Friday, November 21, 2014

Memories of Art (Fair) San Diego 2014

Confession:  I haven’t traveled to any of the art biennales – not in Venice, Gwangju, Florence, Basel, Miami, Herzliya, Berlin, Munich, Liverpool, Sydney, and the like. Nor have I traveled to art fairs in Miami, London, Hong Kong, Toronto, Paris, New York, and Los Angeles or art festivals in Edinburgh, Avignon or Tongyeong.

The confession continued:  I am not well versed on the differences between art fairs, art festivals and biennales (confining the discussion to the visual arts).
 

Two references caught my eye while investigating the differences between biennales and art fairs.
 
Art San Diego 2014 (November 6-9) / Balboa Park, San Diego, California
Federica Martini suggests that the presentation of contemporary art in biennales emphasizes the “spectacularisation of the everyday.”

Georgina Adam adds some detail:  [In biennales] “[t]he ‘traditional’ countries with pavilions in the Giardini (Venice gardens) tend to show artists who are already well established and have an existing market, so it is inevitable that pieces are sold there. . . Many will come from countries without a developed gallery system, and the excitement of the Biennale is this element of discovery. ‘Biennales are very different from art fairs: they are laboratories,’ says Hans Ulrich Obrist, co-director of London’s Serpentine Gallery, who has directed biennales in Berlin, China, Russia and elsewhere. ‘They are often about process and experimentation.’ (Quoted by Judith H. Dobrzynsk)

But we do have an Art Fair in San Diego – different from the San Diego County Fair that encompasses ferris wheels and other rides, displays of animal husbandry, lots of sticky and yummy food as well as art; different too from Art Walks (Little Italy and other locales) and community fairs (Hillcrest, La Jolla, etc.).

AnnBerchtold remains as one of the constants to San Diego’s annual Art Fair, continuing as its director, but now under the ownership of Redwood Media Group. The art fair is now titled Art San Diego Contemporary Art Show.

Now located in Balboa Park, the exhibit describes itself as “committed to supporting and showcasing emerging and promising artists. We take risks; we enjoy surprises. We love to spot talent and introduce them to new audiences.”

Stacy Conde, Conde Contemporary (Miami) / Art work by Darian Rodriguez Mederos (left)

More confession:  With this understanding of Art (Fair) San Diego in mind, I can now share my personal experience as I walked through the exhibit. I now know what I saw and why I enjoyed it. 

As soon as I entered the pavilion, I was struck by a collective wall of art. Stretching from waist high to the top of the wall was the small moody landscapes of Nihal Kececi. I needed to close in on the paintings to see the detail and fusion of colors. Kececi traveled from Washington, D.C. where her gallery is located. This was part of the delight of Art SD - being able to talk with many of the artists (and even the gallery owners and agents) and discover what brought them to San Diego. After all, aren't we in the hinterland? Maybe not so much anymore. 

Nihal Kececi art work at the entry to Art SD 2014 pavilion
I asked Kececi what she was trying to capture with her art. 
Nihal Kececi:  Mood, the undefined, mystery, uncertainty and the unknown. 

Nihal Kececi / Relationship
One of the provocative art works was a glass sculpture by Einar and Jamex de la Torre, being shown by the Sergott Gallery.  I wrote to Einar de la Torre and asked him what the sculpture was about, especially since most of us in the United States are not familiar with the politics of Mexico.

Einar and Jamex de la Torre
Einar de la Torre:  We made that figure while teaching in Oaxaca in 2010. Ulises Ruiz was the governor when all the turmoil happened about 2006. He 'disappeared' many school teachers who were  protesting low pay and terrible classroom conditions. This led to massive strikes and roadblocks by the locals that continue to this day.

Einar and Jamex de la Torre / PRI glass sculpture / side view with knife in the back
Einar de la Torre:  When the PRI (Partido Revolucionario Institucional) took over the presidency we decided the piece could be more national than regional and see him as EPN (Enrique Peña Nieto) now. We never imagined that it could be worse than the PAN (National Action Party) government and voila! It is more corrupt and cynical then anybody imagined.

Chris Trueman at White Box Contemporary at Art SD 2104
 
Visitors at Art SD 2014
Such art exhibits should also inspire. So, here's my take on being included in a future Art SD exhibit. 
Joe Nalven imagines his own exhibit space at a future Art SD

Sunday, November 16, 2014

PhotoArtsGroup: Urban Landscapes


by Larry Herzog (Guest essayist) 

You are about to enjoy urban scenes from across the planet.  What, you might ask, is the thread that ties together the photographs on display in the PAG Urban Landscape show?  Here’s a clue:  serendipity. 

One of the joys of cities everywhere is that-- as you wander through their streets and plazas, back alleys and bridges, waterfronts and corner cafés --you are constantly bombarded with a dazzling, never-ending array of changing views and found visual moments.  Cities are humanly constructed kaleidoscopes daring us to open our eyes to their wonder.



 Jodie Hulden  /  Hustle Bustle     
During the mid-nineteenth century, the French discovered the sublime pleasure of carefree urban strolling — they coined the term “flâneur” for the artist/street wanderer.   Poet Charles Baudelaire wrote that “his passion and his profession is to become one with the crowds; to see the world, to be at the center of the world, and yet to remain hidden from the world.”

German writer Walter Benjamin called flâneurs “modern urban spectators, amateur detectives and investigators of the city.”


Dave Hall  /  House Upon House 

 
Robert Treat  /  Prague Wildlife    

Our PAG detectives have been busy shooting in niches, tunnels, corners, and side-streets in the far-flung cities of China, India, Jordan, Brazil, the Czech Republic, and Italy, or in more familiar spaces from New York City to San Diego. 



Urban Landscapes
PhotoArtsGroup

Coordinator: Theresa Jackson

November 1 - December 6
Hours:  11am – 4pm, Tues, Thur, Fri, Sat

Escondido Arts Partnership
262 E Grand Ave, Escondido, CA 92025

Contact:  (760) 480-4101


 A soaring bridge, an ancient Chinese street, layers of Middle Eastern housing cascading down an urban hillside—each can transform an everyday streetscape into a painting.  This urban palette comes alive in a blur of color, light, movement-- bicycles, yellow taxis, luggage carts, hanging laundry, people chatting, waiting, or carrying baskets on their head alongside pastel colonial buildings.  Witness the sublime silence of the moon rising over a downtown skyline, the mysterious façade of a building, the poetic juxtaposition of people, vehicles, and buildings on a legendary civic square in New York City.

 


Lee Loventhal   /  Bridge to Petco Park     



Larry Herzog   /   Street Scape

 
Theresa Jackson   /  Times Square, NYC     

 The flâneur is alive and well in San Diego!