Material Matters, 2018 at Seager Gray Gallery

M aterial M atters

Material Matters Robert Adams Gale Antokal Renee Bott Joe Brubaker Lisa Clarke Diane Tate DallasKidd Susannah Hays Andrew Hayes Linda V. Hubbard Guy Mayenobe Neil Nenner and Avihai Mizrahi Emily Payne Alexander Rohrig Jane Rosen David Ruddell Jane Springwater Helen Stanley and Linda Connor Sanjay Vora

Material Matters Exhibition Dates: March 1 - April 1 Reception for the Artist: Saturday, March 10, 5:30 to 7:30 pm Front Cover: Helen Stanley and Linda Connor, Chukar Singing (detail), photograph by Linda Connor sublimated on aluminum then painted with oil paint by Helen Stanley, 30 x 24 in Back Cover: Diane Tate DallasKidd, Mammoth (detail), hand-knotted linen threads, acrylic paint, brass rod, 83 x 78 x 3.5 in Photo Credits:

Robert Adams: Jay Daniel, Black Cat Studio Joe Brubaker: Charlie Kennard Lisa Clarke (Concentrate): Blink, Inc. Andrew Hayes: Steve Mann Neil Nenner and Avihai Mizrahi: Nimrod Genisher and Leonid Pedrol Jane Rosen: Dona Tracy Jane Springwater: Ben Blackwell Helen Stanley and Linda Connor: Jack Fulton Curated by Donna Seager and Suzanne Gray Direct inquiries to:

Seager Gray Gallery

108 Throckmorton Avenue Mill Valley, CA 94941 415.384.8288

www.seagergray.com All Rights Reserved

Material Matters, 2018 Material Matters, 2018 is the fifth of our yearly exhibitions spotlighting the interaction of artists with their materials and how the materials themselves are an essential part of the content of the work. We are excited to bring in works by Israeli artists Neil Nenner and Avihai Mizrahi in corten steel and paper, fresh from their exhibition On the Edge at the MUZA Eretz Israel Museum in Tel –Aviv. In fiber, we were delighted to discover the work of Diane Tate DallasKidd, whose work Mammoth created with knotted linen thread and acrylic paint moved us with its grace and drama. French artist, Guy Mayenobe’s mechanized kinetic works inpired by Jean Tinguely are amazing examples of form moving through space. Master sculptor Jane Rosen, loving nothing more than drawing on form, shape-shifts one material to appear like another, getting as close as she can to the true nature of her subject matter.

Andrew Hayes’ Plane Study is presented in nine small 3 x 3 inch steel squares like a musical “Themes and Variations” composition where each work explores different topographies – convex, concave, ridged and grooved, his fabrication in steel a study in perfection.

Whether wood, paper, book pages, clay, paint, graphite, glass, steel or stone, every year we discover how the focused interchange with materials allows artists to arrive at new expressions, increasing their visual vocabulary and thus their communication with the world.

- Donna Seager and Suzanne Gray, February, 2018

Robert Adams Woody, 2018

basswood, milkpaint, copper 20.5 x 36 x 8 in

Robert Adams Arlo, 2018

basswood, milkpaint, copper 22 x 8 x 18 in

Robert Adams Robert Adams attended the Art Institute of Boston and spent 2 more years studying drawing and painting at the San Francisco Art Institute, also delving into ceramics and paint finishes. In order to frame his work, he got a job at a frame shop and eventually opened one of his own.

Working with wood and tools inspired his interest in making 3 dimensionl works of his own. He has been in many ACC (American Craft Council) exhibitions and has shown in galleries across the country. He sources ideas from folk art, antique furniture and vintage objects, the hidden layers of paint and wear always speaking to him. These new works bring his drawings into 3 dimensions and showcase his reverence for early folk traditions.

Robert Adams Oracle, 2017

basswood, milk and Japan paint, vintage material 25 x 13.5 x 8 in

Gale Antokal

From the Place on Hills I, 2017 graphite paint on synthetic paper 11.5 x 26 in (unframed)

Gale Antokal Gale Antokal was born in New York, New York, and received her BFA (1980) and MFA from the California College of the Arts in 1984. She is a Professor at San Jose State University in the Department of Art and Art History and Coordinator in the Pictorial area. Antokal held several visiting artist positions and teaching positions including the San Francisco Art Institute, Instructor of Art History at the Lehrhaus Institute, and the American College in Jerusalem. She was an affiliate faculty member in the JSS Italy program in Civita Castellana, Italy in 2015. In 1992 Antokal received a Visual Arts Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.

These new drawings by Antokal speak to her refined sensibility to light and tone. Using a soft graphite stick, which she emulsifies with mineral spirits, Antokal applies layer after layer of graphite paint to synthetic Yupo paper. The luminescence of the Yupo along with its smooth durable and waterproof surface allows her to employ a variety of tools, the most important of these being steel wool. All of the light in the drawings is extracted using various grades of steel wool, revealing the brighter surface of the impermeable paper.

Gale Antokal

From the Place on Hills II, 2018 graphite paint on synthetic paper 11 x 35 in unframed

Renee Bott

Nature’s Justice, 2018

book pages, acrylic paint and ink on linen 64 x 44 x 1.5 in

Renee Bott Born in Ann Arbor, Michigan and raised in Boston, Massachusetts, Renée Bott has always made and worked in art. Bott worked in fine art print publishing for over 30 years. For the past twenty years, she was a founding partner and Master Printer of Paulson Bott Press, a fine print atelier located in Berkeley, California. Here she worked with luminary artists such as Martin Puryear, Kerry James Marshall and Tauba Auerbach. Renée specialized in facilitating the creation of complex and colorful intaglio prints within a traditionally black and white medium. Paulson Bott Press has published over 500 editions, working with many artists. In 2016, the archive of Paulson Bott Press was acquired by the deYoung Museum in San Francisco.

Recently Bott stepped back from printmaking to turn her attention fulltime to her own work. The book pages for the large painting entitled: Nature’s Justice, were from john powell’s : Racing To Justice - about racism and how implicit bias affects us all.

These text lined pages act as the armature for her paintings. With human stories concealed beneath opaque lines, she superimposes images of bucolic landscapes based on landscapes found in antique engravings. She offers these images not as a way to forget our history, but as a way to honor the healing power of nature.

The smaller painting (Notre Dame) is on Victor Hugo’s book: The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

This is really a love story- and it is fiction, which distinguishes it from the other painting(s) she has done.

The images in both works are taken from a snapshot the artist took of an engraving by one of the Purcell brothers from the 1670’s, the actual engraving measuring about 5 x 7”.

Renee Bott

Notre Dame, 2018

book pages, acrylic paint and ink on linen 24 x 24 x 1.5 in

3

Joe Brubaker Joe Brubaker carves wood and assembles found materials to create figurative and abstract sculptures that reflect his concerns with time and the ongoing process of loss and discovery. The work in this show was created sometime after he had visited New York and had been struck by the nobility of the oversized busts and partial figures in marble in the Metropolitan Museum.

He came back and worked on the gigantic head and with layers of thick latex paint he obscured the usual wooden surface aiming for the feeling of some ancient artifact unearthed. During that time, Brubaker had been fascinated by the idea of “everyday saints,” the heroes of our daily life. Enrique, with his crown of building materials and his solid straightforward gaze is given a touch of glory by the addition of gold leaf, the crowned king of “everyman.”

Joe Brubaker was born in Lebanon, Missouri and raised in Southern California. He received his B.A. from Sacramento State University, then attended UCLA where he earned his MA and MFA. From 1980 to 1988 he lectured in Art and Design at UCLA, as well as at Long Beach State from 1982 to 1984. In 1987 Joe moved with his wife and two children to the San Francisco Bay Area. He continued to teach as an Art and Design lecturer at both San Francisco State from 1989 to 1994 and Academy of Art College from 1989 to 1997. He retired from teaching in 1997 to begin full time work on his own sculpture.

Joe Brubaker Enrique, 2015

Port Orford cedar, found materials, milk paint 34 x 13 x 13 in

right:

Lisa Clarke

Salvation, 2018

clay, metal, resin, ceramic, plastic 37 x 25 x 8 in

left:

Lisa Clarke

Concentrate, 2017

clay, metal, resin, ceramic, plastic 15.5 x 10.5 x 5 in

Lisa Clarke Artist Lisa Clarke strives to create complex, intelligent, and magical worlds. The women in her pieces are surrounded by danger, represented by grasping claws, menacing foliage, tentacles, fangs. Their innate bond with nature is represented by little birds whispering in their ears, lending their vigilance. Dignified and steadfast, each woman is poised as perceptive of the surrounding threats, unintimidated and wise.

A free spirit growing up in the Bible Belt, she learned early on to question the expectations and restrictions regarding women’s power in society.

Later, living in Latin America, she delighted in viewing the world through a new lens. Clarke, an epidemiologist, became acutely aware and accepting of mortality and the human condition in her role as cancer researcher.

Her art is a synthesis of these diverse experiences.

She meticulously and mindfully craft each piece by interweaving the unsettling with beauty and wit, in order to draw viewers in, layer by layer.

Over the years, she has developed a technique using mixed media assemblage to create seamless, porcelain-like sculptures.

The process to create each piece can take months and hundreds of individual pieces, either hand sculpted or altered found objects. Most works include a variety of media, including porcelain, wood, metal, clay, ceramic, resin, and plastic parts that are embellished, altered, and used in unique ways.

Diane Tate DallasKidd Diane Tate DallasKidd graduated from San Francisco State University with a BFA in Textile Art. She traveled to Japan afterward to study under Tsuyoshi Kuno, a 4th generation dyer.

Mr. Kuno and his studio use traditional techniques in inventive ways to create cutting edge textiles for high end fashion designers. Having the opportunity t work alongside artisans with an experimental slant and dedication to process informed much of Diane’s approach.

DallasKidd is continually motivated to draw something new and unexpected from the medium at hand, folding paper to delineate planes of space in her paintings of wood, as in Momentum #3 or painting singular threads and suspending them to create ethereal forms as in Mammoth. She begins her explorations with a feeling more than a fixed outcome in mind.

Her resulting works are textural and dimensional, echoing patterns and shapes found in the natural and urban landscape.

left:

above:

Diane Tate DallasKidd

Diane Tate DallasKidd

hand-knotted linen threads, acrylic paint, brass rod 83 x 78 x 3.5 in

acrylic paint, acrylic molding paste, panel 48 x 36 x 2 in

Mammoth, 2017

Momentum #3, 2017

Susannah Hays Storia Villa, 2017

archival pigment print on Museo Silver Rag mounted on dibond from The Biblioteca Series 24 x 36 in

Susannah Hays Susannah Hays approaches her photographic practice as a philosopher experiences poetic material renderings of our phenomenological world. Investigating tangible objects, each of her camera and cameraless images reveal a hidden beauty that asks us to remember where things come from—how they arrive and why they endure. Her series of medieval books, from the Tuscan region of Castiglion Fiorentino, sit on their shelves undisturbed. While DNA research unravels where and when they were made, visible traces of who touched, held and kissed them offer lasting impressions.

A fine art photographer, book artist and educator, Susannah’s subjects are largely drawn from philosophy, biology and ecology. Her work first gained recognition in 2000 when she joined Scott Nichols Gallery in San Francisco and Photo-Eye Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico. While especially known for her early cameraless, 19th Century processed images today her phenomenological investigations expand to digital media.

On the faculty of San Francisco Art Institute’s photography program from 20022012, Susannah is presently Contributing Faculty at University of Georgia’s Study Abroad Program in Cortona Italy. In 2012, she was awarded a two-year fellowship from the University of California Berkeley to complete her doctoral research. After appointments teaching at Shenkar College of Art and Design in Ramat Gan Israel and Leuphana Universität in Lüneburg Germany, she completed a 2-month artist fellowship at the Scuola di Grafica in Venice, Italy. Her dissertation Nature as Discourse: A Co-evolutionary Systems Approach to Art and Environmental Design (2016) is currently being revised for publication. She lives and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Andrew Hayes Andrew Hayes, long a gallery favorite for his sculpture with steel and book pages, created Plane Study for this year’s Material Matters exhibition. The sculpture is presented in nine small 3 x 3 inch squares. It is like a musical “Themes and Variations” composition where each work explores different topographies – convex, concave, ridged and grooved, the overall composition a pleasing study in form.

Andrew Hayes grew up in Tucson, Arizona and studied sculpture at Northern Arizona University. The desert landscape inspired much of his early sculptural work and allowed him to cultivate his style in fabricated steel. After leaving school, Andrew worked in the industrial welding trade. While living in Portland, Oregon, bouncing between welding jobs and creating his own work he was invited to the EMMA collaboration. This one-week experience was liberating for Andrew and he was encouraged by his fellow collaborators to apply to the Core Fellowship at Penland School of Crafts. During his time as a Core Fellow, Andrew was able to explore a variety of materials and techniques. Surprisingly, the book became a big part of this exploration. In this work he faces the challenge of marrying the rigid qualities of metal with the delicacy of paper.

His work has been embraced by collectors and he has been included in exhibitions and collections at Yale University, Hartford University, the Morris Museum in Morristown, New Jersey and the Mesa Contemporary Art Museum in Mesa, Arizona to name a few.

Andrew Hayes

Plane Study, 2017

formed and fabricated steel 11 x 11 x 2.5 in

Linda V. Hubbard

Clockwise from upper left

Linda V. Hubbard

A View from Baker Court #7, 2015

cotton fabric, printing block, block printing ink, thread 8 x 10 in

Linda V. Hubbard

A View from Baker Court #2, 2015 cotton fabric, thread, 8 x 10 in

Linda V. Hubbard

A View from Baker Court #3, 2015 discharged cotton fabric, thread, 8 x 10 in

Linda V. Hubbard

A View from Baker Court #4, 2015 cotton fabric, rusting solution, thread, 8 x 10 in

Benicia artist Linda V. Hubbard received her bachelor’s degree in art with a concentration in ceramics from San Jose State University. A lifelong interest in textiles developed over time into a focus on the quilt as a means of artistic expression. The term “quilt” in this instance refers more to a multi-layered textile sewn with thread than any reference to bed linen. These contemporary fiber artworks experiment with original design concepts, mixed-media and construction techniques and a variety of surface treatments.

In this series, Hubbard has created her own variation on a theme. Using a photograph she took herself of a view from Baker Court in Benicia, she created several landscape “paintings” using quilting and dying techniques. In A View from Baker Court #7, for instance she created a printing block from the photo and used free motion stitching to elaborate the details.

In A View from Baker Court #2, Hubbard used a raw-edged applique technique, sewing bits of fabric to delineate space and then using thread, again in free motion stitching to define the details of the photograph.

In A View from Baker Court #3, elements of the original photograph were traced and printed to create a template which was cut up with portions removed during the discharging process to create a landscape in fabric which was free-motion stitched as a “quilt sandwich” for dimensional effects. Discharge dyeing is a process where one removes or discharges the dye from fabric with some sort of caustic medium such as bleach. Most commonly seen used on Black cotton fabric, the dye removal process reveals under-layers of dye until, if the bleach is left on the fabric too long, the bleached area will disintegrate (and bleach only works on natural fabrics such as cotton). Time is therefore a key element in the process. The longer the bleach solution is left on the fabric, the lighter the remaining color will be. Black fabric is surprisingly made up of many layers of color and usually discharges from dark brown all the way through rust to a light beige.

Finally, in A View from Baker Court #4, cotton fabric was screen-printed (made from the original photo) with an iron oxide powder rusting solution (which stains the fabric in the printed areas) then free-motion stitched as a “quilt sandwich” to create an interesting fabric landscape.

upper right:

Guy Mayenobe Cezanne, 2017

metal and found materials 60 x 12 x 12 in

lower right:

Guy Mayenobe Awesome, 2014

metal and found materials 81 x 22 x 10 in

left:

Guy Mayenobe Seduction, 2016

metal and found materials 72 x 50 x 18 in

Guy Mayenobe Parallel to a career as a business executive, Guy Mayenobe started his artistic life in 1968 making photography and working in the darkroom for a group of Avant Garde artists in Paris until 1973.

Strongly influenced by Jean Tinguely, he then created a series of sculptures involving metallic parts, electric motors and found objects which were exhibited as “Mecasculptures” in La Grande Arche in Paris from May 11 to June 18, 2000. One piece in this year’s exhibition, Awesome is in fact a fanciful homage to Tinguely and Niki de Saint Phalle, with a mirror and a moving double photograph of the pair and a voice interacting with the viewer as they look in the mirror.

Moving to San Diego, Mayenobe became attracted to photo manipulations in the early days of Photoshop and actively participated as a member of the Digital Art Guild exhibiting two to four times per year (including “Homage” at Escondido Gallerie in 2010) During that same time, he had an artistic partnership with photographer Jeanine Free leading to three curated exhibitions at Gallerie 21 in Balboa Park, San Diego: The real life of Mannequins, Don’t Tango in Berlin and Rue St Honore.

Still working with metal, he was selected by a jury, among 200 international artists, for a year-long exhibition, “Urban Trees 4” sponsored by The San Diego Unified Port District who acquired two sculptures out of 30 finalists, one being his piece Orange Tree.

In 2014, Mayenobe met with Joe Brubaker and became an active member of “The Exquisite Garden Project” which led to participation in The Visible Transparency Project in San Francisco (2014), The Found Space Project in Jackson, Wyoming (2015) and Station 11 at the ICB building in Sausalito (2017).

His collaboration with Brubaker also resulted in two sculptures exhibited by Seager Gray Gallery in 2016 and 2017.

In addition to Awesome, we are excited to include Seduction, with its colorful shapes and rotating wheels and two wooden feet keeping pace with the hypnotic movement. Finally, we have a stationery sculpture entitled Cezanne, the stylized French artiste in his painting cloak and beret.

left:

Neil Nenner and Avihai Mizrahi Cover Story #7 corten steel and paper 32 x 12 x 15.2 in

right:

Neil Nenner and Avihai Mizrahi Cover Story #4 corten steel and paper 7.2 x 28 x 16 in

Neil Nenner and Avihai Mizrahi Israeli artists/designers Neil Nenner & Avihai Mizrahi reconfigure books without text. The book constitutes the material and cultural foundation of this project, which is a product of an encounter between a product designer and a graphic designer. The collaborative design epitomizes the essence of the book, corresponds with familiar archetypes, while also preserving the objects in a medial state between the conceptual and the practical.

The series, which uses the Corten surfaces as its cover, forges a relationship between paper and metal, which examines design issues such as: rigidity vs. flaccidity, imprisonment vs. freedom, structure vs. materiality, heat vs. cold. In many cases the roles are reversed: the metal receives a soft, paper-like appearance, and the piles of paper are transformed into a solid and inaccessible lump. This reversal also takes place in the manner in which the materials are processed (cutting the lump of paper with a Bandsaw, or folding the metal and roll forming it like a page of paper).

The series include 7 items and it was presented at the paper exhibition “On the Edge”, MUZA Eretz Israel Museum Tel –Aviv. March –October 2017. The work was published on some design and art websites and printed media like “Designboom”, Haaretz and De marker to name a few.

Both Neil Nenner and Avihai Mizrahi have a master’s degree in Industrial Design from Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem.

upper right:

Emily Payne

Notation (drawing) graphite on book boards 19.5 x 15 x 1 in

lower right:

Emily Payne

Notation (wire) wire, clay 6 x 9 x 1 in

left:

Emily Payne Parlance wire, clay

20 x 10 x 1 in

Emily Payne Emily Payne’s ingenious work with book boards and book covers began when she received her MFA in printmaking and book arts at San Francisco State University. She found herself continually drawn to the materials as sculpture and began to assemble them in ways that celebrated their innate qualities while offering a surface she could draw and paint upon. Her work with wire began when she had an internship in Ireland with scholar and artist Jean McMann whose PHD work centered around the Loughcrew Cairns in Ireland.

Payne drew inspiration from the line drawings on stone and the ironwork in the fences – the positive and negative juxtaposition stayed with her as well as the concept of environment as art.

“I have always been keenly aware of balance,” said the artist, “and in these works, I am playing with gradations of density and weightlessness, darkness and light, two- and three-dimensionality.” In Notation (drawing) and Notation (wire), for example we see the relationship between a 3-dimensional sculpture and its visual imprint on a two dimensional work made of book boards and graphite. When installed and lit, the wire work creates a shadowed grid on the wall that relates directly to the spectre of that same grid that operates as negative space on the masterfully modulated graphite drawing.

The imprint of shadow on the wall, counterbalanced by an imprint of light on the companion work recalls patterns in nature. In Parlance as well as Notation (wire), Payne has pushed her vocabulary further by the addition of clay on the wire works which is fired in a kiln, giving even more interest to the work and its accompanying shadow.

Alexander Rohrig After completing his education at the University of California in Santa Cruz, Alexander Rohrig took a position as studio assistant to artist and sculptor Jane Rosen in 2009 on her ranch, a beautiful natural preserve high in the California mountains. Under Rosen’s tutelage and with his daily practice of drawing from these extraordinary surroundings, Rohrig developed a drawing style and vision all his own. He was featured in three exhibitions in 2015 and was the subject of an article in Works and Conversation, an insightful chronicle of California art and artists published and written

by Richard Whittaker.

In his sculpture, Rohrig works minimally and intuitively.

He loves the physicality of the materials and the pleasure of touching things. He assembles the works and with a few lines or chipped in textures somehow unerringly gets at the nature of the animal. As with his structures and landscapes he endears us to his subjects by paring them down to their essential shapes. It is enough for them to be what they are.

Alexander Rohrig (left page) Coopers Hawk, 2012

wood, rigid foam, paint and cardboard 21 x 4 x 3 in

Alexander Rohrig (above)

Red Hawk on Post, 2018

recycled western red cedar, limestone, found metal and pigment 13 x 8 x 3.5 in

Jane Rosen There is nothing Jane Rosen loves more than drawing on form.

Whether glass or bronze, she works her magic after it is cast or blown until she can get at the life force of her subject. Palomino, for example is a cast bronze work. The original piece was sculpted with Rosen’s own mixture made with marble dust and then cast with the lost wax process. There was no single patina she could use to get to the exact modulation of cream and white and dark that she envisioned, so she began with white and then an ochre patina, drawing on the surface and using a torch as she modulated the coloring of the work. The coloration gave life to the graceful form of the horse, his head bending down.

The same can be said of blown glass Big Cash, the multicolored horse’s snout modulated in color with small bits of glass. Within the blowing process she has learned how to control the fluid process through years of experimentation and close communication with the glass blowers.

Avatara is a blown figure somewhere between a hawk, a fox and a human. Here again Rosen utilized her marble dust and drew on the figure until a spirit was breathed into it.

New York native, Jane Rosen studied at New York University and then the Art Student’s League in the early 70s. She recalls going often to the Egyptian wing of the Metropolitan Museum studying the falconheaded God Horus, God of the sky. Birds appear in her work as early as that same decade, in the form of abstracted wall-hung heads, which evolved gradually into freestanding figures in the ‘80s. She became interested in raptors through staying with a friend who ran a raptor rescue center in upstate New York, even requiring her students to ‘adopt’ one the birds and help care for it—and draw it--as part of a class requirement.

Jane Rosen

Palomino, 2016

unique patina on bronze with limestone base

15 x 30 x 4 in

Jane Rosen

Big Cash, 2011

hand blown pigmented glass

10 x 6 x 15 in

Jane Rosen During what was intended to be a sabbatical break, she crossed the country to live for a few months on a friend’s horse ranch near San Gregorio, a few miles south of the Bay Area. In this area of extraordinary natural beauty, she found herself watching the birds—the hawks that wheel and float on the currents of warm and cool air that rise from the ground at different times of day, the ravens and crows, the darting swallows. She remembers seeing a hawk on the first day at the ranch, and hearing a voice in her head saying, -stay and tell my story. For a decade she shuttled back and forth between both coasts, but finally sold her NY loft to settle on her own California ranch.

Rosen was selected by the American Academy of Arts and Letters for inclusion in their Annual Invitational in New York in 2010 and again in 2015. This prestigious exhibition is juried by some of the greatest artists of our time. A masterful and sought after teacher, Rosen has taught at numerous elite institutions including the School of Visual Arts and Bard College in New York, LaCoste School of the Arts in France, Stanford University and the University of California at Berkeley. Rosen’s work has been reviewed in the New York Times, ArtForum, Art in America, and Art News. She has been exhibited across the United States and is in numerous public and private collections including the AlbrightKnox Art Gallery, the Aspen Art Museum, the Brooklyn Museum, the Chevron Corporation, the collection of Grace Borgenicht, JP Morgan Chase Bank, the Luso American Foundation, the Mallin Collection, the Mitsubishi Corporation, and the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego.

Jane Rosen

Avatara, 2010

hand blown glass, marble mix and sumi-e ink

21.5 x 5 x 4 in

David Ruddell David Ruddell explores his own mythology for the journey of life by using the boat form as a metaphor for the passage of the human vessel through time. The physical representation of this symbol is meant to represent the choices we make in our lives.

Ruddell creates works on raw poplar panels and blackboards, including a small series of boats on children’s readymade chalkboards. Ruddell utilizes a palette of rich blues, reds, and yellows, in natural tones that evoke a symbolic landscape.

Blue Circle on Fir/Mahogany Boat gives testimony to Ruddell’s love of fine craftsmanship and the pure materiality of things. The chalkboard top, always a favored surface to him is reminiscent of school days. The mahogany boat, carefully crafted of mahogany and varnished stands in contrast to the blonde color of the fir and the perfect blue circle, reminiscent of the sea.

David Ruddell’s work is in the collections of the Smithsonian American Museum, Renwick Gallery, Washington, DC, the di Rosa in Napa, California, and the Oakland Museum of California, as well as many private collections.

David Ruddell

Blue Circle on Fir/Mahogany Boat, 2018 fir, mahogany, acrylic paint

65 x 42 x 7 in

Jane Springwater Jane Springwater received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Washington University in St. Louis, majoring in what was then called “Multi Media� but which today would be described as conceptual art. After working briefly as a graphic designer, she attended law school, and has practiced law for the past 36 years.

Springwater re-engaged seriously with artistic practice in 2009 through the summer workshop program at Crown Point Press.

After becoming intrigued by the complexity and beauty of the etching processes, she began to work annually during the summer workshops at Crown Point, developing proficiency in a wide range of techniques. The process has been seminal to the development of her attitude and way of working as an artist.

Since 2014 Springwater has expanded beyond the print medium, undertaking a number of series of large-scale drawings on paper.

Over the past several years, this has resulted in more than 80 largescale works in varied series. The largest of the drawings is twelve feet by eight feet and comprised of three panels, each of which is the product of one continuous line.

Springwater currently lives and works in San Francisco.

left:

Jane Springwater

Time Squared, 2017 drawing, ink on paper 46 x 46 in (unframed) above:

Jane Springwater

Ring Sequence, 2017 drawing, ink on paper

43.75 x 51.25 in (unframed)

left:

Helen Stanley and Linda Connor Chukar Singing, 2017

photograph by Linda Connor sublimated on aluminum then painted with oil paint by Helen Stanley

30 x 24 in

right inset: Linda Connor, Once the Ocean Floor #3 available at Haines Gallery, SF

Helen Stanley and Linda Connor The collaborations between long-time artists and friends Linda Connor and Helen Stanley bring together photography and painting in an entirely unique way. Connor and Stanley took a trip with students to Ladakh in Northern India, a remote area known for its huge vertical mountains and rich culture, much like that of Tibet. After the students had gone, the artists took a trip into the mountains accompanied by a jeep and driver. Connor took photographs with her 4 x 5 camera and Stanley drew on this excursion. After the trip Connor sublimated her sepia photographs of the mountains onto aluminum and many of them (like the one shown in the inset right) were part of her exhibition last year at the Florida Museum of Photographic Arts and a current exhibition at the Haine’s Gallery in San Francisco. Stanley took some of the photographs given to her by Connor and using a technique called “grisaille” applied color oil glazes on the surface transforming the photograph from sepia to color, striating the jagged mountain surface and infusing with various humorous fanciful elements, the singing chukar bird, the seated hidden Buddha or the cartoon-like cairns. The result is extraordinary and a perfect reflection of both artists sensibilities.

Linda Connor has led a creative life devoted to photography. With her large format camera, she has traveled in Africa, Southeast Asia, Nepal, India, Turkey, Mexico, Tibet, the American Southwest, and Europe exploring sites that evoke mystery and spirit. She is known for her luminous and iconic photographs and fascination with culturally sacred sites and landscapes. Her artwork reveals the essence of her subjects, yielding a sense of timelessness while visually evoking the intangible. She uses a distinctive technique: a large-format view camera allowing her to achieve remarkable clarity and rich detail.

Connor is the recipient of three National Endowment for the Arts grants and a Guggenheim fellowship. Her work can be found in the collections of Art Institute of Chicago; Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona, Tucson; the J. Paul Getty Museum, Museum of Modern Art, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Linda Connor is also the president and founder of Photo Alliance, a nonprofit organization that supports the understanding, appreciation and creation of contemporary photography. She has taught photography at the San Francisco Art Institute since 1969.

Helen Stanley and Linda Connor The Photographer, 2017

photograph by Linda Connor sublimated on aluminum then painted with oil paint by Helen Stanley

30 x 24 in

Helen Stanley and Linda Connor Artist Helen Stanley’s individual style, keen sense of observation and love of process have long distinguished her work. She has been widely exhibited in many galleries including the prestigious Paula Anglim Gallery and William Sawyer Gallery in San Francisco and the Susan Cummins Gallery in Mill Valley. She received a Life Work award by the Marin Arts council and was given a retrospective show at the Falkirk Cultural Center, San Rafael, California.

Journalist Nancy Ellis once wrote that Stanley’s “evocative works come to the viewer through her unerring eye, impeccable hand and generous heart.”

Stanley grew up in Farmington, New Mexico, but moved to San Francisco when she was 18 to attend the Art Institute. She married sculptor Rodger Jacobsen and together they have created a life of family and art, both teaching as well as continuing to pursue their individual work.

Helen Stanley and Linda Connor Cairns, 2017

photograph by Linda Connor sublimated on aluminum then painted with oil paint by Helen Stanley

25 x 20 in

Sanjay Vora The work of Sanjay Vora is born of reflection, derived from a lived American life as well as a peripheral heritage offering East Indian culture and modal music. Each piece stands as a testament to history, human experience, and the endlessness of the search for remembering and rediscovering that which was once familiar. The work examines the fragility of the actual; the processing of our place in the now, and ultimately, acceptance. Experiences and materials become connections as they intersect, live and pass through interstitial, transitional moments towards adulthood and endings--lost, found, dissected, and/or reconstructed into sensations driven by comfort.

Materially, Vora has created a way to use acrylic and gel medium to create a kind of screen over his paintings – a means to seeing the works as memory visible, but beneath a veil. He covers the paintings with the medium and then meticulously reveals the underpainting by removing the medium in a pattern.

In most works, the veil is white, but in Deer in Twilight it is dark as befits the coming of the night. The painting is large, 72 x 60 in, as large as the great outdoors as might be seen by a young boy glancing out a window to catch the magical sight of a deer grazing on the lawn.

Born in New Jersey into a musical Indian family, Vora began playing instruments around the house, learning by ear and watching his parents perform at concerts.

His urge to compose music early in life paralleled his desire to create visual environments. Producing drawings and paintings was a way to manifest and inhabit his visions to which music had played as an ongoing soundtrack. Both his music and art have been strongly influenced by a bicultural upbringing as well as the surrounding rural American landscapes of his childhood. In addition to an undergraduate degree in Architecture from the University of Virginia in 2002, he obtained an MFA in Painting at the San Francisco Art Institute in 2005.

Sanjay Vora

Deer in Twilight, 2014

oil, acrylic and gel medium on canvas

72 x 60 in