Selected Selections | Chuck Koton | Jess Koehler | Suburban Legend | Intimate Oddities
PASILLOS I
SELECTED SELECTIONS, curated by Laura Satterfield
Selected artworks from Santa Monica College Art Mentor Program
Claudia Hirsch,Blue Baby, Digital Inkjet Print, 19" x 13", 2009
Featured Artists: Abdul Mazid, Ana Baranda, Gary Frederick Brown, Rumeng Fang, Brittany Freeman, Claudia Hirsch, Eli Joteva, Brian Thomas Jones, Mei Wah Koa, Kylie Michel, Sarah Riedmann, Jeanne Roderick, Elena Rosa, Gina Peterson, Elizabeth Weber, Ryan Zufryden
About Laura Satterfield
Laura Satterfield attended Santa Monica College before transferring and receiving her BA from the UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture’s Department of Art. She was formerly a docent at the Hammer Museum, as well as Co-Director of South La Brea Gallery. Ms. Satterfield is currently the Chief of Staff at The Broad Art Foundation in Santa Monica, CA.
Opening Reception Saturday, August 1, 2009, 6-10pm
August 1 - August 28, 2009
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Chuck Koton,Kenny Burrell, Photograph Courtesy of the Artist |
Chuck Koton, Slide Hampton, Photograph Courtesy of the Artist |
Jazz Moods II
Jazz Moods II is a collection of work visualizing Koton’s lifelong commitment to Jazz. Inspired by Francis Wolff’s black and white photographs that adorned many of the Blue Note records purchased by Koton, his portraits of live jazz, shot in the Los Angeles area over the last ten years, share with us the passion and creativity of dedicated jazz artists. Mesmerized by live performances by musicians like Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, Rahsaan Roland, and Kirk and Pharoah Sanders, Koton’s approach to capturing the essence of jazz is to simply convey, with the use of light and motion, what jazz means to him: dignity and the entire spectrum of human emotion. The use of dramatic lighting along with tight compositions allows viewers to focus on the moments that create the flowing sounds of spontaneity and the unique improvisation that is involved in creating this lively syncopated music. Through sharing with his audience the relationship between artist and instrument, one can feel the passion and emotion radiating from the images.
About the Artist
Born into a family of photographers, Chuck Koton’s passion for photography may have been inevitable. At a young age, these mysterious boxes, covered with buttons and knobs and able to magically capture the briefest of moments, exerted an irresistible attraction on his imagination. During his teenage years, Chuck had begun carrying his camera wherever he went. He even set up a darkroom in his parents’ apartment, where he would print negatives while listening to jazz. Though not a full-time photographer, his cameras are always near at hand and his photographic “eye” is always open. Over the years, his work has been exhibited in several galleries and has won awards. For the last five years, Chuck has been reviewing and photographing live jazz for All About Jazz.com, the largest jazz website. Currently, the artist continues to work on a lifelong project of documenting jazz, in addition to pursuing other photographic studies of the world of man and the world of nature.
PASILLOS II
JESS KOEHLER
La Palabra de Los Ninos (The Voice of the Children)
Opening Reception Saturday, August 1, 2009, 6-10pm
August 1 - August 28, 2009
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Jess Koehler, Student of Jorazu, |
Jess Koehler, No Weapon Formed Against Me Shall Prosper, |
La Palabra de Los Ninos (The Voice of the Children)
La Palabra de Los Ninos (The Voice of the Children) is Koehler’s collection of work that spans the globe from Honduras to the West Indies, Cuba to Mexico, and also includes Zambia. This current body of work is an exploration of various impoverished children who are not only connected by latitudinal region, but by the similar struggles they face. Amongst other things, Ms. Koehler has recently concentrated on children that have become orphaned due to the HIV/AIDS virus that has been growing within these developing countries. Her social photojournalistic approach moves us from a mere onlooker to actually feeling engaged by the emotions conveyed in the images. Whether it is a simple gaze off into the distance or the feet of what appears to be three friends on a bench, we are impacted by the power that lies within the composition of each piece. The cinematic lighting, and more importantly the stars of each frame, the children, hold our attention with such power and grace. If the intention of an artist is to provide an echo of another’s voice, then Koehler has done a marvelous job of not only documenting the children’s stories but of capturing a resilience that resonates deep within us all, and that shows promise for an up and coming artist.
About the Artist
Jess Koehler, an artist and social photojournalist, documents human conflict and strife in the world, not to sensationalize the stories but to re-tell them in a dignified manner. Koehler’s dedication as a photographer began in high school back in central New York, at the base of the Adirondack Mountains, and has continued since. She is the first in her family to attend college, graduating from Rochester Institute of Technology with a BFA in Advertising Photography. She has made Los Angeles her home because of its rich diversity and global impact as a leading metropolitan city that continues to influence the world with its art and culture.
www.curiositysavedthehuman.com
SUBURBAN LEGEND
A selection of work from
Oxnard College Art Department
Curated by Heather Jeno Silva
Featured Artists: Richard Arcia, Anna Carrillo, Aaron Dadacay, Yi Gao, Antonio Garcia, Olivia Jones- Hernandez, Pamela Lamas, Andrew Lepe, James Santistevan, Olguin Tapia Heredia, Maria Villote
Opening Reception Saturday, May 2, 2009, 6-10pm
May 2 - May 22, 2009
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Pamela Lamas,Existentialism the Past and Pending, Digital print, 2009 Courtesy of the Artist |
About Heather Jeno Silva
Heather Jeno Silva is an art critic and independent curator residing in Santa Barbara, CA. Silva received her Masters of Arts degree in Art History and Museum Studies from the University of Southern California in 2003 and has variety of experience in curatorial work, including the USC Fisher Gallery and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Silva's art criticism has been published in numerous print and online publications, including various exhibition catalogs, art.blogging.la, RiM Magazine, the Santa Barbara New Press, THE Magazine Los Angeles, and the Pasadena Weekly among others and writes a column, Off the Wall, about visual art in unconventional venues for the Santa Barbara Independent.
INTIMATE ODDITIES
Selected artworks from
Santa Monica City College Fine Art Mentor Program
Curated by Ronald Lopez
Artists Include: Susanne Melanie, Sarah Boyce, Jay Grant Buckerfield, Joseph Cochrane, Helen Geisler, Lucas Kazansky, Ka Man Lee, Cedar Miller, Gustavo Muñoz, Elyse Reardon-Jung, Jeanne Roderick, Zoma Crum Tesfa, Sarah Theden, Nathan Warner, Elizabeth Weber, Kristen Winslow, and Elena Wolek
Opening Reception Saturday, February 7, 2009, 6-10pm
February 7 - February 13, 2009
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Elena Wolek ,Untitled, plastic shopping bags Courtesy of the Artist |
Intimate Oddities - Curator's Statement
Intimate Oddities is a title that came to be as a result of photographs bearing witness to intimate sexual escapades with partners of both sexes, mixed media drawings containing silhouettes of women filled with the phone numbers of the artist’s ex-boyfriends, small ink drawings on paper depicting various people picking their noses that seemed odd yet true of us all, and photographs of bikinis left in various places around the city, creating a trace of the artist ' s playfulness and wittiness that further embrace the voyeurism that both reality TV and the tabloid media so eagerly embrace. And what would a show be without work that reflects our society's newfound sense of responsibility toward the environment? In this case it is brought forth by a massive shopping bag created from a plethora of smaller plastic shopping bags and juxtaposed next to an acrylic painting of a canvas bag on an un-stretched, raw, and dirty piece of canvas. Both are familiar objects that, upon closer study, reveal oddities that are meant to elicit a thoughtful response.
The various works included in this show bring to light the many mixed emotions that one goes through in college looking for acceptance, creating work with great ambition and a certain sense of naive sensibility that makes art fun, pure, and experimental. Perhaps traces of these emotions have yet to fully escape any of us as we attempt to become better technicians, and help us continue to reflect the intimate oddities within our daily affairs.
When asked by Ichiro Irie, the Fine Art Mentor Program's instructor, to curate this show, I did not know what to expect from the students of Santa Monica City College. I quickly drifted back to my days at a city college and remembered a makeshift studio with a majority of students who lacked fervor and a majority of instructors who lacked passion. Thus, I entered the opportunity without high hopes. I knew, however, that my colleague Irie had a great eye and was a very good artist himself, so I was eager to participate. Upon entering the studio across from the Santa Monica airport, I was quickly greeted with art that not only flushed away my past city college experiences, but beckoned me to look further and deeper into each piece. The work was vast in its mediums and styles yet focused, with driven potential, ambitious but honest, peculiar but smart, and, most of all, it carried with it a sense of professionalism one would only hope to find in young, talented, and emerging artists.
The works in the show leave me with anticipation of what is yet to come from some of these artists as they press forward with discipline and diligence. I also look forward to seeing the future artists that will come through Santa Monica College's Fine Art Mentor Program.
About the Mentor Program
The Mentor Program serves as a unique learning experience for a select group of students in the Santa monica College Art department. Students have the opportunity to work intensively with faculty members, visiting artists and fellow students toward the development of individual bodies of work. the program consists of frequent visits to galleries, museums and artist studios, in addition to focused discussions and critiques. The program features an open studios event in the spring, an annual group show in the summer, and a web site.
The Mentor Program, helmed by Professors Ronn Davis, Kavin Buck, and Ichiro Irie, is in the process of being completely redesigned. New approaches to educational and art making processes are being implemented in order to better reflect (a) the strategies used in the nation's leading art schools, and (b) the ideas and issues discussed by art practioners, educators, curators, and critics around the world.
Through conversation and interaction, students are challenged to explore their own work and those of others, and to solve problems in relevant and innovative ways. Students are also exposed to different aspects of becoming an artist including the preparation of individual portfolios, collaborative work in small groups, and gallery level preparation and installation practices. Students are also introduced to the art world and the dynamics of working with galleries, museums, curators and collectors.
One of the main objectives of the Mentor Program is to serve as a stepping stone; to help students become better prepared and more competitive at the University level, and to provide the intellectual tools and awareness to present themselves as professional artists in the local and international visual art communities.
18th Street programs are supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation for Visual Arts, Asian Cultural Council, Australia Council on the Arts, California Community Foundation, CEC ArtsLink, Council for Cultural Affairs Taiwan, Getty Foundation, James Irvine Foundation, Jewish Federation of Los Angeles, Jumex Foundation, Los Angeles County Arts Commission, Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, National Endowment for the Arts, Peter Norton Family Foundation, Santa Monica Cultural Affairs Division, and the Trust for Mutual Understanding.
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