2014 05 02 paw section1

Page 24

Arts & Entertainment

Open studios

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3921 Fabian Way, Palo Alto 94303 | www.paloaltojcc.org | (650) 223-8700

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‘Intersection’ by Pat Mayer combines street guides, cheap music, stencils, an antique stock certificate, a car registration, one crayon wrapper, an envelope, sand paper and bolts.

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sentences. “How does that work with physical forms?� “Opus� can double as a jungle gym, a fact that his daughter appreciates. Lobykin demonstrates by climbing up the sculpture, which easily supports his heavy frame even though it is not secured to the ground. He says it weighs thousands of pounds. Inside the nearby garage, two of Lobykin’s assistants work on similarly stringy, shapeless forms. These pieces are far lighter than “Opus� — made of foam and plaster. Lobykin still needs to smooth them down, paint them, and then arrange them for the opening weekend of Silicon Valley Open Studios. One imagines the final product looking like some sort of outsize, psychedelic, open-air kelp garden, where visitors can weave their way in and out of the 8-foot-tall sculptures, assigning their own meaning to the work. That’s what Lobykin wants, anyway. Though he says he usually has an idea of what his art is meant to represent, he doesn’t like to explain too much to his audience. Lobykin is only one of many local artists showing work during the first weekend of SVOS. Video artist Nora Raggio will present video installations at the Cubberley Community Center in Palo Alto. Like Lobykin, Raggio has lived a globetrotting life, splitting her youth between the Bay Area and family in Argentina. In the past, Raggio has used her videos to examine the passing of time, change and human frailty. “Film is all about change, whether it’s slow or rapid,� Raggio, who has worked as an artist in residence at the Cubberley center for nine years and has been showing at SVOS for seven. “There is this sense that it’s made of light and then it disappears,� she continues, explaining what has drawn her to video. “There is a fragility, it’s more ethereal, and not material as, say, a sculpture or painting.� There is also a time element to video, which appeals to Raggio. Through videos, Raggio often works to show change over time. For example, her video “Trash Hourglass� is just 30 seconds long — a shot of trash accumulating at a waste facility. The film is edited, so that the trash is in the form of an hourglass. “We can measure time by the amount of trash we generate every half minute,� she explains in the video’s caption. Another of her videos, “Trans,� is “about migration,� Raggio says. The video flips back and forth between people speaking English and others speaking Spanish, and is meant to explore “displacement in time and in space and in cultures.� In addition to Lobykin and Raggio, first-year Open Studios participant Pat Mayer will show her mixed media collage work at her Redwood City studio, during

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‘Observer’ by Oleg Lobykin. the event’s first weekend. Mayer has only been working as an artist for five years, but already shows a sharp eye for aesthetic. The artist says she seldom aims to convey a message with her collages — which most frequently comprise passages of text torn from books, solitary letters and other scraps of ephemera. “I like the printed word,� Mayer explains. “I like graphics and I like letters.� As an artist, Mayer says she is heavily influenced by the order of cubist works, and her work mirrors that inspiration. She uses pages of text to create repetitive lines; large block letters are tilted on their side or flipped upside down, divorced from any relationship they may have had to language, becoming pure forms; she arranges these materials into geometric shapes, working to create movement with lines, contrast and visual weight. The results are abstractions and

shapeless sentiment, rather than concrete messages, which is what Mayer seeks to create. “There’s something about the shapes that I find beautiful,� she says. “The pieces are just my feelings.� N Arts & Entertainment Editor Nick Veronin can be emailed at nveronin@paweekly.com.

Silicon Valley Open Studios: Sculptor — Oleg Lobykin: 538 Sacramento St., East Palo Alto; May 3-4; info at www.lobykin.com Video artist — Nora Raggio: 4000 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto; May 3-4; info at www.cubberleyartists.com/Nora.php Mixed media — Pat Mayer: 275 A Linden St., Redwood City; May 3-4; info at www.pdmayerart.com Information: www.svos.org

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