making Pancakes on Friday for the Family” became the starting point for a window that includes the work of sculptor McConnell and muralist LaPierre.

Nye, a fine art advisor at the Artists Gallery and an artist herself, was struck by how Raphael House provides a setting where families can develop expressions of what home is to them. The child’s drawing, focused on the simple act of sitting down together for a meal, became the starting point for the Artists Gallery design team.

The team plans to construct an imaginative kitchen vignette featuring McConnell’s family of woodland creatures making and eating pancakes in a forested glen painted by LaPierre.

“Home is presented from a childlike perspective, weaving the wonders of the natural world into the comfort and safety of a familiar domestic interior,” Nye says. “As children innately understand, life is richly fulfilling when the imagination is allowed to roam. As adults we come to understand that though we deal in practicalities and necessities, a satisfying life, at home and work, requires creativity, play, and wonder.”

The Windows Reveal Party will be held Thursday, February 9, from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the International Art Museum of America (1025 Market Street between Sixth and Seventh streets). Tickets are $15–$30 and may be purchased online at http://www.thewindows.org/.

The International Interior Design Association (IIDA) is a professional networking and educational association of 13,000 members in 10 specialty practice forums and 29 chapters around the world. The San Francisco City Center is the heart and foundation of the award-winning IIDA Northern California Chapter. Each year the chapter provides its members with a series of programs and events that inspire, educate, and connect the San Francisco design community.

Raphael House, the first shelter for children and families experiencing homelessness in Northern California, provides an environment of loving support where families are able to move toward brighter and more hopeful futures. The mission of Raphael House is to help at-risk children and their parents achieve stable housing and financial independence, while strengthening family bonds and personal dignity.

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery features a dynamic exhibition program and represents Bay Area artists at all stages of their careers. As a nonprofit gallery, the majority of the proceeds go directly to our artists. The remainder supports exhibitions and educational programming at the museum. Located in Building A at Fort Mason Center, the Gallery is open 11:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays. Admission to gallery exhibitions is free of charge.

Visit sfmoma.org/visit/artists_gallery or call 415.441.4777 for more information. Become a fan of the Gallery on Facebook (facebook.com/ArtistsGallerySFMOMA), follow us on Twitter (@SFMOMAArtistsG), and check out our blog (sfmomaag.blogspot.com).

Happy Birthday to James Joyce!

2012-02-02T14:13:00.000-08:00

James Joyce, author of Dubliners

February 2 marks the 130th Anniversary of Joyce’s Birth.

The 130th anniversary of the birth of James Joyce on February 2 is an opportune moment for reflection upon the convoluted themes of Irish Diaspora identity. Also a good time to brush up on some history before our highly anticipated March show Amid A Space Between, Irish Artists in America.

Joyce, probably the most well-known Irish writer, travelled to Paris after university and only made five return visits, the last in 1912, after which he never returned. He lived over 30 years out of the country that would be the main subject of his many writings for the rest of his life, including the seminal work, Ulysses. Other artists many might identify as Irish like Samuel Beckett, also lived in Ireland during his formative years, but by age 30 he had moved to France and lived on the continent and wrote nearly all his major works in French.

Many Irish artists have made significant contributions to the arts within other countries. Art historian, painter, and sculptor Brian O'Doherty, who moved to America in 1957, was an influential member of the National Endowment for the Arts, where he was responsible for the creation of such programs as American Masters and Great Performances. Closer to home, William Coulter, considered the most important West Coast maritime artist of the 19th century moved to San Francisco and began his career in 1869. His most famous work is San Francisco Fire, 1906, and his works are in the Oakland Museum of California’s permanent collection.

As our world grows smaller due to the ease of communication, travel, and global collaboration, it has become increasingly difficult to assign artists representative to any nationality. Today, there are 40 million people in the United States alone who identify themselves having Irish ancestry, with the island of origin having a population of just 4 million people. Artists like Katie Holten, Richard Mosse, Alen MacWeeney, Helen O’Leary, Helen O’Toole, and Nuala Clarke in SFMOMA Artists Gallery’s upcoming show, Amid a Space Between: Irish Artists in America highlight in their artworks the significant traits of Irish art's Diaspora. They have been both a significant part of the history of modern and contemporary art here in the United States and Ireland. The artists’ ambiguous and multifaceted Irish identities also illustrates a larger idea that many artists of various nationalities and groups form communities and create opportunities to exchange ideas and experiences.

Amid A Space Between, Irish Artists in America opens at SFMOMA Artists Gallery March 8. Please join us for the opening on March 10.

Here are a few ways to commemorate the birth of one of the 20th Century’s greatest writers.

Attend a Lecture
Sunday, January 29th, 4 pm
United Irish Cultural Center, 2700 45th Avenue, San Francisco
Professor David Vela (Diablo Valley College)
“The Influence of Joyce’s Works on Latin American Writers”
A reception will follow the presentation. Join the ILHS at the event and attend this event for free, $5 suggested donation for visitors.

Have Irish Breakfast & Read Dubliners
The Copper Kettle
2240 Taraval St. (between 32nd Ave & 33rd Ave)
San Francisco, CA 94116
The Copper Kettle serves a traditional Irish Breakfast with eggs, bacon, black pudding, white pudding, potatoes, beans, grilled tomato and slices of freshly baked Irish bread. Order a pot of tea to go with it.

Listen to Reels and Jigs
Fiddler Martin Hayes can trace his roots directly back to the Tulla Ceili Band, in which he played along with his father P.J. Hayes. Guitarist Dennis Cahill was born in Chicago and studied at the city’s prestigious Music College. Both share a love for this traditional music that Martin says, “contains the longing and essence that moves you at the level of your soul.”

Save the Date for an Art Opening
Saturday, March 10, from 1 to 3 p.m.
SFMOMA Artists Gallery, Bldg. A, Fort Mason Center
Amid a Space Between: Irish Artists in America
On view March 8 thru April 19, 2012
Admission free!!

Ari Salomon - OPEN SHOW @ Apple Store

2012-01-19T14:02:00.000-08:00

Ari Salomon will be giving an Artists Talk tonight at the San Francisco Apple Store!

DATE & LOCATION
January 19, 2012 (Thurs) 7-9pm
Apple SF Store
1 Stockton St., San Francisco

Ari Salomon
Interface #7606 (Shibuya), 2007
Pigment print
14 x 18
Edition 1/15
$350

Ari Salomon
Interface #1211 (Tsukiji), 2004
Pigment Print
14 x 18
Edition 1/15
$350

Ari Salomon
Interface #3085 (Hakone), 2010
Pigment print
14 x 18 inches
Edition 1/15
$350

Ari Salomon
Interface #9881 (Iriomote Ferry), 2008
Pigment print
14 x 18 inches
Edition 1/15
$350

Ari Salomon
Interface #3307 (Kyoto), 2010
Pigment print
14 x 18 inches
Edition 1/15
$350

Ari Salomon
Interface #3310 (Kyoto Station), 2010
Pigment print
14 x 18 inches
Edition 1/15
$350

ARTIST’S STATEMENT
In the series Interface, I investigate the humanness that can be found in mechanical objects. I find in these objects a reflection of the people that anonymously build the cities around us; that anonymously roam the cities around us. Using fresh eyes, I can find fresh eyes winking back at me from surprising places.

WHAT I’M DOING
I’ll be giving a 20min artists talk (slideshow) of my Interface series—this is an encore presentation of what I presented last year at Stanford.

WHAT IS OPEN SHOW
Rapidly growing into a worldwide movement, OPEN SHOW is a series of free monthly curated artist-talks that feature 5 or 6 photographers who have 10-15 minutes each to show a 20 image story (or 4‐7 minute video/multimedia project). Beyond offering a stage to get great work seen, shows are also incubators for emerging photographers and works in progress. This evening is a “best of 2011″ encore so it should be an especially compelling show. More info at openshow.org.

To learn more about photography by Ari Salomon or to schedule an appointment with an art advisor, please contact the SFMOMA Artists Gallery. (415) 441-4777.

Winni Wintermeyer - Portrait Photographer

2011-12-01T14:51:00.001-08:00

Kim Frohsin, Claire Pasquier, Winni Wintermeyer
January 12 - February 23, 2012
Opening reception: Saturday, January 14,
1:00 – 3:00 p.m.

Winni Wintermeyer

Winni Wintermeyer's photographic portraits range from the constructed to the emotional, some of them carefully crafted, others captured in a passing moment. At the core they all deal with the same question of what makes a portrait. Often he eliminates elements that we've become accustomed to in traditional portraiture, like faces, and provides the viewer with a starting point to create their own narrative. He experiments by adding and subtracting to the surroundings the subject is placed in to change the scope of information and adds mystery by juxtaposing environmental images. Stripped down to the close-up of a person's face he strives to tell a story about the dynamics between photographer and subject, a tension that can create fiction instead of produce a likeness.

Winni Wintermeyer
EL, 2011 (left)
Photography
56 x 44 inches
Edition 1/15
$2,200

Winni Wintermeyer
Mo, 2011 (right)
Photography
34 x 44 inches
Edition 1/15
$1,400

Winni Wintermeyer
Bus, Chicago, 1995
Photography
16 x 20 inches
Edition 1/11
$950

Winni Wintermeyer
Jon Moritsugu, 2003
Photography
16 x 16 inches
Edition 1/18
$800

Winni Wintermeyer
Sparkle, 2008
Photography
11 x 17 inches
Edition 1/18
$850

Winni Wintermeyer
Scarlett, 2011
Photography
30 x 40 inches
Edition 1/7
$1,400

For more information about Winni's work or to schedule an appointment with an art advisor, please contact us at 415-441-4777. We look forward to seeing you!

Claire Pasquier - The Portrait Landscape Project

2011-12-01T14:24:00.001-08:00

Kim Frohsin, Claire Pasquier, Winni Wintermeyer
January 12 - February 23, 2012
Opening reception: Saturday, January 14,
1:00 – 3:00 p.m.

Claire Pasquier; photo: courtesy of Suzanne Hutton

Portrait Landscape has been a yearlong project by artist Claire Pasquier, in which individuals were encouraged to connect with the artist via Facebook to have their portrait painted. In what can be read as a relational aesthetics piece, the artwork draws attention to the encounter – an opportunity often missed in our modern world, as Pasquier describes it:

“San Francisco is a small-big city, where people from all over the world seem to crisscross. The idea of this project came to me in Paris after I opened my workshop gallery. The window overlooked a tiny busy street. I watched all the people go by but never stop; it was like the halls in the metro. I felt the need to communicate with all these people and break the protective and indifferent walls that we build when we live in big cities.”

The portraits will be exhibited at the Artists Gallery along with the work station where Pasquier painted over 100 portraits. The portraits are also on Facebook: www.facebook.com/SFMOMAportrait.

Claire Pasquier, Compilation of 3 Portraits, 2011

Claire's gallery work space

For more information about Claire's work please check out her Facebook or Twitter links or contact the gallery at 415-441-4777. We'll see you at the show!

Kim Frohsin - Portraits of the Iconic and the Mundane

2011-12-01T11:19:00.001-08:00

Kim Frohsin, Claire Pasquier, Winni Wintermeyer
January 12 - February 23, 2012
Opening reception: Saturday, January 14,
1:00 – 3:00 p.m.

Kim in her studio

Portraits of the Iconic and the Mundane comprises Kim Frohsin’s most recent paintings, exploring instantly recognizable numbers, symbols, and commercial packaging for branded products. Typically numbers express quantity, but in these paintings they revert to forms abounding with layers of color, multiple linear elements, and purposeful splatters. The work expands on the artist’s thesis that the detritus of everyday life can be a source for telling portraiture.

Kim Frohsin
Portrait of Independence: #16, 2011
Mixed Media
22 x 22 inches
$6,200

Kim Frohsin
Portrait of #5: For Coco Chanel and Joe DiMaggio, 2011
Mixed Media and 24 kt. gold leaf
22 x 22 inches
$6,500

Kim Frohsin
Portrait of an Addiction, 2011
Mixed Media
22 x 22 inches
$5,800

Kim Frohsin
Portrait of Rescue, 2011
Mixed Media
22 x 22 inches
$5,600

For more information about Kim's work or to schedule an appointment with an art advisor, please contact us at 415-441-4777. We look forward to seeing you!

Bring Home some Holiday Cheer!

2011-11-29T11:57:00.001-08:00

Masako Miki
(left) Things Don't Last Forever & (right) Always Better to Have Plan B, 2009
Collage, gouache on paper
34 x 27 inches
$1,800 each

Richard Lang
(center) Wreath 4, 2004
Pigment Print Edition 1/10
23x23
$650

Need some great gift giving ideas for your friends and family?

A World of Art Awaits:
*Join us here at the gallery to view our current exhibition or for an art placement appointment with one of our art advisors. To schedule an appoinment with an advisor at the SFMOMA Artists Gallery, in Fort Mason, please contact us at (415) 441-4777.

*Give an SFMOMA Membership!
Share the wonder of SFMOMA this holiday season by giving a full year of unlimited access to one of the nation's leading museums of modern and contemporary art. Members save 10 percent on gift membership purchases. Place your order before December 10 to ensure timely delivery for the holidays.
New! SFMOMA now offers a Family membership providing a year of access to our exhibitions and family-friendly programming, plus exclusive benefits and special treats designed just for families.

To give a gift membership today go online for fastest service and to help the museum save paper and resources or call 415.357.4135 (Monday through Friday, 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.).
Click here, to review our membership levels and benefits.

Adrienne Defendi - Remembrance

2011-11-11T13:45:00.001-08:00

Stephanie Peek, Annette Corcoran, Adrienne Defendi
November 11 - December 22, 2011
Opening Reception - Saturday, November 12
1:00 - 3:00 p.m

Adrienne Defendi
Remembrance 1 (Reader), 2011/2002
Photography
23 x 23 inches
Edition 1/6
$800

Adrienne Defendi
Remembrance 11 (Forza), 2011/2002
Photography
23 x 23 inches
Edition 1/6
$800

Adrienne Defendi
Remembrance 10 (Youth), 2011/1988
Photography
23 x 23 inches
Edition 1/6
$800

Artist Statement:

"I love feeling the weight of the camera, losing myself when photographing.
Observing what emanates from the stillness and the shadows.
I revel in the tensions between precision and chance, light and dark, the visible and invisible.

I began playing with a camera and image making at a young age with intense periods of formal photographic study along the way (RISD, NYU Tisch School of the Arts, ICP, and numerous workshops). From my graduate studies in Italian Literature to numerous teaching appointments in Italian and the Humanities, memory, myth, nostalgia, and mere beauty in the mundane have fascinated me and indeed continue to inform my photographic expression. For the last ten years, I’ve photographed with low-tech cameras (Holga, Diana, pinhole), and have enjoyed experimenting with alternative processes, integrating spontaneity and serendipity into my artistic process."

Adrienne Defendi
Remembrance 4 (Solitude), 2011/1987
Photography
23 x 23 inches
Edition 1/6
$800

About the Rememberance series:

"In this series of photographs, I explore the relationship between decaying beauty and monumentality. Having spent much time in Italy, I found myself drawn to these statuary works as they seemed overlooked, forgotten, and melancholic. I imagined their importance when they were first created. I imagined what history unfolded around them. I imagined what they might have witnessed. For me, these photographs symbolize forgotten narratives that beg to be retold and remembered.

These images were photographed with a 1956 Rolleiflex, a medium format twin lens reflex camera." -Adrienne Defendi

For more information on this show or to schedule an appointment with an art advisor, please contact the gallery at (415) 441-4777.

Stephanie Peek - Certian Riches

2011-11-09T17:35:00.000-08:00

Stephanie Peek, Annette Corcoran, Adrienne Defendi
November 11 - December 22, 2011

Opening Reception - Saturday, November 12
1:00 - 3:00 p.m

Stephanie Peek
Without Time, 2011
Oil on panel
30 x 30 inches
$4,200

November's show explores the theme of Ars longa, vita brevis...or Art is long, life is short. We are very pleased to have the work of three talented artists coming together for this very special show. We do hope that you can join us for the opening reception, this Saturday afternoon!

About the work of Stephanie Peek:

"Fecund comes to mind. Profusion. Mystery. Loss.
Stephanie Peek’s recent still lifes are splendid and they are rarely still. Redolent of 17th century Dutch painting and brushed with a lavish and delicate hand, Peek’s work is also distinctly contemporary in its ambiguous surround. In variant choreographies, her flowers express attitudes of movement suspended in space. Atmosphere is aqueous. Gravity absent. Downward is up, forward back. Spaces are glimpses, less defined than suggested and they are radiant and unsettling...flowers turn, dip, glide and bow. Time expands. What emerge also recedes. Space feels voluptuous and forever. Seeing is the first part. Watching is the rest.

Naturalistic in their depiction, but not in their spatial surround, Peek’s floral sites are as assured as they are varied. Paint is washed, brushed, scraped, smeared and revisited. Often dark and always quiet, these flowered couplings and configurations form sorrowful evocations. Peek’s subject is less subject matter and more the nature of nature; a seductive and compelling exploration into the dark undertow of transience."
—Judith Foosaner, 2011

Stephanie Peek
Good Luck, 2009
Oil on panel
30 x 30 inches
$4,200

Stephanie’s inspirations for this body of work:

"For years the subject central to my art practice has been nature: from dark gardens as a kind of refuge, to camouflage patterns as a response to perpetual war, and always complex color fragments as a way of seeing. The genesis of this current body of work, Certain Riches, was an image of a rich red flower from a still-life by 17th century Dutch painter Rachel Ruysch. I painted a loose rendering of that flower into the dark smoky atmosphere of an earlier night garden painting from my Dark Arcadia series, made at the American Academy in Rome in the late nineties. The deep red burned out of the darkness. I tried another color, then another until I was satisfied with the cascading of many colors through the deep space. In addition to floral borrowings from the dark Northern European tradition, there are also softer, lighter paintings which reflect the melancholy of early 18th century French painter Jean-Antoine Watteau. And in Requiem, the American Romantic painter Martin Johnson Heade is quoted with his iconic magnolias. Using flowers, leaves, insects from several sources, I also work from direct observation and photography. Suspended in silence, these flowers speak for me of fragile beauty and the ephemeral nature of worldly delights. Flowers traditionally represent the intransience of life, a kind of memento mori, yet the very fact that they ever existed can afford solace and be seen as an intimation of beauty as an immortal quality. Like paradise, the very absence of what once was causes us to long for it, a longing that may include melancholy, nostalgia even, but not only—also the hope that there is an unchanging principle behind beauty, a kind of soul, the idea of paradise as possible."—Stephanie Peek, 2011

Stephanie Peek
Transition, 2011
Oil on panel
30 x 30 inches
$4,200

For more information on this show or to schedule an appointment with an art advisor, please contact the gallery at (415) 441-4777.

Home for the Holidays

2011-11-02T14:28:00.000-07:00

Don't forget to schedule an appointment to get your home ready for the Holidays! The celebrations will be here before you know it.

Bruce Katz
Indian Corn, 2006
Oil on canvas
26 x 26 inches
$1,500

Bruce Katz
Candy Apples, 2011
Oil on canvas
19 x 15 inches
$900

Pat Doherty
Wrapped Candy I, 2010
Oil on canvas
6 x 6 inches
$250

Pat Doherty
Wrapped Candy II, 2010
Oil on canvas
6 x 6 inches
$250

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery will be CLOSED for the Holidays on these days:
Thanksgiving Weekend: Thurs, Nov 24th – Mon, Nov 28th
Winter Holiday Week: Sun, Dec 18th – Mon, Jan 2nd, 2012

Photographer, Tom Hawkins - Featured in California Northern Magazine

2011-10-21T17:14:00.000-07:00

Tom Hawkins
Potting House, 2008
Platinum/palladium print on vellum
21x25
Edition 2/20
$500

Photographs by Tom Hawkins have been featured in the 3rd edition of California Northern : A New Regionalism paired with Bruce Patterson's memoir "Rural Manpower” and Lindsey Thordarson's short story "The Prayer". Be on the lookout for features of Tom Hawkins photos in upcoming issues as well.

Tom Hawkins describes his process:

“I choose to render images in platinum and palladium metals. These materials are appealing to me for the beauty of their tonalities, and because of their associations with the early practitioners of photography.
The physical act of making a print – weighing out the precious metals, mixing the solutions, painting the emulsion onto paper, etc., - is a very meaningful part of making a photograph.
Though the materials I use are traditional, I also make use of contemporary methods of generating enlarged negatives for contact printing. I use both digital and traditional film cameras for picture-making.
Working in this way, I take advantage of ‘old’ and ‘new’ tools to explore the medium…as photographers always have.”

and what motivates his work:

“The idea of ‘cultivation’ is the basis of my photographic explorations. My work is an examination of the marks we make, the things we plant, and the structures we build when we cultivate a place.
My experiences in agriculture and landscape architecture inform my image-making.
Robert Adams writes that ’…what we hope for from the artist is help in discovering the significance of a place.’
The idea of cultivation becomes more relevant to our lives as farmland disappears and is replaced with other constructions.
This is why I make pictures.”

Here is a selection of Tom’s work that can be viewed at the gallery.

Tom Hawkins
Homestead: Methyl Bromide, 2008
Platinum/palladium print on vellum
21x25
Edition 2/20
$500

Tom Hawkins
Peaches in Fog, 2008
Platinum/palladium print on vellum
21x25
Edition 2/20
$500

Tom Hawkins
Cloches, 2008
Platinum/palladium print on vellum
21x25
Edition 2/20
$500

Tom Hawkins
Flooded Walnuts, Summer, 2008
Platinum/palladium print on vellum
21x25
Edition 2/20
$500

Tom Hawkins
Almonds, Latewinter, 2008
Platinum/palladium print on vellum
21x25
Edition 7/20
$500

To view these or other works by Tom Hawkins, please contact the gallery at (415) 441-4777.

City Streets

2011-10-14T16:56:00.000-07:00

Everyday scenes that are often overlooked come into focus when they are the subject of a photo or painting. Here are a few artists who have hit the street in search of inspiration. Each artist in this grouping has taken on the challenge of merging realism and abstraction to show that sometimes they are one in the same.

Robert Welsh
Urban Landscape A, 2011
Gelatin silver photograph
24 x 24 inches
Edition 2/12
$1,500

Robert Welsh
Urban Landscape D, 2011
Gelatin silver photograph
24 x 24 inches
Edition 2/12
$1,500

Robert Welsh
Urban Landscape F, 2011
Gelatin silver photograph
24 x 24 inches
Edition 2/12
$1,500

Mary Curtis Ratcliff
Sonic (Diptych), 2010
Mixed media
10 x 8 inches
$400

Anne Subercaseaux
Reflections: on Crossing L, 2010
Oil on canvas
14 x 28 inches
$1,850

Alan Ostreicher
Untitled 842-5, 2008
Digital C-print
11 x 14 inches
Edition 1/8
$350

Alan Ostreicher
Untitled 590-12, 2002
Toned Silver Print
16 x 20
Edition 1/35
$350

To schedule an appointment to view works at the gallery, please contact us at (415) 441-4777.

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery is open Tuesday – Saturday, 11:30 – 5:30.

The Remarkable Birds of Annette Corcoran

2011-10-13T17:01:00.000-07:00

Stephanie Peek, Annette Corcoran, Adrienne Defendi
November 11 - December 22, 2011

Opening Reception - Saturday, November 12
1:00 - 3:00 p.m

Annette Corcoran
Golden Tailed Sapphire, Porcelain
12 x 7 x 5 inches
$10,000

We are very pleased to have works by, museum collected artist, Annette Corcoran for our upcoming show. Annette's porcelain sculptures transcend the functionality of their teapot form; rather, they are relics of the wildlife that the avid bird watcher is so enamored by. Annette's most recent body of work, highlighting the birds of Peru and her interpretations of Peruvian burial pots, will be featured in this upcoming show.

Highly regarded in the world of ceramics, her pieces have found permanent homes in significant collections worldwide, both public and private. Locally, you may have seen some of Corcoran's eye catching birds during a trip to the Oakland Museum of California or the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

“All wild birds beguile and fascinate, and Annette Corcoran’s porcelain bird teapots do that, and more. Corcoran’s work draws on her love of wild birds and her extraordinary ability to capture them in porcelain. Each piece is a complete sculpture that captures the gesture and spirit of the subject birds, even when tethered to the requirements of their teapot perches…Their subtle yet intricate feathers afford Corcoran an opportunity to use her skillful trompe l’oeil painting, which she tempers with graphic realism, modulating gracefully between two- and three-dimensional renderings.”

Martha Drexler Lynn, Ph. D., Founding curator of the twentieth-century decorative arts collections, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, on the work of Annette Corcoran.

“Of the many fine artists working in clay who have come into view in the last decades, only a few have referred so directly to nature as Annette Corcoran. Corcoran is a long time bird watcher, who brings an informed point of view to her subject of porcelain bird teapots...with a truly free vision and competent dexterity, she has created such wondrous, often breathtaking objects. If it were possible to transcend nature, Corcoran’s birds could be the candidates. Perhaps this is one reason her work has such great appeal to viewers who respond to representational work, as well as to collectors whose primary interest is in a more abstract or non-objective avant-garde art.

Annette Corcoran believes in using her imagination, fantasies and inspirations in making her innovative teapot forms. Her ideas are combined with an unusual perfection of ability in achieving sculpture which captures the spirit of the bird she has chosen to depict. The imagery of the bird and the form of the teapot are totally integrated, creating a perfect harmony between two elements, the functional and the aesthetic…Corcoran works quietly but passionately absorbed in her work in which subtle questions and challenges are posed and explored. It is her sensitive and very personal way of combining her infatuation with nature and the world of art which continues to enchant me.”

Dorothy Weiss, Founder of the Dorothy Weiss Gallery, San Francisco, on the work of Annette Corcoran.

Annette Corcoran
Chaffinch, GoldFinch, Greenfinch, Hermitt, Manakin, Tragopan
Please contact the gallery to inquire about availability and pricing.
Photographs by Patrick Tregenza.

Please feel free to contact the gallery regarding work by Annette Corcoran. We can be reached at 415-441-4777. We look forward to seeing you at the opening.

Ceramics Annual of America Featured Artist - Steven Allen

2011-10-08T17:04:00.000-07:00

Steven Allen's work in the CAA show.
GR Code: custom tile for your Business, 2011
Porcelain

What Steven says about his year in review:

"The year started out with a focus on the mechanical. My mechanical assemblage series joins my experiences as a machinist and potter. The similarities between these two worlds are more similar than disparate. The wheel works much like a lathe, turning the material as it is shaped into something that is traditionally highly functional. In my work, precision machining meets artistic freedom and when they collide it renders the final product non-functional. It becomes form without function, as a vase holds no water, a ginger jar holds no ginger and blueberries fall through the colander. Nuts, bolts and gears are thrown on the wheel, altered and assembled into familiar shapes. I like glazes that have a toxic appearance and formulate them to resemble aged, rusted or painted metal further separating the work from any customary function. I hope the viewer senses that I am honoring the traditions of potter and machinist while simultaneously rebelling against them.
Work in the second part of the year has changed again. With the downturn in the economy and changing economic climate, many old steel mills and industrial plants have closed leaving their abandoned buildings and equipment to rust. With this deterioration has come the inspiration for many beautiful and colorful abstract images. My recent work tries to capture this new reality.

And the changes continue as I have found the joy in creating repeating patterns. Mechanical patterns are created in Gimp photo editing software, printed and transferred to Thermofax screens, then screened onto clay that is further transformed into canisters, plates, bowls, tiles and serving dishes."

Steven Allen's work in the CAA show.

Here is a recent blog post that features some of Steven Allen's mechanical gear sculptures.

Ceramics Annual of America Featured Artist - Paula Moran

2011-10-07T17:31:00.000-07:00

Paula Moran
The Difference is in the Touch, 2010
Porcelain
25 x 14 x 10 inches
$1,800

"The emergence of creativity is a manifestation of the interaction between that person and their environment. I am always inspired as I feel the interplay through this medium that unites touch, movement and ideas with the movement and emerging dynamics of the clay. It is this interplay between the person and environment that shapes an outcome that is creative and fluid.
In my recent work, I am creating a moment, glimpse in time; but I want the viewer to think past that moment. I reference familiar, literal and nostalgic objects to draw the viewer in close to trigger memory and reflection. This work documents current events and personal experiences. Using objects that hide messages, encoded information and personal data, I compose scenes that carry double meaning. Sometimes they convey humor but also outrage and hurt, exposing disparities that divide family and culture."

Paula Moran
Ironic, 2011
Porcelain
16 x 16 x 5 inches
$1,200

Want to learn more about Paula's ceramic sculptures? Here is a blog post where she explains her attraction to creating in the Tromp-l’oeil style.

Where Hard Rock Meets Pop Art - Chuck Sperry and Chris Shaw In the New York Times

2011-10-07T17:02:00.000-07:00

Chris Shaw and Chuck Sperry
Gorgon 1, 2 & 3, 2011
Collaborative installation in the Minna and Natoma Street windows
Please inquire with gallery for pricing.

This Saturday is the Rock Poster Society’s 13th annual Festival of Rock Posters in San Francisco!!!

Chris Shaw and Chuck Sperry, collaborators on the SFMOMA's Minna and Natoma Street windows, were just mentioned in an article in New York Times and will be featured artists at this Saturday's event.

...Sharing top-buzz billing with Emek is Chuck Sperry, who recently completed a marathon job for Widespread Panic, which commissioned 2,000 screen prints for its fall tour. “It was seven colors, four and a half gallons of silver metallic ink alone. It was a little crazy, a color a day for a week.” Unlike most contemporary poster artists, Mr. Sperry still does all his printing. “There’s a dialogue between my original design and what’s actually happening with the ink on the press,” he says. “It’s part of my process.”

Other second-generation artists who’ll be at the TRPS show include Marq Spusta, who has created posters for My Morning Jacket and Phish. The poster power couple Chris Shaw and Alexandra Fischer will be showing off their work for Moonalice, whose singer and rhythm guitar player is the venture capitalist Roger McNamee (one of whose business partners is Bono)...

Ceramics Annual of America Featured Artist - Shenny Cruces

2011-10-06T17:34:00.000-07:00

Shenny Cruces
She's a Dish, 2009
Porcelain
14x24
$850

The history of ceramics has significant roots in California.
Here are some higlights of the CAA Press Release:

The Ceramics Annual of America (CAA) is an ambitious exhibition and art fair spotlighting the quality and diversity of contemporary ceramics from around the world including works from China, Korea, Mexico, Australia and Italy. It is the only event of its kind in the United States and the goal is to encourage the education and enrichment of the public, cultivate a fertile art market, and foster dialog between collectors and makers of ceramic sculpture.

Part of California's continuing legacy of excellence and innovation in ceramics, CAA is the largest exhibition and art fair that is entirely focused on ceramic art in America and is modeled after the Ceramic Biennials held in Europe, Korea, Japan and China. It provides a venue for the top regional and international artists working in the clay medium to show their work to a broader audience of collectors.

CAA is organized by the California Ceramics Cooperative, a group of invested regional ceramic artists, and will feature panel discussions, lectures and tours--plus daily interactive art demonstrations from 4-5 that will provide a greater understanding of the artistic process for students and educators alike. Schools located in the Bay Area will have free admission all day Friday and should contact the Ceramics Annual for Reservations.

About Shenny Cruces:

Shenny Phillips Cruces received a BA in Ceramics from Illinois State University and and Masters of Fine Arts in Ceramics from San Francisco State University in 2011. Her work has appeared in juried shows throughout California and the United States and includes NCECA National Juried Student Exhibition, Ink and Clay 35, Visions in Clay 2011, California Clay Competition, among others. Her work has received numerous awards with most recent being Murphy Cadogan Fellowship, and a Kiln God Award Residency at Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts. Ms. Cruces currently teaches ceramics at NIAD in Richmond, California.

Shenny's thoughts on her process:

"The act of collecting is an intrinsic part of my process and my work. I actively seek out objects that were once loved and displayed within the home but now reside within junk stores and resale shops. These objects are now empty vessels devoid of the familial memories they once held.

I use recognizable objects associated with collecting and china cabinets to engage with the viewer’s sense of home and memory. I collect, cast, recreated and alter existing porcelain objects into sculptural forms to expose the underlying issues of class, identity, memory and the meaning of objects in our lives."

Here is the information for this weekend's event. We do hope you'll join us!

The Ceramics Annual of America 2011: Exhibition and Art Fair at Fort Mason, Festival Pavilion, San Francisco, California

Exhibition Dates: October 7-9 2011
Friday: 10am-8pm
Saturday: 10am-8pm
Sunday: 10am-6pm
Opening Reception: October 6, 2011, 5:30 - 9 pm

Ceramics Annual of America Featured Artist - David Kuraoka

2011-10-04T17:24:00.000-07:00

David Kuraoka
Celebrating Water, San Francisco State University
photographs by Brian Mahany

David Kuraoka, ceramics professor at SFSU, recently installed a magnificent sculpture, called Celebrating Water, in an on-campus plaza at San Francisco State University. Celebrating Water is a solar-powered fountain that uses collected rain water. It consists of 24 enormous stacked clay rings that were extruded in an industrial factory in Phoenix, Arizona. After cleaning and smoothing each ring, David carefully paints the segments with colorful under glazes and then covers them in a clear glaze.

About David Kuraoka:

"Hawaii-born David Kuraoka is a professor of art at San Francisco State University. He returns for several months each year to his island home, where he has been named a State Living Treasure... Kuraoka is best known for his pit-fired forms in which the clay body becomes a three-dimensional canvas for an extraordinary and subtle palette of hues...A group of large wheel-formed porcelain vessels with celadon glaze pays homage to Asian tradition. Their simplicity and elegance, the subtle variations of symmetric contour, the soft crackle in the ocean-cool transparent layers of color belies inherent technical challenges. In contrast, the pit-fired forms speak of ways in which the artist has created significant variations on classic process, working with a freer hand. Though begun on the wheel, they are further shaped by hand.
Kuraoka frequently works with large, pit-fired tiles grouped in wall-mounted sections. The artist has been able to guide but not dominate the serendipitous effects of chance, creating distinctive gestural marks with the calligraphy of smoke and fire. Other tiles are used to create multi-sectioned works, glazed in interlocking stripes that provide a dynamic contrast to the rich but muted hues of the pit fired works.
Kuraoka also works in bronze, using clay works from which to create molds for casting. Patination of the metal surface becomes the equivalent of the colors which bloom on the clay during pit firing. The bronze forms are darker in coloration, but their resemblance to their kin in clay is uncanny – an inspired and boldly playful move by an artist wonderfully in tune with his materials."

We are very fortunate to have several pieces by David Kuraoka in the gallery currently. We have just received three celadon pieces, a pit-fired mango, a blue and red mango and a bronze casting in addition to the large vessels and wall tiles featured here.

Want to learn more? Here is a SPARK segement featuring Kuraoka on KQED.

Please join us in Fort Mason during the upcoming Ceramics Annual of America, October 7 - 9. We welcome you to visit the gallery to view additional works by David Kuraoka.

"Ed Hardy: TATTOO THE WORLD" - Film by Emiko Omori

2011-09-27T16:02:00.000-07:00

Emiko Omori, Producer & Director

Emiko Omori's documentary film, "Ed Hardy: TATTOO THE WORLD", about the life and work of Don Ed Hardy was recently released on DVD and we wanted to share it with you.

Information about the filmmaker:

Omori began her career as a filmmaker and cinematographer in 1968. Her first job was as camerawoman/editor on the KQED program, Newsroom. She left KQED in 1972 and, since then, has freelanced as a cinematographer on many award-winning films and traveled extensively with her work in addition to producing her own films.

Director’s statement:

“My friendship with Don Ed Hardy began in 1974 when I got my first tattoo from him and here we are, 36 years later. It was time to update a film I made on him in 1980 called “Tattoo City.” It was time to get it done while we still had our memories, our hair, our teeth, and our sense of humor. To be perfectly honest it was an excuse to explore the unique mind of this phenomenal artist. Like getting a tattoo, it was a true collaboration. He allowed me into his most private space – his painting studio -opened his archives and access to all of his works. Now in our sixties, we’re two artists surprised and delighted to still be friends and still doing our art.”

For more information about Emmy-winning Emiko Omori, check out this link.

For more information about Don Ed Hardy here are some links to check out:
Interview with Don Ed Hardy
Spark Segment: Don Ed Hardy
SFAI presents the documentary "Ed Hardy: Tattoo the World"

And here is a link to Buy the Movie! We hope you enjoy!

Appointments at the Gallery

2011-09-21T17:25:00.000-07:00

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery, established in 1978, exhibits works of both emerging and established artists from the Bay Area. As a department of the world-renowned SFMOMA, our gallery is dedicated to enriching our community through the arts and currently has three exhibition venues as well as an art placement program. We encourage you to attend exhibitions and engage with our gallery’s expert staff in order to learn more about Bay Area art and the process of collecting.

Michelle Nye, Mary Powers, Julio Badel
Art advisors at the gallery

If you have an interest in adding to your private collection or in leasing artworks temporarily we’d love to schedule an appointment with you. In order to get the most from your visit, we ask that you schedule an appointment with one of our advisors for a private consultation, which allows us a chance to get to know your art interests as well as your collecting goals. During this process we encourage you to share images of your space, your ideas, interests, favorite artists or information about what kind of artwork you find yourself responding to. With this background knowledge, we can tailor a presentation and offer guidance and advice that will help you build a collection or enhance the beauty of your home.

Collecting artwork takes time and passion. Here is a blog post to get you started with great tips for the ABC's of Art Collecting. Also, we think this interview with Erin Feher of California Home and Design hits the nail on the head when it comes to design elements as well as collecting. Taking your time leads to the best results.

Access the appointment services online at: http://www.supersaas.com/schedule/SFMOMAArtistsGallery/Appointments
Or call us at 415.441.4777

Building A, Fort Mason Center
San Francisco, CA 94123
415.441.4777 www.sfmoma.org/artists_gallery
Tuesday - Saturday, 11:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m.

Get it in Gear

2011-09-14T17:28:00.000-07:00

We are on a roll at the gallery with new work coming in every day. Today we are featuring two artists who are always on the move; works on paper by Katina Huston and ceramic sculptures by Steven Allen.

Katina Huston
Dynamo, 2008
Lithograph
32 x 28 inches
Edition of 150
$980

Katina Huston
Twister, 2008
Lithograph
39 x 29 inches
Edition of 150
$1,100

Katina Huston
Mechanical Repeat (Wheels), 2008
Ink on mylar
40 x 40 inches
$6,600

Steven Allen
Blue Column, 2011
Stoneware
51 x 17 x 12 inches
$2,700

Steven Allen
Colander, 2010
Porcelain
10 x 18 x 18 inches
$800

They are sure to go quickly! To make an appointment, please contact the gallery at (415) 441-4777.

New on the Horizon - Mark Bowles

2011-09-13T17:28:00.000-07:00

We have just received new work by Mark Bowles and wanted to spread the word!
Please contact the gallery to schedule a time when you can view these and other works by Mark. Here is a link to another blog post featuring his paintings. Enjoy!

Mark Bowles
Change of Atmosphere, 2009
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
$8,000

Mark Bowles
Vantage Point, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
36 x 36 inches
$4,500

Mark Bowles
Autumn View, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
36 x 48 inches
$6,000

Mark Bowles
A Brilliant Blue Day, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
40 x 40 inches
$5,600

Mark Bowles
Red Sky, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
40 x 40 inches
$5,600

Mark Bowles
Wetlands, 2008
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
$8,000

Mark Bowles
Bees, 2009
Acrylic on canvas
60 x 80 inches
$16,800

Through the Lens of Kirk Crippens

2011-09-07T15:10:00.000-07:00

Heather Wilcoxon, Kirk Crippens
September 8 - October 27, 2011

Opening reception: Saturday, September 10
1:00 - 3:00 p.m.

Kirk Crippens with his photograph
The Dealership Wreck: Dream Car, 2010
Archival pigment print
30 x 42 inches
Edition 2/20
$1,600

Kirk Crippens had an early start with a camera, inspired by his grandfather, who kept a darkroom in his closet after retiring as a military photographer. As a college student Crippens ventured into photojournalism, interning with The Dallas Morning News in Dallas, Texas; The Flint Journal in Flint, Michigan; and The Patuxent Publishing Company in Columbia, Maryland.

Kirk's photography draws our attention to present day occurrences that are significant historically but that are often left undocumented. In this show, Crippens depicts the mass shuttering of American auto dealerships since 2009; the rarely-seen inner workings of Walmart; and the non-events of May 21, 2011, which some predicted would be end of the world.

Kirk Crippens
Big Box #3, 2008
Archival pigment print
21 x 28 inches
Edition 2/20
$1,000

Kirk Crippens
The Dealership Wreck: Through the Plastic Window, 2010
Archival pigment print
42 x 30 inches
Edition 2/20
$1,600

Kirk Crippens
The Dealership Wreck: Great Timing, 2010
Photography
30 x 42 inches
Edition 2/20
$1,600

Kirk Crippens
The Dealership Wreck: Monolith, 2010
Archival pigment print
50 x 69 inches
Edition 2/7
$5,000

To learn more about Kirk Crippens, check out this blog post and some interviews with the artist. We look forward to seeing you at the show!

A Look into the Works of Heather Wilcoxon

2011-09-01T17:58:00.000-07:00

Heather Wilcoxon, Kirk Crippens
September 8 - October 27, 2011

Opening reception: Saturday, September 10
1:00 - 3:00 p.m.

Heather Wilcoxon

Lucy

Our upcoming exhibition features two of our favorite artists: a painter influenced by graffiti styles of the 1980s and a photographer with a foundation in journalism. Both Heather Wilcoxon and Kirk Crippens process contemporary anxieties (looming economic and environmental disasters) in distinct ways in their work.

Wilcoxon is a Bay Area painter who received her MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1988. She has exhibited in New York, Houston, Denver, Seattle, Miami, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Her work is in many collections such as: the Fine Art Museums in San Francisco; Triton Art Museum; the De Saisset Museum in Santa Clara, California; and the di Rosa Collection in Napa, California.

While artworks by Heather Wilcoxon have been exhibited from coast to coast as well as internationally, our upcoming exhibition will present other works by Wilcoxon not yet shown in the Bay Area. This will include paintings and drawings referencing the Fukushima nuclear disaster as well as calamities that hit closer to home such as the health care crisis.

"My paintings and works on paper are commentaries about our current global and environmental ongoing situations. Through my drawings, I have developed these characters that I feel reflect all of our concerns, our fears, our worries and our brutality towards one another.
I see the world as a dangerous place. However, I am seasoned enough to see the absurdity of it all. My cartoon characters represent both the comedy and tragedy of humanity. In their childlike iconography, they embody a sense of innocent playfulness, yet in their monstrous rendering a dark humor is reflected. This dichotomy creates an interesting tension. In my paintings I invite the viewer in with nice colors and pretty surfaces. But if you look closer, the bite is there."

Heather Wilcoxon
Flag Ship, 2008
Mixed Media on canvas
54" x 54"
$9,500

Heather Wilcoxon
The Juggler, 2005
Oil on canvas
60" x 60"
$9,500

Heather Wilcoxon
Google Me, 2011
Oil on canvas
30" x 35"
$3,000

Heather Wilcoxon
Nuc Wall, 2011
Installation of mixed media works on paper
Size is variable
Please inquire

Reviews of Heather's work:

"Heather Wilcoxon is one of those unique artists that manage to provide you with a look at the sunny and bright side of their point of view while coercing you to take a deeper, sometimes gloomier, look at the same piece." Jack Archer, Curatedmag.com, Washington DC

“Looking at all the works, it was hard to decipher precisely what Wilcoxon’s images might mean, but that is part of the fun. She hovered successfully between figurative content and obfuscation, yet always managed to evoke a feeling, thereby making specific meaning irrelevant.” Christine Brenneman, Artweek

“Heather Wilcoxon is one of those people with a grotesque sense of humor and sharp wit, just the type of artist we love.” SFist.com

Susan Goldsmith - Nature's Radiance

2011-08-30T17:28:00.000-07:00

We have been eagerly awaiting the arrival of new works by Susan Goldsmith.
They have arrived and we want to share them with you!

Susan's dynamic pieces combine the layering of gold, silver or copper leaf with photography, drawing and painting and have beautiful resin surfaces that enhance the shimmering reflections of light.

Susan Goldsmith
No. 150 Acacia, 2009
Silver Leaf with Pigment Print, Oil Pastel, Oil Paint and Resin on Panel
36 x 36 inches
$8,800

Susan Goldsmith
Eastern Redbud III, 2011
White gold leaf, pigment print, mica, oil pastel, acrylic, oil paint, resin on panel
36 x 36 inches
$8,800

Susan Goldsmith
Paris- In November, 2011
Silver leaf with copper leaf, pigment print, oil pastel, acrylic & oil, resin on panel
30 x 30 inches
$6,000

Susan Goldsmith
Paris- Luxembourg Gardens I, 2011
Silver leaf with pigment print, oil pastel, acrylic & oil, resin on panel
20.5 x 20.5 inches
$2,600

Susan Goldsmith
Hachiya Persimmons, 2010
Oil, oil pastel, gold leaf, resin on panel
17 x 17 inches
$2,200

Susan Goldsmith
Montecito Palms (triptych), 2010
white gold leaf with pigment print, oil pastel, oil, resin on panel
21 x 62 inches
$7,800

Susan Goldsmith
Blue Heron II (diptych), 2010
silver leaf with pigment print, oil pastel, oil, resin on panel
21 x 41 inches
$5,200

Here is what Susan says about her creation process:

"My work is inspired by the beauty I find in nature. I take lots of photographs of trees and some of these images are up in my studio where I paint. I've been creating resin mixed media paintings for the last three years. The possibilities are limitless and I plan to continue exploring these mixed mediums in my work.

My undergraduate degree is in printmaking and drawing while my master's degree is in painting.

These mixed media paintings combine my love of painting with various image making techniques. I've been working with digital imagery for the last seventeen years. My interest grew out of working with digital paint and rotoscope on special effects for feature films. I began working with gold and silver leaf seven years ago. I got inspired to work with leaf out of my appreciation for antique Chinese screens and my friendship with Robert Kushner. My mixed media paintings are a combination of old and new materials. The metallic powders and interference paints that I work with give my pieces an unpredictable radiance that varies according to the viewer's perspective. So as you walk by one of my pieces you will see the colors change similar to how colors change in nature based on; different times of day or how the wind modifies the effect of sunlight on leaves and branches."

Please contact the SFMOMA Artists Gallery if you'd like to view these or other pieces by Susan Goldsmith.

Claire Pasquier's Portrait Landscape

2011-08-24T16:59:00.000-07:00

Claire Pasquier's portrait landscape
Masks from a portrait event

Claire Pasquier is approaching her 100th portrait in her year long portrait landscape! Claire's project encourages us to slow down and take some time to sit with one another and share a moment or experience rather than rushing off to our next destination.

What Claire says about her project's inspiration:

"San Francisco is unique and famous; it's a small-big city, where people from all over the world seem to crisscross. The idea of this project came to me in Paris after I opened my workshop gallery. The window overlooked a tiny busy street, I watched all the people go by but never stop; it was like the halls in the metro. I felt the need to communicate with all these people and break the protective and indifferent walls that we build when we live in big cities. A portrait is the result of a unique look at a given time. Each portrait is a challenge and at the same time a mutual encounter. Even if we are made alike, each person has unique features, characteristics and stories..."

From January 2011 to January 2012, I'll be doing portraits of people at the SFMOMA's Artists Gallery.

One year! One life!

Here are some fantastic time-lapse videos from a few of Claire's two hour portrait appointments.

Get ready to hit replay!

Many of our gallery artists have already participated in the project. Here are just a few painters, photographers and printmakers.

Painters:

Kim Frohsin, Jennifer Harris, Anthony Holdsworth

Photographers:

Michelle Nye, Winnie Wintermeyer, Kirk Crippens

Printmaker:

Thierry Rosset

Please call the Gallery to set up an appointment or contact the artist on her Facebook page. The only requirement is that you bring a frame (recycled, new...your taste).

Anthony Holdsworth - Plein Air Paintings

2011-08-23T16:41:00.000-07:00

Anthony Holdsworth with his painting
Climate Change Quartet #3 (Fire Over Water)
Oil on canvas
42 x 55 inches
$20,000, 2011

Anthony Holdsworth : Photos by Justin Beck

You may have seen plein air painter, Anthony Holdsworth, with his easle set up on location in San Francisco or Oakland. His goal is to visually translate a space and it's surroundings to the viewer. Not an easy task when you think about it. The light shifts, the traffic flows, passersby are inquisitive. All part of the experience of the space. Yet to focus in on how to interperet what you are seeing and feeling is quite a unique challenge. Anthony once described it like this:

"If you think about painting the sky...The sky is blue, but you don't just paint the sky blue. It has light and depth which our eyes can see, the challenge is caputuring that with paint."

Anthony Holdsworth
Bay Bridge Panorama, 2008
Oil on canvas
30" x 120" inches
$20,000

Anthony Holdsworth
Beneath the Bay Bridge # 5, 2000
Oil/C
40x30
$5,000

Anthony Holdsworth
A Break in the Clouds, 2004
Oil on canvas
36 x 34 inches
$3,500

Anthony says this about his process:

“ I generally work on location in the city. The urban landscape is an accurate and disquieting testament to our common condition. I encounter it first-hand in the hope of conveying its original intensity. Though sometimes devoid of people these ‘cityscapes’ emerge from my interaction with passersby and inhabitants at each site.

Color theory and Perceptionism (a term coined by color theorist Faber Birren) provide a foundation for my work. I weave qualities of light throughout a painting to create interacting harmonies that compel attention and convey a mood. I seek an approach in which the abstract dynamics of color and paint application play an essential role in conveying the essence of place. My interest in place has drawn me to paint traditional regions of Europe and Latin America where the close connection to the natural environment sheds light on the surrealistic disassociation of American streets.”

Many of Anthony's paintings show his concerns about the way we impact our environment and the effects of global warming. Recently one of his projects moved Anthony off the city streets and into a San Francisco garden, where over a period of five and a half months he documented the life cycle of a single sunflower in a project called Season of the Sunflower : The Continuous Oil Painting.

(Video is best veiwed in full screen.)

This video is composed of 450 images of a painting that was repainted daily on location over a 5 and one half month period to reflect the life-cycle of a sunflower in a San Francisco garden. To Holdsworth's knowledge, this is the first time a 'continuous oil painting' of this nature has ever been created.

Reminder of Tomorrow's Event - Exhibition Talk, Tour and Booksigning With Don Ed Hardy

2011-08-19T12:10:00.000-07:00

Don Ed Hardy will give a talk and tour of exhibition highlights of The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy, and also sign books on August 20, 2011 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m. Several of his books and limited edition show posters are available for purchase at the gallery.

Art for Life, $20

2000 Dragons, $50

Beyond Skin, $98

Tattooing the Invisible Man, $90

The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy
limited edition show posters, $150

Hardy will talk about his original artwork informed not only by a lifelong involvement with tattoo, but also a far-reaching knowledge of Western and Asian art history.

Check out a few other posts about The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy including a SPARK segment and a review of the show in Square Cylinder. We look forward to seeing you!

Location: SFMOMA Artists Gallery, Bldg. A, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA. 94123

Mark Bowles - Changes in the Weather

2011-08-17T14:15:00.000-07:00

Fall seems to be fast approaching as we begin to feel the seasons change.
Today we feature the paintings of Mark Bowles, who uses form and color to capture the beauty in the transitioning of light and weather. We'll keep you posted as new works from Mark will be arriving to the gallery shortly!

Mark Bowles
Atmosphere #35, 2009
Oil on canvas
48 x 48 inches
$8,000

Mark Bowles
Atmosphere #40 (2009-40), 2009
Oil on canvas
60 x 80 inches
$16,000

Mark Bowles
Changing Weather, 2010
Oil on canvas
36 x 36 inches
$4,500

Mark Bowles
Nightfall, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
30 x 40 inches
$4,000

Mark Bowles
Storm, 2009
Acrylic on canvas
30 x 40 inches
$3,600

Mark Bowles
The Weight of the Weather, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 36 inches
$6,000

Mark Bowles
Tropical Light, 2010
Oil on canvas
36 x 48 inches
$6,000

Mark Bowles
Untitled 54, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
40 x 30 inches
$4,000

Marilynne Morshead - Capturing Texture and Light

2011-08-12T16:48:00.000-07:00

Marilynne Morshead
Discovery Series
Maelstrom, Flury, Serenity, Sail, Flow, Burst & Journey, 2009
Photography
16 x 20 inches
$800 each

Fashion by Alexander McQueen

Being bold is an art.
Looking at everyday life in a different light can surely change your perception.

What Marilynne says about her process:

Gravitating between reality and abstraction, I am drawn equally to sculptural curves and geometric motifs, seeking order and beauty in chaotic times. The Discovery series blurs the lines between organic form and manufactured design in an opulent awakening of light, shadow and pattern. It's a serene journey into an intimate world, inviting unique interpretations dependent upon the viewer's mood and experience.
Painted with a camera, the series is printed in toned black and white, beckoning everyday objects to become animate. A lamp serpentines into a curvaceous nude, crystal droplets dance and dissolve into the ether, a silk chandelier bursts with raw emotion, a stairwell transforms into a woman's stocking-covered thigh, and a skylight opens a window to the soul. A silent room, a gentle breeze, a rhythmic sound can serve to quiet the mind. In these images, it is the emerging form that guides us into visual meditation.
Discovery is a personal Rorschach Test, an invitation to uncover fresh meaning on a well-traveled path. May we find therein whatever we need, whatever it is we seek.

San Francisco's Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival

2011-08-11T16:37:00.000-07:00

Planning to check out this year's Outside Lands Festival?
We're guessing that, like us, you're counting down the hours with tickets in hand!

Be on the look out for a few of our artists, Mike Shine and Don Ross, who will be showing in conjunction with the festivities.

Once again, this year's Outsider Art will be curated by Juxtapoz Magazine to present an immersive aural and visual weekend. Make sure you stop by to visit with Mike Shine and his crew!

Mike Shine

Artworks by Mike Shine

Meanwhile Don Ross' Sutro San Francisco - The 'Outside Lands' A Century Apart is just opening at RayKo Photo Center.

In this survey, Ross spent a year re-photographing vantages around the City that were originally pictured in a 1910 estate survey and presents several large-format color views taken with a 4″x5″ film camera in contrast to the 1910 black and white enlarged originals, to show how San Francisco was shaped as its residents plowed into the 20th Century.

Don Ross

Exhibition will run from August 11th - September 15th, 2011

Enjoy, and we'll see you out there!

New Work in by Jennifer Harris

2011-08-09T14:18:00.000-07:00

Jennifer M. Harris
The Man in the Blue Boat, 2007
Oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches
$1,350

What new adventures lie ahead for this traveler?
With colorful characters, Jennifer Harris depicts fantastic dream-like worlds.
Let's keep exploring!

What Jennifer says about her work:

"I realized that one of the first places we learn to define ourselves and our worlds is in childhood stories, both the ones from books and the ones we are told by our families, our cultures, and our society.
It's surprising how often people don't know what story they're living by (myself included).
Today my work explores my fascination with how we relate to the stories in our lives and how we are impacted by those stories.
In my paintings, I create characters in symbolic environments suggestive of children's stories, using them to question our relationship with those narrative worlds."

New work by Kim Frohsin

2011-08-05T14:28:00.000-07:00

Kim Frohsin
Merav: Schiele Pose, 1999
Black pencil
18 x 17 inches
$1,600

We just love the new figure drawings that Kim Frohsin brought in!

This one clearly refrences the work of Egon Schiele.

Egon Schiele
Squatting Woman, 1918
Black chalk
45 cm x 29.5 cm
Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna

Here are a few more of Kim's recently consigned figure studies.

Kim Frohsin
Lost to Find, 2011
Ink, pencil, dry pigment, paper
11 x 16 inches
$2,900

Kim Frohsin
B. Cali with Cap & Scarf, 1998
Black marker on handmade paper
12 x 10 inches
$1,650

Please contact the gallery if you'd like to see these or other works by
Kim Frohsin.

Exhibition Talk, Tour and Booksigning

2011-08-04T11:16:00.000-07:00

Art for Life, $20

2000 Dragons, $50

Beyond Skin, $98

Tattooing the Invisible Man, $90

The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy
limited edition show posters, $150

Hardy will talk about his original artwork informed not only by a lifelong involvement with tattoo, but also a far-reaching knowledge of Western and Asian art history.

Location: SFMOMA Artists Gallery, Bldg. A, Fort Mason Center

Coffee Break!

2011-08-02T12:39:00.000-07:00

Paul Madonna, All Over Coffee #445, July 31, 2011
Text by Richard Lang.

Two gallery artists have teamed up for today's feature.
If you saw this Sunday's All Over Coffee by Paul Madonna in the San Francisco Chronicle, then you may have noticed that his collaborator on the text was Richard Lang.
Madonna's drawings of San Francisco are paired with a text that somehow relates or reflects upon the scene. This week he collaborated with Richard Lang in documenting the things Richard experiences on his walk to and from work.
So, if your day started like many of us, walking to work with a latte in hand, just remember to keep your eyes peeled. Some interesting things can occur All Over Coffee.

Check out some previous posts about Paul Madonna and Richard Lang to learn more about their artwork.

Upcycled Whimsy - Perfectly Paired

2011-07-29T11:37:00.000-07:00

JoAnn Biagini
untitled "Desmid", 2010
Mixed Media
42 x 41 inches
$3,500

Apartment Therapy recently featured Capetown-based designer and artist, Katie Thompson of Recreate. Katie uses found objects to create a stunning line of recycled furniture as well as interior accessories. Shown here, an old suitcase is reenvisioned as a charming (and worldly!) lounge.
Throw a little light on the subject with these FL/Y pendants from Design Within Reach.

We thought Katie's chair would feel right at home next to a piece that just arrived to the gallery by artist, Jo Ann Biagini. JoAnn's collection of found images from old school text books become layered in a collage of facts and whimsy. A perfect compliment.

For more about JoAnn, read an interview about her work.

Ron Donovan's "Keeper of the Gate"

2011-07-28T11:51:00.000-07:00

Ron Donovan
Keeper of the Gate, 2011
Mixed Media on panel
144 x 108 inches
$8,000

Ron Donovan’s Keeper of the Gate, a site specific installation, can be seen now, any time of day or night at the gallery’s public arts venue: the SFMOMA Garage Windows at 147 Minna Street and 150 Natoma Street.

Set against a receding black background, the monumental piece is constructed with 8 layers of hand-painted wood paneling, and prints on wood panel, and stands over 9 ft tall and 12 feet wide. Like the other two artists, Chris Shaw and Chuck Sperry whose work can be found in the adjacent window spaces, Donovan chose the female as his subject matter. She appears all encompassing: part super hero, part vixen, part rock star and part Hindu goddess. For Donovan, she represents strength; and like everything (or at least most things he sees in life), the dichotomous structure from which its meaning is created. Strength reflects characteristics that may seem contradictory: strength requires vulnerability, revealing one’s core truth, for example, not just courage of one’s convictions. You cannot have one without the other. In layers of meanings depicted in symbolic adornments, antiquated and contemporary, religious and cultural, she is alluring yet fearsome. Her swords derive from Hindu iconography symbolizing enlightenment, for use against the darkness of ignorance. She is Keeper of the Gate and she is also strength: fierce and vulnerable. She carries a Mayan head dress on her head, a chain of human skulls around her neck and sacred tools in her hands. Her form fitting fabric references Chinese manufacturing and American currency. She is a cross pollination of cultures and religions identifiable with societies around the world. Wearing wings she is also like Garuda, the male winged Hindu god, the enormous mythical bird-like creature with keen intelligence and highly developed organizational abilities, representing the combined characteristics of animals and divine beings. Be it man, woman, of any culture, of any religion, “every religion tells the same story,” says Donovan, and we are one in the same.

Ron Donovan

Bay Area artist Ron Donovan was raised in Honolulu, Hawaii. His father, a pioneering computer systems scientist with a keen intellect, worked on special projects for the military and his mother, a home maker, wanted her son to pursue a profession, law or medicine. It was his father who encouraged Donovan’s creative nature and artistic ability and supported his desire to follow his passion. Donovan took his talents to the mainland and studied at California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland, California. It was the 80’s, Reagan was in office, yuppies were the rage, investment banking a rising profession, the monetary carrot of capitalistic dreams dangled in front of college students of the era. Donovan’s interest in politics and people found expression through a discovered passion: silk screening. His rebellious, humorous constitution, immersion in the local art and music scene, personable nature, and charismatic personality unified his peers. Before long, he became well known for his renegade, abundant creative energy and candid expression. Donovan’s Pacific Island background and influence invigorated his focus on American political satire and relations, and multi-cultural studies. It was also in college where he met Chris Shaw, fellow collaborator in the exhibition. Later, Donovan met Sperry and set up a printing studio, a Warholian factory of sorts, at an old vacated San Francisco firehouse on Polk Street. When they were asked to vacate in the 90’s, they crossed the bay and set up shop in West Oakland, while retaining the original name, The Firehouse. Today, with Shaw living nearby in his own live/work studio, the group continues to work, collaborate, tour, debate and “hang-out.” With a radiant work ethic, the three also continue on, creating their own individual art works as well as the rock posters for many famous bands that they themselves have become known for.

For more information about Ron Donovan's and Chuck Sperry's Firehouse, check out this video.

A Little Studio Visit

2011-07-27T10:30:00.000-07:00

Joe Fig, Barnaby Furnas: 1/3/06, 2006.
11 x 11 x 9.5 inches, Mixed Media

Joe Fig, Chuck Close (Bridgehampton): April 25, 2006.
11" x 11" x 9.5", Mixed Media

Joe Fig, Jasper Johns 1963, 2008.
10” x 17” x 12, Mixed Media

Apartment Therapy has a great feature on a New York artist, Joe Fig, who has a very unique way of taking viewers on a studio visit. He creates small-scale reproductions of the studios of well-known artists to understand the artists and their work.

Hear a radio show interview with Joe Fig on ARTonAIR.org .

Here is a link to an one of our earlier studio visit posts with gallery artist, Kai Samuels-Davis.

What Dreams May Come

2011-07-26T12:15:00.000-07:00

Form Magazine has included Gallery Artist, Pat Sonnino in an article about the fusion of art and architecture in the creative process.

“What Dreams May Come: When architects put down the plans and pick up the brush” by Ina Drosu, Form Magazine, May-June issue 2011. Read the article here.

Patricia Sonnino
Blue List 2, 2006
Mixed Media
18 x 14 inches
$475

Patricia Sonnino
Ricevuta, 2009
Mixed Media
18 x 14 inches
$475

A Picturesque Evening at Greens Happy Hour

2011-07-26T11:19:00.000-07:00

What to do after you visit the Gallery? Try the new Greens to Go Happy Hour right next door from 5-7 pm Monday thru Friday. This month they feature the wines of Italy and wonderful nibbles like potato griddle cakes with romesco and creme fraiche, Andante Dairy and Cowgirl Creamery cheese board, and summer squash and pesto pizza.

Top that off with a lovely view of the Golden Gate Bridge in the evening light and you've got the makings for a splendid happy hour indeed! Salute!

Happy Hour at Greens to Go | Greens Restuarant
http://www.greensrestaurant.com/.

Making Beautiful Art out of Beach Plastic

2011-07-21T10:22:00.000-07:00

Artists Gallery artists Judith and Richard Lang are featured on Smithsonian.com

By Jeff Greenwald
Smithsonian.com, July 14, 2011

Photo: courtesy of Richard and Judith Lang

Judith Lang waves from a kelp pile on Kehoe Beach, shouting to her husband. “Here’s the Pick of the Day!”

The artist holds aloft her newfound treasure: the six-inch long, black plastic leg of an anonymous superhero toy. But did it come from Batman or Darth Vader? Only careful research will tell.

“We’ll google ‘black plastic doll leg,’” Richard Lang informs me, “and try to find out what it belonged to.”
In 1999, Richard and Judith had their first date on this Northern California beach. Both were already accomplished artists who had taught watercolor classes at the University of California and shown their work in San Francisco galleries. And both (unbeknown to each other) had been collecting beach plastic for years.
“This is a love story,” Richard says quietly. “Our passion is not only plastic but each other. We could never have imagined, on that day, what an incredible life would unfold—picking up other people’s garbage.”

It’s not just about picking up the plastic, but what he and Judith do with it. Since 1999, they’ve found countless ways to turn their huge collection of beach debris into extraordinary art. Partners and collaborators, they have created found-object works ranging from exquisite jewelry to mural-size photographs; from wall-mounted sculptures to, most recently, the coveted trophies awarded at the 2011 Telluride Mountainfilm Festival. Their work has appeared in exhibitions worldwide, from Singapore to San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art.

“Our hope is to make these artworks so valuable,” Judith jokes, “that wars will be fought to clean up these beaches.”

Read more: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/Making-Beautiful-Art-out-of-Beach-Plastic.html#ixzz1SZdGnfCa

"The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy" Review

2011-07-20T10:11:00.000-07:00

Review of "The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy" in Square Cylinder

http://www.squarecylinder.com/2011/07/don-ed-hardy-sfmoma-artists-gallery/
Posted on 19 July 2011
By David M. Roth

Blue Boy Gets Physical,
1995, etching, 24 ½ x 19 ¼ "

The trajectory of tattoo artist Don Ed Hardy’s career mirrors the shifting history of the tattoo itself. It’s a form that continuously reestablishes its social standing, oscillating between high and low, depending on when and where you look.

In 18th century Japan, the tattoo was meted out as a punishment to criminals. Yet during the latter part of the Edo (1600-1868) period, it co-existed on equal footing with ukiyo-e woodblock prints and was worn by moneyed elites in the U.S. and Europe. Later in the same period, it was appropriated by Japanese gangsters, and then by U.S. servicemen in the 20th century. Now, it’s been rehabilitated. Today, a quarter of Americans between 18 and 50 are tattooed. No one embodies these historic mood swings better than Hardy himself. His sprawling show, The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy, which includes 68 objects and a re-creation of a vintage tattoo shack, is as fine a reflection (and reinterpretation) of the tattoo’s colorful past as any you’re likely to find.

By his own count, Hardy, 66, has tattooed many thousands of people in a career that’s spanned more than 40 years up and down the West Coast. He may be the only person ever to have turned down a Yale fellowship to ink sailors. He did it after earning a degree in printmaking at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1967. Extending a childhood fascination with the form that began at age 10, Hardy, with tutelage from established masters, translated the etching techniques he learned at SFAI to skin, churning out, as a journeyman, a repertoire of Americana: hearts, flags and eagles and the like. In comparison to what followed, such drawings are to the tattoo what clip art is to graphic design.

Hardy’s big leap was becoming the first American tattooist to apprentice in Japan. There he learned the ukiyo-e-influenced full-body technique that would, over time, establish him as a master. Today, as a fine artist – a practice he returned to full-time only in the last decade — Hardy maintains that he has no signature style. It’s a stunning admission from any artist, particularly one who was awarded an honorary doctorate by SFAI. Fact is, Hardy is an appropriationist who makes no attempt to disguise his borrowings from surf culture, hot-rod art, California funk, hippie-freak “comix”, Dada, Surrealism, Chicano art and Abstract Expressionism. In a 1999 catalog essay for the 45-year survey, Tattooing the Invisible Man, at LA’s Track 16 gallery, Hardy spoke mostly about personal history, technique and philosophy, but said little about content. After viewing the current show, organized by Track 16 director, Laurie Steelink, I understood why: Hardy’s work really does speak for itself. The exhibition features paintings, drawings, etchings and ceramics that overflow with pointed, graphic allusions to sex, violence, mortality and enlightenment. Hardy demonstrates repeatedly how cross-cultural cultural mash-ups can yield works that multiply the impact of their component parts.

The show opens with a series of cast-resin works layered with vintage Hardy acetate tattoo stencils. While their slick surfaces work against the raw sensibility Hardy strives for, certain works stand out. Shattering Tiger, to take but one example, is an exceptional “painting”. In it, triangular shapes converge to build a cubist-like ground and an almost vertiginous aerial view of the big cat, rendered in wavy, broad strokes. Near the animal’s shoulder, Hardy drops representation and allows his brush to spin a series of arabesques that resemble a face. It’s a beautiful moment in a beautiful piece, one that embodies the freedom Hardy sought when he quit tattooing to make personal work.

Stronger still are the works that mix Asian and Mexican motifs. The best combine Hokusai’s famous wave forms with Mexican Day of the Dead iconography. In Popeye’s Last Voyage, the muscle-bound cartoon character is reduced to a skeleton striding across waves. Look closely and you’ll see a stiff penis – a fairly remarkable act for a dead man and perfect example of the “unruly” art of Edo-period artists who subverted the conventions of their day by placing unclothed private parts into their pictures. Hardy pays homage to that tradition in many places, but no where does he do so more sneakily and seductively than on a vase that shows an ungainly naked butt.

In Our Lady of Waterlupe (Pray for Surf), to take another example, Hokusai’s waves spill from the chest of the Virgin of Guadalupe in a triptych whose flanking images are of migrants stranded in the desert. They’re bound by rope and cowering beneath flaming drops of rain. Hardy created the piece in 1988, well before the immigration debate turned nasty; but it could easily be read today as a cautionary tale. Floater, a term used by fishermen for bodies washed ashore, doubles as the title of an equally searing lithograph of a skeleton in a lotus position. The picture, part of a series, brings to mind the corps du dame paintings of Jean Dubuffet, working as if he were a death-obsessed Chicano scratching out designs on obsidian. Haptic King of Sweden, an obscurely titled acrylic painting on Amate paper, recalls a James Ensor self-portrait – one that’s been tattooed with bare-breasted women. From these details, one might surmise that the picture is, in some measure, autobiographical, just as the painting titled Save Your Fair (D.I.Y.) almost certainly is. The latter shows the artist with a crazed expression, pounding a nail into his head.

Buddhists would probably call this enlightenment, and it’s in this realm – of cosmic struggle – that you’ll find Hardy’s richest works. Two that stick in memory are Blue Boy Gets Physical and Conversations with Grampy. The first depicts a tattooed, long-haired half-man, half-beast, set against a geometric maze — raging against an unseen enemy. The second shows a naked woman bent over backwards in the shape of a skull biting its own tongue. Both, Buddhist lore tells us, are about same thing: the unconquerable demon of mortality.

To the cognoscenti, the link between historic Japanese woodbocks and the tattoo will probably not be news; but for those who’ve recently acquired ink as a fashion accessory, this exhibition of the form’s rich lineage, spiked with Hardy’s late-20th century pop culture iconography, will likely be a revelation.

–DAVID M. ROTH

Go to the article.

The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy, @ SFMOMA Artists Gallery through August 25, 2011.

Exhibition Tour, Talk and Book Signing by Don Ed Hardy, Saturday August 20, 2-4 p.m.

Inspired by Wonderful Memories

2011-07-18T09:04:00.000-07:00

Lisa Barker has consigned a number of new paintings to the gallery. Her work is so vibrant, it is such a treat.

Lisa Fernald Barker
Harborside, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 36 inches
$2,700

Lisa Fernald Barker
LA Trattoria, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
36 x 36 inches
$2,500

Lisa Fernald Barker
Marina City, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
12 x 12 inches
$500

Lisa Fernald Barker
Surfin Santa, 2009
Acrylic on canvas
36 x 36 inches
$2,025

My "Special Spaces" series is inspired by wonderful memories. Times spent in special locations like the West Shore of Tahoe, growing up and visiting family on the Seacoast of New England, and many beautiful places throughout California.

For each new painting I concentrate on one individual memorable experience and day so each painting has its own unique feeling and ambiance.
                                                                                  Lisa F. Barker

The B-Side

2011-07-15T10:33:00.000-07:00

Adair Oesterle
Caffe Museo at SFMOMA
July 14 - August 23, 2011

Adair Oesterle currently has work on exhibition at the SFMOMA Caffe Museo.

Using primarily traditional photographic methods and shooting mainly with nonprogrammable, manual cameras, Northern California photographer Adair Oesterle explores and examines industrial and agricultural environments throughout the west. "I am drawn toward the simple beauty of everyday objects and the ways in which history accumulates on these items, making them landmarks in their own right," she says. Her work demonstrates her fascination for what she calls "roadside survivors," including weathered signs and fallen structures, combining a wistful sense of a bygone era with a genuine appreciation of the majesty of the land.

Adair Oesterle
Access, 2011
Photography
48 x 48 inches
$4,000
At Artists Gallery

Adair Oesterle
Compliance, 2003
Photography
50 x 22 inches
$2,000

Adair Oesterle
Ghirardelli, 2005
Photography
48 x 48 inches
$4,000

Adair Oesterle
Golden Gate Bridge, 2001
Photography
47 x 21 inches
$2,000

Adair Oesterle
Hunt & Behrens, 2005
Photography
48 x 48 inches
$4,000

Adair Oesterle
Palm, 2011
Photography
48 x 48 inches
$4,000

Adair Oesterle
Retired, 2011
Photography
30 x 30 inches
$2,000
At Artists Gallery

Adair Oesterle
Still Standing, 2003
Photography
30 x 22 inches
$2,000
At Artists Gallery

This is what Adair says about this current series:
The exhibit title, "The B-side" is in reference to the reverse side of the 45 vinyl record that traditionally offered additional or alternate music tracts. As in the B-side of the 45 record, the images of this exhibit present a less common view that was documented by exploring the alternate side, back side or underside of the structure.

When observing a building I will first attempt to circumnavigate around the entire structure and explore all the possible vantage points and, in doing so, I hope to uncover and capture a fresh perspective.

Sometimes these explorations call for going over or under barbed wire fences, hiking through unfriendly terrain and more often than not, a little trespassing has occurred. When caught in the act of trespassing, the fact that I am doing photography and usually carrying my old Rolleiflex camera, the transgression is usually overlooked and the conversation quickly turns to my 1950’s medium format camera where I am usually asked, “Can you still find film for that camera?”

My goal is to present a vantage point that is different from how it is first presented and/or most commonly viewed. Rarely is it that the front of a structure is of most interest.

More often the less conventional perspective, which offers more information, texture, and mode, tells a better story.

"I Walk on Guilded Splinters"

2011-07-14T13:21:00.000-07:00

Don Ed Hardy explains the symbolism in the piece Gilded Splinters below. To hear more insights into his work, plan to attend the Exhibition Talk, Tour and Book Signing on Saturday, August 20th at 2 p.m. at Fort Mason.

Don Ed Hardy
Gilded Splinters
Acrylic on archival synthetic paper
105 x 51 inches, 2000

This work was done soon after the completion of the massive 500-foot long 2000 Dragons scroll, a tribute to the Dragon Year of the millenium. Here a small Mayan spirit serpent/dragon advances on fiery stilts over a raging sea under a swirling, stormy sky. The title of the piece is borrowed from a mystical Dr. John song from the mid-1960s.
-Don Ed Hardy

Emotional Capsules

2011-07-13T07:37:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to Gallery Artist Germán Herrera. The Fundación Antonio Saura based in Cuenca, Spain, is preparing a monograph about his work, which willl be published this year.

German Herrera
Don't Follow the Wake
Archival pigment print
35x44
Edition 1/5, 2001

German Herrera
Tree Houses
Photography
20 x 24 inches
Edition 1/15, 2009

German Herrera
Kinetic Stillness
Photography
20 x 24 inches
Edition 1/15, 2009

German Herrera
Obstructed View
Photography
20 x 24 inches
Edition 2/15, 2008

German Herrera
Plastic Tree
Photography
20 x 24 inches
Edition 1/15, 2009

German Herrera
Mother ship
Photography
20 x 24 inches
Edition 1/15, 2009

I was formed as a photojournalist.

The body of work these images belong to, emerged after a period of 10 years of not

exercising any form of image making. The collage form emerged as a response to the need of

addressing an internal reality, previously inaccessible and more complex in nature.

I photograph what feels compelling, attractive, disgusting -the images are correspondences...

nods to these connections. Dreams, beliefs, fears, intuition and aesthetics nurse the

approach as I move on to amalgamating the image; in the same emotionally conscious and

undirected way.

They are not the product of an idea or an association of ideas, but emotional capsules, which

also are maps... a diary of maps. The biggest challenge as they are constructed is to stay

away from a linear form of thought —letting emotion guide the thrust. It is worth to keep in

mind the original function of these documents: appropriation of the depicted territory. In this

case I am re-cognizing what con-forms me, therefore owning it

There is no message to decode. If anything, the transmission of an emotion may take place.

The more individual the search is, the more universal it becomes.
- Germán Herrera

Control and Loss of Control

2011-07-12T10:41:00.000-07:00

Peter Foucault
Four-Squared
Ink/paper
72 x 60 inches, 2004

detail of Four-Squared

Peter Foucault creates works on paper, videos, and installations that are fueled by his love of drawing and mark making. He has created a series of Drawing-Projects, which utilize systems developed by the artist that produce complex abstract compositions. At the root of these projects is a constant tension between control and the loss of control. Viewer interactivity plays an integral part in his drawing installations, large-scale artworks in which participants influence the outcome of a drawing that is created by a small robot over the duration of an event or exhibition. His work is concept driven, and often utilizes objects that reference printmaking and multiplicities.

Dangerous Shapes, Disintegrate Series #1, 2007
ink on paper and Mylar, 10”x14”

Translations, exhibition at the SFMOMA Caffe, 2009

California Home and Design Cover, 2009

Foucault’s procedure connects his work with the Surrealist lineage of automatism, the chance-enamored strategies of Fluxus and oddities on the fringes of art such as Harold Cohen’s computer-generated drawings.
-Kenneth Baker, San Francisco Chronicle

Trends in Paint Colors

2011-07-08T11:59:00.000-07:00

Ozier Muhammad/The New York Times

From the New York Times
By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE
Published: June 30, 2011

If you heard the words “Tempest,” “Turbulence” and “Tornado Watch,” you might head for the basement — fast.

Paint manufacturers want you to head for the living room.

In a redoubled effort to capture consumers’ attention in this sputtering economic recovery, some paint companies are hoping to distinguish their brands with names that tell a story, summon a memory or evoke an emotion — even a dark one — as long as they result in a sale.

What they do not do is reveal the color.

“For a long time we had to connect the color name with the general color reference,” said Sue Kim, the color trend and forecast specialist for the Valspar paint company. “But now,” Ms. Kim added, “we’re exploring color names that are a representation of your lifestyle.”

Thus, Valspar, which once featured Apricot 1 through Apricot 6, now offers Weekend in the Country, a name that might put you in mind of an idyllic getaway or a Stephen Sondheim tune but that will not convey a specific hue. (For the record, it is the color of mud — perhaps not such a great weekend after all.)
Sherwin-Williams offers Synergy. From Ace Paint comes Hey There! Benjamin Moore has Old World Romance, all names that give new meaning to the term colorblind.

“Color names are marketing tools, meaning they help sell paint,” said Lyne Castonguay, merchandising vice president for paint at The Home Depot.

Read the complete article.

"Everyday" America

2011-07-07T13:31:00.000-07:00

James Torlakson has consigned these three framed etchings to the Artists Gallery.

James Torlakson
North Tower II
Etching
8.5 x 14.25 inches
Edition 12/50, 1987

James Torlakson
Zoo Train II
Etching
11 x 22 inches
Edition 27/50, 1987

James Torlakson
Westlane Drive-In
Etching
10 x 15 inches, 2000

What James Torlakson says about his work and career:
The realism in my work is oriented toward the sensuous consumption and reinterpretation of the world I see. I am not interested in how closely I can mimic physical images in paint, but rather in how I can change and distort them to suit my personal aesthetic. When I paint an image, I break it down in my mind and put it back together in the second dimension as if it were a puzzle. The pieces of the puzzle are the compositional elements of shape, texture, light, value, hue, line, etc. If the elements are assembled harmoniously, the painting will function well as both an abstract composition and a realistic image.

I have been working as a professional fine artist since 1971. My realist oils, watercolors, aquatint etchings, and drawings have been widely exhibited nationally and internationally. Many of my artworks are housed in the permanent collections of American Museums.

I am best known for my photo-based realism, though working from life is still an active part of my creative process. My imagery has centered on “everyday” America; shifting over the years from trucks, to railways, to amusement parks, to waterfronts, to fireworks booths, to deserted drive-in theatres, to coastal landscapes. Through these shifts in subject matter, related architecture has been a steadily repeated motif.

Stayin' Alive

2011-07-06T14:46:00.000-07:00

Don Ed Hardy
Stayin' Alive, 1995
Etching
24 1/2 x 19 1/4 inches
$2,500

A determined white gorilla skanks along to a reggae beat. The Wheel of Existence, or the endless Wheel of the Dharma, accompanies him in the night sky, while the elusive lightbulb of inspiration/awareness keeps him moving forward. A pair of Buddha eyes, like those on Tibetan stupas, oversee the scene. The artist was born in the year of the Monkey, in Asian zodiac.
- Don Ed Hardy

In May of 1995 Hardy spent two weeks at Kurumaki Studio work intensively on a set of eight intaglio printsof which Stayin' Alive is one, which he calls The Mysterious East. He used a full range of media - from traditional hard and soft ground drawings which refer to the tightness of the Ukiyo-e school, to a more modern technique of brushing a copy toner solution directly on the plate to achieve a fluid painterly stroke. The result is a richly varied body of work which reflects Hardy's vast knowledge of Eastern iconographic images.

Don Ed Hardy will give a talk and tour of exhibition highlights, and also sign books on August 20, 2011 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.

Hardy will talk about his original artwork informed not only by a lifelong involvement with tattoo, but also a far-reaching knowledge of Western and Asian art history.

Location: SFMOMA Artists Gallery, Bldg. A, Fort Mason Center

Chris Shaw: Madonna Fukushima

2011-07-05T12:33:00.000-07:00

Madonna Fukushima
March-June, 2011
Acrylic on canvas
9' x11'

Chris Shaw is one of the three Bay Area artists whose work is currently on exhibit at the SFMOMA Garage windows. He and fellow collaborators, Ron Donovan and Chuck Sperry comprise a long-time network of rock poster artists/screen printers who together have come to define the current rock poster art form that was spawned in the San Francisco Bay Area in the mid 1960’s.

Chris Shaw painting in his studio

Chris Shaw received his printmaking degree at The California College of Arts and Crafts after moving to San Francisco from Boston in the mid 1980’s. Soon afterwards his work came into the public eye with his immense black-light murals seen in many of San Francisco’s nightclubs. By the early 90’s he was working for Bill Graham Presents creating rock posters and stage sets for many of the biggest bands: Kiss, Pearl Jam, Cypress Hill, Hole, Foo Fighters, the Allman Brothers as well as some of the most notorious events of the era, the Tibetan Freedom Concerts, the Horde Tours, and Lollapalooza, etc. By 2000, as large-format digital printing became a cost-efficient alternative to hand-painted stage and concert art, Shaw made the leap and turned his focus on posters and fine-art paintings full-time.

Shaw, a humble, self-proclaimed color chemistry/ theory geek, applies his genuine interest in color and geometric principles with popular iconography, all of which are characteristic of his paintings.

This is what he says about his piece titled Madonna Fukushima (on Minna):

I watched the Japan earthquake and Tsunami live on television March 11, 2011. Like many, I was completely awestruck by the utter destruction I witnessed, but for some reason could not turn away. I'll never forget the images of the tsunami hitting the Japanese mainland and entire towns being washed away. It was certainly Nature's fury at its worst. I was extremely saddened and felt awful for all the people whose lives were affected or lost.

Then came the news of an incident at the Fukushima nuclear plant. At once I realized that there was something extremely wrong and scary happening there. Over the next days I again watched in horror as 3 of the reactors exploded and melted down, with a 4th in peril. I actually heard some "expert" say that the reactor buildings were designed to explode... "Don't Worry". There were massive radiation releases, but again the world was told that there was no problem, nothing was out of control. To me the situation looked very much out of control. As of this writing , Fukushima remains far from being stable or under control, it is a monumental catastrophe for Japan, the environment, and the world as a whole.

I felt that Fukushima had (has) the potential to be an even worse disaster for Japan than the earthquake and tsunami, the main difference being that Fukushima is a man-made catastrophe. For several years I have been wanting to explore the concept of "Man's Dominion Over Nature," or more specifically, how ridiculous I think that idea is. The earthquake, tsunami, and Fukushima served up the concept on a silver platter.

Immediately I knew I would need to appropriate a Japanese style for my image. Edo Period art and Hokusai's "Wave" painting immediately came to mind. I also wanted to include a Bonsai tree as a symbol of Man's Dominion Over Nature. I wanted to incorporate a female figure, in a classic Edo style but to construct her -almost- as a Madonna, who is facing forward, but looking backward. Of course, a representation of the Fukushima nuclear plant would need to be included as well.

PROCESS
Over the course of a few weeks I explored thousands of Japanese prints online in the Library of Congress and elsewhere, ultimately selecting a group of source material that contained the themes and types of images I was looking for. I then built a digital collage using appropriated parts and elements from various Edo period prints. Specifically, I mainly worked from imagery created by Hiroshige, Sadakage, Sadahide, and Toyokuni. All are artists whom I grew to admire during my exploration of Edo art.

Original drawing

The composition of the piece was initially inspired by a Golden Spiral, which I saw in a wave print by Hiroshige. Geometry and ratios have long been a deep part of my artwork, the spiral intrigued me. A golden spiral is created with golden rectangles. Two Golden rectangles create the footprint for this painting. By subdividing the golden rectangles I then created a diagonal lattice which was used to lay out the initial collage, along with spirals and arcs. Elements were moved and adjusted to "fit" the composition as needed. When I felt that I created a harmonious collage image, I then drew the line- art for the image by hand with pencil, adjusting image elements further to enhance the composition and geometry. I used the pencil drawing as a key-line to transfer the image to the full size canvas.

Since this piece is designed to be seen in both normal and UV (blacklight) the colors for this image had to be designed for both wavelengths of light. I made many of the paints by hand from raw pigments, using both visible and invisible fluorescent colors. I felt that fluorescing color would also be a good visual metaphor for radioactivity, I wanted the painting to become a somewhat sinister reminder of the world-wide contamination from Fukushima. When viewed in UV, the ocean glows, the plants glow, the land glows, the figure glows, the reactor burns and vapor appears. In addition to fluorescent colors I also made some paints with Europium, a material that is extremely phosphorescent (glowing), the Europium pigments make certain parts of the image actually give off light.

Visible light

Mixed light

Black light

Since the situation at Fukushima was evolving as I painted this piece, the nuclear plant was added at the very end to represent the actual status of the facility. I elected to include the classic cooling towers of a nuclear plant since they are such a strong symbol of nuclear power even though Fukushima doesn't actually have such towers.

Currently at the SFMOMA Garage Windows: Ron Donovan, Chris Shaw, and Chuck Sperry, June 11, 2011 - January 12, 2012, 147 Minna and 150 Natoma Streets

Happy 4th of July!

2011-07-04T11:00:00.000-07:00

Adrienne Defendi
Heart of America
Photography: Archival pigment print
24 x 24 inches
Edition 3/25
$750, 2006

33 Unique Seats

2011-06-30T11:28:00.000-07:00

The SEAT Exhibition at Fort Mason is a year-long installation project featuring unique outdoor seating designs.

The curators of SEAT, Topher Delaney + Kika Probst of Seam Studio, have brought their expertise in the field of public art and reached out to the diverse and creative Bay Area community with a request that artist’s create a seat which is responsive to the site and the extraordinary weather conditions of Fort Mason Center.

Concept drawings and completed pieces for SEAT

Each artist has considered and built a unique expression of the SEAT project which they have generously loaned to Fort Mason. Of special interest are the working collaborative partnerships which have grown through this exhibition. Read more about the project at the Fort Mason Center website, along with a list of participating artists and their biographies.

Deladier Almeida Featured in Southwest Art

2011-06-29T09:27:00.000-07:00

Deladier Almeida

Deladier Almeida | Carrying On a Tradition

Southwest Art, June 12, 2011

By Bonnie Gangelhoff

The first thing you should know about Deladier Almeida is that when he was 5 years old, he asked his neighborhood pals in the port city of Santos, Brazil, to pose for him while he sketched their portraits with his school pencils. When he was 7, he saw a movie featuring an artist who demonstrated how Leonardo da Vinci may have painted the MONA LISA. He was riveted to the screen, and he knew at that moment what he was going to be when he grew up. “There weren’t any artists in my family. It was all just spontaneous for me,” Almeida says.

The charming efforts and interests of the young Deladier were a foreshadowing of things to come. Many years later, Almeida would ask an array of prominent California artists, including Paul Wonner, Gregory Kondos, and Clayton Bailey, to sit for him as part of a series for a 2006 show at John Natsoulas Gallery in Davis, CA. Likewise, the MONA LISA would pop up decades later as part of his provocative visual commentaries on modern life.

Deladier Almeida
Melon RowOil on linen board
10 x 18 inches
$2,500, 2009

Today the California-based Almeida, 50, is known for both his landscapes and his figurative works. This month a solo show at Blue Rain Gallery in Santa Fe, NM, spotlights both genres, including his paintings FORTRESS and OBFUSCATION. One day recently, Almeida sat down in his studio and reflected on his life, now half spent in Brazil and half in the United States. Slight traces of a Portuguese accent lace his speech. It’s hard to believe that when he first arrived in the United States in 1985, he didn’t speak a word of English. These days he speaks it with the speed of a native New Yorker as he talks enthusiastically about art, geology, and technology.

Deladier Almeida (pronounced de-LA-dee-ay al-MAY-dah) left his native Brazil in 1985 after meeting and marrying an American exchange student. The couple eventually settled in the Northern California college town of Davis, located in the fertile Sacramento Valley. In Brazil, Almeida had studied architecture, industrial design, and urban planning and worked at a Sao Paulo newspaper creating portraits of international heads of state. But in the United States he decided to enroll in the fine-art department at the University of California at Davis.

Deladier Almeida
Anode MusicOil on linen
32 x 42 inches
$6,500, 2010

Pundits are fond of saying that being in the right place at the right time is all-important, and for Almeida that was certainly the case. When he entered the UC Davis art program, legendary artists Wayne Thiebaud, Roland Peterson, and Roy De Forest greeted him in his painting and drawing classes. Even before Almeida arrived, the Davis campus had been evolving from a sleepy university known for home economics and agricultural studies into a hotbed of creativity, thanks to the art department. In fact, today whole museum shows are devoted to the painters, sculptors, and ceramists who taught and studied in the department from the 1960s onward.

Thiebaud, Peterson, and De Forest were all part of the Bay Area Figurative movement—a cadre of artists that turned New York’s Abstract Expressionist movement on its ear, creating their own answer to the East Coast hegemony. The Bay Area Figurative artists left behind the abstraction of Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko and replaced it with artworks marked by figures, humor, and a return to realism. The Davis art department in particular became known as a center for the humorous side of the Bay Area Figurative movement, according to Susan Landauer, a curator at the San Jose Museum of Art. She wrote about the subject in a catalog essay that accompanied The Lighter Side of Bay Area Figuration, a museum exhibit in the year 2000.

Read the complete article.

The SFMOMA Artists Gallery has a selection of Almeida's still life and landscape works available.

Learning to Draw

2011-06-28T17:20:00.000-07:00

Video: Learning To Draw
Posted by The New Yorker

This week in the magazine, Adam Gopnik writes about what he learned when he learned to draw. In this video his teacher, Jacob Collins, begins a self-portrait and discusses his representational style..

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/06/video-jacob-collins-drawing.html#ixzz1QayoUiED

Studio Visit: Kai Samuels-Davis

2011-06-28T10:21:00.000-07:00

Today we will have an online visit to the studio of Kai Samuels-Davis located in Bodega Bay. A quick look into the space where the artwork is made.

Kai Samuels-Davis' work utilizes expressive realism to creat a mood of melancholy, self-reflection and solitude, all meant to provide a sort of quiet escape. We have a number of his landscapes available at the Gallery.

Kai Samuels-Davis
Fog lifting over hillsideOil on wood
15 x 20 inches
$1,200, 2010

Kai Samuels-Davis
Still morning (Russian River)Oil on wood
18 x 18 inches
$1,300, 2010

Kai Samuels-Davis
Sky over Sonoma coastOil on wood
24 x 24 inches
$1,500, 2010

Kai Samuels-Davis
Bodega Bay SunsetOil on raised panel
36 x 60 inches
$4,500, 2011

Kai Samuels-Davis
Bodega Bay SunriseOil on raised panel
36 x 60 inches
$4,500, 2011

Road Trip

2011-06-27T09:16:00.000-07:00

The Artists Gallery has new photography by Philip Ringler.

Philip Ringler
Ladies and GentlemenSilver Gelatin Print
63 x 42 inches
Edition 1/1
$5,000, 2011

Philip Ringler
MartyrSilver Gelatin Print
63 x 42 inches
Edition 1/1
$5,000, 2011

Philip Ringler
Things Are Looking UpSilver Gelatin Print
63 x 42 inches
Edition 1/1
$5,000, 2011

What Philip says about this new work:
"Things Are Looking Up" is a series of black and white photographs that re-invent roadside Americana as a sinister visual landscape. I made these photographs during a road trip across historic route 66 from Illinois to California with the intention of turning conventional roadside imagery on its head. The images function as metaphors for my emotional relationship to the current cultural/economic climate of the United States. Images of dinosaurs and folk art, commonly presented in a benign nostalgic documentary style, are electrified by high contrast 35mm film printed on 60"x40" fiber base silver gelatin mural paper. The difficulty inherent to the mural printing process mirrors the struggle of existing as an artist in the depressed American economy.

Read more about Philip and his work.

What's Familiar

2011-06-23T11:54:00.000-07:00

Marie with an installation of her work

Marie Van Elder has just consigned new work to the gallery. Van Elder paints what's around her, what's familiar, surfers, her daughters, her dog.

Marie Van Elder
Untitled (2 girls)
Monoprint
30 x 24 inches
Edition 1/1
$800, 2008

Marie Van Elder
Untitled (girl-dog)
Monoprint
30 x 24 inches
Edition 1/1
$800, 2008

Marie Van Elder
Untitled (big rock-3 surfers)
Oil on canvas
6 x 12 inches
$900, 2009

Marie Van Elder
Untitled (10 surfers)
Oil on canvas
6 x 9 inches
$800, 2011

Marie Van Elder
Untitled (big rock-2 surfers)
Oil on canvas
8 x 10 inches
$900, 2011

Black Magic

2011-06-22T09:06:00.000-07:00

via Anthology Magazine

via decor pad

via Elle Decor

Black paint is in. It may not be for everyone but it does have a look of sophistication and drama and sure shows some artwork to amazing advantage. Here are a few choices available at the Artists Gallery that could find their home easily on a black wall.

Maizie Gilbert
Mostly After Dark no. 34, 2002
Pigment Print
31x41
Edition 1/8
$2,100

Maizie Gilbert
Mostly After Dark no. 39Pigment Print
31x41
Edition 1/8
$2,100, 2005

Silvia Poloto
HushMixed Media
44 x 44 x 4 inches
$5,200, 2010

Sandra Russell
At the Foot of the North MeadowOil on canvas
48 x 60
$5,500, 2008

Andrea Voinot
BranchingOil pastel/ Oil stick on paper
37 x 37 inches
$1,800, 2009

Andrea Voinot
ConnectionOil pastel/ Oil stick on paper
37 x 37 inches
$1,800, 2009

Carol Inez Charney
POT 1Photography
32 x 32 inches
Edition 4/15
$2,400, 2007

Organizing the Chaos of an Expansive Space

2011-06-21T12:28:00.000-07:00

The inventory at the Artists Gallery is always changing with new consignments and also the addition of new artists to the gallery. Robert Reed is a new artist to the gallery and he has recently brought in these new paintings.

Island, 2010
Acrylic on paper
34 x 39 inches
$1,600

Blossom, 2010
Acrylic on paper
25 x 26 inches
$800

Longitude, 2011
Oil on canvas
36 x 36 inches
$2,000

Heartbeats, 2011
Oil on canvas
30 x 36 inches
$1,800

Gloomy Sunday, 2011
Oil on canvas
30 x 40 inches
$2,000

Folly, 2011
Oil on canvas
28 x 28 inches
$1,400

What Robert says about his work:
My recent work has been influenced by satellite imagery of the earth; I use high color resolution photos as a departure into the world of abstraction. This macro-perspective allows me to experiment with shape and form, organizing the chaos of an expansive space into an artificial landscape that inspires and peaks my sense of wonder. I want to travel to these imaginary spaces and get lost in the fantasy world that emerges. The brilliance of color and layers present give the work a spatial connotation, suggesting without describing a playful use of the elements water, air, earth and fire within the composition.

Fascination with Texture, Form and Color

2011-06-20T09:59:00.000-07:00

Mark Bowles recently consigned a number of new works to the gallery.

Spring Rain, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
$8,000

Magenta Sky, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
36 x 36 inches
$4500

Summer Heat #4, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
60 x 60 inches
$12,000

Fields of History, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
$8,000

The Weight of the Weather, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
48 x 48 inches
$6,000

Nightscape, 2010
Acrylic on canvas
60 x 48 inches
$10,000

What Mark says about his work:

Whether I am working with a still life, the human figure, or landscape, I am always fascinated by texture, form and color which I use in expressing how I feel about what I am seeing. I do not limit myself in what I paint or how I might interpret what I see. This freedom allows my work to move from representational to minimalist to abstraction. My work is ever changing, ever challenging and always a passionate delight. It is always my intention to address the canvas directly, honestly, and boldly. My heart is always pushing my work to find new language in expressing what I see and how I feel about it. The result therefore is not just an intellectual exercise for me, it is being involved in the “Now”...always open for change and challenge always ...evolving.

Exploring color, composition, the quality and attitude of a line, as well as various materials will always fascinate and be tools for me. It is my goal to draw the viewer into my space and let them become involved in their own personal journey and discovery of the work. The ultimate reward for me is to communicate something new to the viewer even if for just a moment in time.

Perfect Addition

2011-06-16T12:25:00.000-07:00

Via housetohome

This light and neutral room is serene and relaxing, but what about a little colour and interest with the addition of a painting. Michelle Mansour's Waiting for Time would be a perfect addition.

Michelle Mansour
Waiting for Time, 2007
Acrylic, ink, silicone on muslin on panel
18 x 40 inches
$2,400

Michelle's process includes layering translucent washes of color and building up a system of marks. As amorphous shapes bloom through the application of fluid pigment to wet surfaces, she proceeds by applying tiny marks and patterns to create an ethereal space where particles gather and disperse in an endless cycle. In some areas these particles accumulate, and in the case of the works on panel, layers of silicone begin to grow, emerge, and cluster on the surface. They are fascinating and beautiful paintings.

Master Ceramicist: David Kuraoka

2011-06-15T09:54:00.000-07:00

David Kurakoa in his studio

David's Wall Tiles

Tall Black Spot with Red,
stoneware, wheel thrown, altered, underglazed, glazed,
48 x 10 x 12 inches
$26,000
Currently available at the Artists Gallery

Tall Blue,
stoneware, wheel thrown, altered, underglazed, glazed,
33 x 13 x 12 inches
$22,000
Currently available at the Artists Gallery

Master ceramicist David Kuraoka throws enormous pots weighing 100 pounds and more, a process that requires an extraordinary level of skill, patience and strength. KQED Spark documented him at work in his studio at San Francisco State University, where he is a professor of art and head of the ceramics department.

The Artists Gallery currently has consignments of both David's free standing sculpture and his wall tiles.

"St. Everyone" Chuck Sperry Painting at the SFMOMA Artists Gallery Windows

2011-06-14T11:30:00.000-07:00

St. Everyone

Chuck Sperry installed 11 foot by 9 foot acrylic painting, “Saint Everyone,” at the SFMOMA’s Artists Gallery Windows on Minna Street. The painting will be on view from June 2011 through January 2012. There are florescent lights which are timed to go on at dusk until 2 am.

What Chuck says about his painting:

My large scale painting, “Saint Everyone” is figurative, a postmodern pastiche of Pop, Op and Rock Art. Its theme is inspired from the very recent spontaneous popular movements which have swept the world since January 2011. My iconic figure holds a lotus, it’s unfolding petals suggest the expansion of the soul. The growth of its pure beauty springs from the fertile mud of its origin and grows into a benign spiritual promise. The figure is a loose appropriation and is re-imagined by the artist from a rock poster created by The Big Five (Mouse, Wilson, Griffin, Kelley, and Moscoso) for the 20th anniversary of the Summer of Love in 1987. The Summer of Love in 1967 is the San Francisco analog of the change that is sweeping the world in 2011. This image was originally used on a poster I designed and printed for “American Artifact, The Rise of American Rock Art,” directed by Merle Becker. Appliqué disks employ elements of Op Art, inspired as they are from the work of Martin Sharpe, the British psychedelic artist. They are produced via silkscreen and applied – like a poster would on the street – in rhythmic patternization. The disks suggest decentralization or cell structure. I wanted to combine acrylic painting and silkscreen techniques in a seamless composition, and “Saint Everyone” is the result.

This painting was a year in planning and six weeks in execution. Renée de Cossio curated the project which involves me, Chris Shaw and Ron Donovan. Renee has been a constant source of support and inspiration and I thank her and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art for making this show happen.

Make sure to check the websites of my collaborating artist friends Chris Shaw and Ron Donovan to see their paintings and art work.

Here is a video taken showing the process of the painting:

Additonal videos about the painting can be found on Chuck's website.

An Opulent Awakening of Light, Shadow and Pattern

2011-06-10T13:36:00.000-07:00

Marilynne Morshead is a new photographer to the Artists Gallery and she has just consigned these pieces.

Illusion, 2010
Photography
16 x 20 inches
Edition 4/15
$800

Maelstrom, 2009
Photography
16 x 20 inches
$800

Serenity, 2009
Photography
16 x 20 inches
$800

Sail, 2008
Photography
16 x 20 inches
$800

Journey, 2009
Photography
16 x 20 inches
Edition 3/15
$800

Flight, 2009
Photography
16 x 20 inches
Edition 2/15
$800

Opening, 2007
16 x 20 inches
Edition 5/15
$800

Flow, 2009
Photography
16 x 20 inches
$800

What Marilynne says about her photography:

Gravitating between reality and abstraction, I am drawn equally to sculptural curves and geometric motifs, seeking order and beauty in chaotic times. The Discovery series blurs the lines between organic form and manufactured design in an opulent awakening of light, shadow and pattern. It's a serene journey into an intimate world, inviting unique interpretations dependent upon the viewer's mood and experience.

Opening Reception Tonight

2011-06-09T14:21:00.000-07:00

Don Ed Hardy, Sacred Tiger Ascending, 1995; intaglio etching, edition of 20; 34 3/8 x 27 3/8 in. (paper size),
24 ¾ x 19 5/8 in. (image size); photo courtesy the artist

The Unruly Art of Don Ed HardyJune 9 - August 25, 2011
Opening reception:
Thursday, June 9
5:30 - 7:30 p.m.

The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy is a site-specific installation created by Hardy for the Artists Gallery. It will include cast resin work layered with vintage Hardy acetate tattoo stencils, porcelain pieces with cobalt handwork, original prints, and large-scale original brush paintings. Also included will be a replica tattoo shop in a tiny closet space in the gallery: much like ones he observed in the 1950s complete with sheets of “flash” (painted designs), ink, and tattoo machines, it will reanimate the aura of that art in a bygone era.

Hardy is perhaps best known as the man behind a major lifestyle brand, enjoying commercial success that paralleled an unprecedented spike in tattoo popularity both in the US and worldwide. His signature and images are seen globally on products from clothing to wine.

Hardy came to San Francisco in 1963 to study printmaking at the San Francisco Art Institute. Upon completing his degree Hardy began tattooing and worked in various West Coast cities as well as Japan. He opened a tattoo shop here in 1974 and has made the city his home since.

Hardy has produced a substantial body of original paintings, sculptures, and prints that are informed not only by his lifelong involvement with tattoo, but also his far-reaching knowledge of historic Japanese forms of expression and Western and Asian art history. Hardy’s art draws on multicultural iconography and vernacular sources such as low rider car culture, surf culture, and comic books, along with tattoos.

Hardy sees his art sharing the same sensibilities as eccentric sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Chinese painters such as Chen Hungshou and Ding Yunpeng, who were characterized as “unruly.” Classically trained and steeped in ancient aesthetics, these artists took off from tradition to create work that was distinctive, Expressionist, and often humorous or grotesque.

Installation in Progress

2011-06-07T14:46:00.000-07:00

Here is a "behind the scenes" look at the installation of The Unruly Art of Ed Hardy. This exhibition shows the progression of Hardy as an artist from his days at SFAI in the 1960's to his ceramics done over a series of years in Arita, Japan; his etchings done throughout the course of his career and his large scale resin pieces completed last year. With over 70 pieces in the show, it is a rich sampling of his work. The opening reception is this Thursday at Fort Mason, 5:30 to 7:30.

Just a peek...

2011-06-06T11:08:00.000-07:00

Of one of the pieces in The Unruly Art of Don Ed Hardy.

Don Ed Hardy
Haptic King of Sweden
Acrylic on paper
94 1/2 x 47 inches, 1997

Fusing Asian aesthetics, traditional Japanese art, Western art history, and the aesthetics of surf culture, hot-rod art, and California funk, this piece has it all. A must see! Opening Reception, Thursday, June 9 5:30 - 7:30.