Thick Solidarity

A project of Related TacticsAugust 1 – September 11, 2022 Made possible by Montalvo Art Center’s Lucas Artists Program and the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts Thick Solidarity is a project in Related Tactics’s ongoing Who Else But Americans series that explores the liberatory potential of relationships between communities of color as we navigate the extractive and violent systems of nation-building, power, and American exceptionalism.  Thick Solidarity is a residency project organized by Related Tactics inviting two cohorts of multidisciplinary artists to join together in building community, resting, and carving out space for each artist to conduct research. The ongoing work as…

It’s All About Love: Mixtape for the Landscape

A durational recorded soundscapeCommissioned by the Lucas Artists Program at Montalvo Arts Center A recorded durational soundscape, designed to be heard in conjunction with a designated pathway on Montalvo’s grounds, and created in a form accessible on Montalvo’s stART here application by means of a smart phone. The soundscape may be connected to physical elements along the designated pathway in a number, form and nature to be determined in advance and subject to Montalvo’s final approval. The conceptual content of the soundscape is described by Artist as follows: “Just like the old school mixtapes you painstakingly created for your sweetie pie,…

Works By Riva Lehrer

No longer on view. The cottage gallery portion of the exhibition closed November 13, 2022. Acrylic, dimensional collage and mixed media on Amate paperCollection of Larry A. Gerber Dolls contain images of organs removed from my body during surgery. Mixed media on paperPrivate collection, Chicago William Shannon is a dancer, skateboarder, choreographer, and video artist, an early pioneer in subverting assumptions about contemporary dance. Shannon resides in Pittsburgh, PA. Mixed media and collage on paperCollection of Larry A. Gerber Lennard Davis is a Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Davis explores the political, literary, and…

Untitled (Marble and Wood Sculpture)

Marble, wood, steel, canvas, graphite, mixed media46 x 48 x 24 in.Courtesy of the artist and Rena Bransten Gallery, San FranciscoPhoto: Diane Roby No longer on view. The cottage gallery portion of the exhibition closed November 13, 2022. Jackson spent extended periods in 1983 and 1985 in Carrara, Italy, working on marble sculptures, which he has continued in his studio in Oakland, California. In an art historical sense one might perceive the figures in his otherwise abstract paintings as an attempt to resolve or at least investigate the space between abstraction and figuration. That would be wrong. His figures are…

Of Color

Photo courtesy Pilar Agüero-Esparza The large-scale painted and woven canvas tapestry mural by Pilar Agüero-Esparza, brings together the power of the hand-made, references to the body through skin color and prismatic color found in the landscape. While juxtaposing ideas related to social hierarchies and stratums, the tapestry interweaves symbolic color both of the physical body (as represented by a skin tone palette) and color found in nature. Through the creation of a wall like structure, Agüero-Esparza evokes the tradition of Chicano muralism, which is often used to uplift marginalized communities, into the social space of the Montalvo Arts Center Italianate…

One Legged Woman Standing

Courtesy of Dolby Chadwick Gallery and the Estate of Stephen De Staebler. The fractured human form has long been a subject for acclaimed American sculptor Stephen De Staebler. As with many of his works, One Legged Woman Standing recalls the fragmented remains of figurative sculpture from classical antiquity. The incomplete figure registers the vulnerability of the human body—the cataclysmic effects of time, disease, and war—as well as the modern existential experience of the individual who feels psychically and spiritually fragmented. Balancing atop one leg, it also alludes to human endurance and tenacity. De Staebler’s One Legged Woman Standing finds a home among a classical…