STUDIO-ONLINE

Sergio Vasquez. Gracias a San Laborio, 2008.

Avenue 50 Studio presents, Silent Testimonies – Contemporary Ex-Votos. Artists and community members were asked to interpret the uniquely Mexican art form known as ex-votos with contemporary themes. The artists and community members are from various cultural and ethnic backgrounds.

Artists Katrina Alexy, Paula Baqueiro, Barbara Carrasco, Ana Flores, Frank Gutierrez, Lucy Hagopian, Amy Inouye/Stuart Rapeport, Pola Lopez, Isabel Martinez, CCH Pounder, Joseph Sims, Cindy Suriyani, Eloy Torrez, Richard Valdes, Sergio Vasquez, along with Board Members Vanessa Acosta, Raoul De la Sota, Ulises Diaz, Kathy Mas-Gallegos, Poli Marichal, Lara Medina, Ricardo Muñoz, David Stowe, and J. Michael Walker were chosen because they had no history of painting such forms.

Ex-Votos historically were devotional visual offerings to the Catholic Church for a miraculous cure or for some intervention by a specific religious figure that prevented harm or death. In 16th century Spain they were painted directly onto interior walls of churches and Cathedrals as murals depicting the miracle. The paintings themselves were called Milagros or miracles. In 18th and 19th century Mexico they became the source of income for itinerant artists depicting in their paintings some sort of “miracle”. These artists, often academically untrained, created their works with oil on whatever small scraps of material was convenient and cheap, most often tin or wood.

The works ranged from the charmingly rustic to the aesthetically profound. The works were then in turn donated to a nearby church as gratitude for its intervention. In the 20th century the craft continued but with less religiosity and more pleas for financial help or material goods. In all cases there was always a narrative painted onto the surface that described the event and the stated gratitude of the donor. Frida Kahlo was a modern artist who admired and patterned some of her work after this art form.

Avenue 50 Studio, Inc.
131 No. Avenue 50
Highland Park, CA 90042
323-258-1435
www.avenue50studio.com

Amy Bennett. Paula, 2008. Oil on panel, 18 x 18 In.

Opening Reception: Saturday, January, 10th, 5 - 7pm

Amy Bennett’s paintings are glimpses of a scene or fragments of a narrative. Bennett says, “I am interested in storytelling over time through repeated depictions of the same house, car, person, seasonal changes, or shifting vantage point.” Constructing miniature model neighborhoods from styrofoam, cardboard, and plastic, Bennett’s painting series culminated through the neighborhood’s history. She invites the viewer to form a narrative and connection that empathizes with the occupants’ seemingly mundane existence.

Bennett’s common themes such as: transition, aging, isolation, and loss, expose the fragility of relationships and the awkwardness often found when groups of people try to coexist and relate to one another. Her models are a stage onto which the psychological implications of belonging to a particular family, their struggles and familiar routines develop. Bennett considered who lived in each home, their family dramas, and the way their private lives might spill into view of their neighbors.

Richard Heller Gallery
2525 Michigan Ave., B-5A
Santa Monica, CA 90404
310-453-9191
www.richardhellergallery.com

Ted Orland. Environmental Impact Craters, 2004. 15×15

Terra Galleria presents Scenes of Wonder & Curiosity, a retrospective exhibition of well-known author, educator and photographer Ted Orland. The exhibit showcases his evolving artistic vision, from tonally perfect black and white prints in the tradition of Ansel Adams, to hand-colored works and digital collages with a uniquely Orlandian twist.

“Lead an interesting life and you will make interesting art” is Orland’s overall theory. His photography, with its intriguing mix of format, technique and content, is evidently an integral part of that life. Instead of creating large series’ of work concentrating on a particular subject, Orland simply hangs his camera around his neck and sets out across the countryside, recording his encounters with wildly varying scenes of wonder and curiosity along the way.

His photographic career began in the 1970s, when he worked as Ansel Adams assistant and instructor at Adams’ Annual Summer Yosemite Workshops. He later held academic positions at Stanford University and at the University of Oregon; currently he teaches Digital Photography at Cabrillo College, and leads photography workshops across the country. Today, Ted Orland lives in Santa Cruz, California, where he pursues parallel careers in teaching, writing and photography.

Terra Galleria Artworks
2525 Michigan Avenue T-1B
Santa Monica, CA 90404.
310-453-5104
www.tgartworks.com

Untitled Lidded Vessel, 2001. Earthenware, 33 x 18 x 15 in.

The late Ralph Bacerra’s intricately decorated ceramic vessels in various different forms are featured at the Frank Lloyd Gallery on through January 10, 2009. The selected works from the late period will demonstrate the artist’s extraordinary technical facility as well as his strength in surface pattern and decoration. Ralph Bacerra recently passed on June 10, 2008.

Known for his straightforward statements and his disciplined approach, the artist stated, “My pieces are based on traditional ideas and engage in certain cultural appropriations—in form, in design, in glaze choices. However, my work is not postmodern in the sense that I am not making any statements—social, political, conceptual, or even intellectual. There is no meaning or metaphor. I am committed more to the idea of pure beauty. When it is finished, the piece should be like an ornament, exquisitely beautiful.”

With over twenty solo exhibitions and numerous group exhibitions to his credit, Ralph Bacerra developed an international reputation in the world of contemporary ceramics. His works were collected by the Shigaraki Museum of Contemporary Ceramic Art in Japan, the National Museum of Modern Art in Kyoto, the National Collection of American Art at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C., the M.H. de Young Museum in San Francisco, and the Everson Museum in Syracuse, New York.

Frank Lloyd Gallery
2525 Michigan Avenue, B5B
Santa Monica, CA 90404
www.franklloyd.com

The Dark is my Delight, 2007. Oil on Canvas, 177.17 x 86.61 in

Opening Reception: Saturday, January 10th, 5-7pm

Mark Moore Gallery introduces new work by the innovative collaboration Daryoush Asgar and Elisabeth Gabriel. Asgar and Gabriel’s large-scale paintings are postmodern mise en scène where linear narrative is lost; where the figurative and the abstract, image and text exist simultaneously and vie for the viewer’s attention. These dislocated canvases ironically serve to locate a contemporary audience who is perfectly at ease with the disjunctive over-stimulation of a world saturated by the media and the image.

In an age of appropriation, Asgar and Gabriel acknowledge numerous Art Historical Influences - from Baroque to Pop Art to Abstraction - are all absorbed and reassembled to create worlds where reality and virtuality interplay. Just as their youthful subjects set themselves adrift within this fragmentary, shifting landscape, the viewer happily succumbs to the sensory overload.

Mark Moore Gallery
2525 Michigan Ave. A-1
Santa Monica, CA 90404
Tel. 310-453-3031

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Wanting to see more of what the L.A. art scene has to offer, I attended the L.A. Downtown Art Walk on December 11, 2008, and passing the Fifth and Main Streets corner, I noticed the soft and poetic photographic images of Robert Mack. Intrigued, I walked into the Los Angeles Center for Digital Arts gallery space and into the opening of his show.

Mack’s skill, composition, and technique are a paragon to what digital photography is today. Many of these images were shot using only a consumer iphone and his Haiku film with a point and shoot canon powershot. It is not always the expensive top of the line cameras taking the great shots.

Los Angeles Center For Digital Arts
107 West Fifth Street
Los Angeles, CA 90013
www.lacda.com

Taken at the Forbidden City

Due to poor market conditions, the International Asian Art Fair held each spring at the Armory at 67th St.  and Park Avenue in New York City has been canceled.

A message from Sanford  L. Smith & Associates:

With the recent announcement of the cancellation of the Asian Art Fair, we want to reassure our exhibitors and our clientele that all of our shows this spring–the Outsider Art Fair (Jan 9 – 11, 2009), Works on Paper (Feb 27 – March 2, 2009) and the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair (April 3 – 5, 2009)–are going ahead as planned.

Dozens of our exhibitors as well as non-exhibiting dealers tell us that there is very little traffic in their galleries. Private dealers without open spaces see scarcely any clients. If you are a dealer and this is what you are experiencing, it’s going to be more important than ever to participate in fairs.

We completed three fairs in November: The IFPDA Print Fair, ART20 and Modernism:
Centuries of Style and Design. All experienced decreased attendance and sales from prior years due to the current economic situation. Even so, 4500 to 5500 people attended each show. These were serious people: dealers, collectors, curators, designers, decorators and art consultants. They displayed genuine interest in the material and many made purchases.

In this market, collectors and dealers cannot go into hibernation. Great value is out there for collectors and a lifeline is there for the dealer—at fairs.

On the back of “The Virgin and Child with St. Anne,” a painting by Leonardo da Vinci done in the early 1500s, the Louvre found three drawings: a horse’s head, half of a skull and a young Jesus playing with a lamb.

The Louvre stated:

“When the work, which is painted on wood, was unhooked, a curator noticed two barely visible drawings on the back of the painting, showing a horse’s head and half a skull.”

“This is an exceptional discovery because drawings on the back of paintings are very rare and no example by Leonardo was previously known.”

Stephen Nachamie, director; Vic DiMonda, choreographer; Kimberly Matela, costumes

Reviewed by Cindi Di Marzo

For most people, attending the theater is a special event. Live performance gives real life all of the energy of which it is capable, and more. Bright lights, brilliant colors, period scenery and costumes, memorable songs, these are what we hope to experience from a musical. In December, as the holidays draw near, the prospect of attending a show can be the highlight of an already overcharged season. Although one may not live in or near New York City or London, there are many local productions that, thanks to the participation of talented performers, bring the professional stage closer to home. (more…)

Past Dreams (section), 2008.  43×31 inches. Acrylic on canvas.

Vitalis Cepkauskas lives in Vilnius, Lithuania. Vitalis attended Kaunas Stepas Žukas Art College where he received his degree in the arts.  Vitalis also studied art  in Germany and France. He can be described as a versatile modern artist, a sculptor, a master of collages and a painter. His works portray the joy of life, love and faith.

Vitalis has held exhibitions around the world, half of them in France, as well as group exhibitions in Germany, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands and the United States. He is also recognized for his fashion house “Trinite“ in Vilnius.

Reception: Saturday, December 13, 4-6PM and
Sunday, December 14, 12-6PM

Something Unexpected Art Gallery
152 Main Street
Nyack, NY 10960
Phone:(845) 709 1756
Web: www.something-unexpected.com