2022 - Claiming Space

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,…

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…

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…

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…

High-fired stoneware, porcelain, glazes; aluminum baseOverall: 80 x 30 x 38 in. / Base: 30 x 40 in.Courtesy of the artist and Catharine Clark Gallery, San FranciscoPhoto: Isaiah Plaza Return to the Garden of Eden is deeply inspired by Zhang’s upbringing in Maoist China, his subsequent disillusionment, and his ultimate relocation to California as a young artist in the 1990s. The sculpture reflects both a geographical journey and an ideological search. The monumental clay figure features the artist’s signature style – a blend that reflects Bay Area Figurative and California Funk traditions with nods to Chinese history. Inspired by his…

High fired clay with glaze30 x 31 x 37 in.Courtesy of the artist and Catharine Clark Gallery, San FranciscoPhoto: Isaiah Plaza Wanxin Zhang began his Color Face series in 2007 as an homage to his homeland. These works specifically reference Chinese opera performances where actors’ faces are painted in a stylized fashion or masked to represent a character’s personality or cultural status. The use of certain colors can distinguish goodness from evil, and strength from serenity. Although the designs can be complex, there are usually only two or three colors used for each character. Dripping with multi-colored glaze, this sculpture…

Polished stainless steel122 x 120 x 30 in.Courtesy of the artistPhoto: Airyka Rockefeller In Strike, based on a 1935 lithograph by Louis Lozowick depicting an encounter between a protester and a policeman, a disembodied arm raised up and wielding a nightstick is grasped at the wrist by another hand, the forearms forming a triangular geometry. This piece, made of gleaming stainless steel with a mirrored finish, resembles a trophy. In these works too, the intentional ambiguity, the incompleteness of the disembodied figures, leaves viewers the opportunity to find meaning in their own questions about what it is they are seeing.…

Marble56 x 23 x 27 in.Courtesy of the artist and Rena Bransten Gallery, San FranciscoPhoto: Isaiah Plaza 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 not trying to become something else, they exist in between states — being and becoming, living and dead, dreaming and awake.…

Cast bronze61 x 45 x 48 in.Courtesy of the artistPhoto: Cassils with Megan Paetzhold. Courtesy of the artist Resilience of the 20% is a sculpture cast from the bashed clay remnant of Cassils’ Becoming An Image performance, and acts as a monument to the resilience of queer communities. The title underscores a sickening statistic: in 2012, murders of trans people increased by 20 percent worldwide. Cast in bronze and weighing nearly two tons, this massive sculpture forms the centerpiece of Monument Push. Monument Push is a four-hour performance of collectively pushing the 1,900 pound bronze Resilience of the 20% sculpture…

Cast bronze22 x 31 x 23 in.Courtesy of the artist and L.A. Louver Gallery, Venice, CAPhoto: Margaret Kemp Winter is a work out of a larger series of four that Saar conceived around each season. In her own words, the work is "about, of course, the cycles of nature, but they're also about the cycles of women—our bodies and their maturations. Additionally, the whole project also came to embody, to me, the cycle of creativity." "Summer is pregnant with fireflies…I wanted her pregnancy to signify a very fertile stage in a woman's life, but also the idea of summer, and…