Arts & Life, Fine & Performing Arts

School of Art student galleries present student creations

Paintings featuring vibrant images cover every wall, with some standing five feet tall and overwhelming your senses in the group exhibition entitled “Displacement” at the School of Art galleries.

The artist statement, put together by faculty advisor Daniel Dove, details the exhibition’s theme of finding one’s cultural place as they find themselves caught between their “familial origins and contemporary surroundings.”

“Often we try to hold on to the memories by relating them to certain landmarks, locations or objects,” the statement reads. “This exhibition examines the complex issues of identity through personal narratives and their relationships to the current social and cultural climate in Southern California.”

Amidst the work hanging on the walls is the vibrant painting “Estoy Secando la Ropa (I Am Drying Clothes)” by Eva Altamirano, an oil-on-canvas painting depicting a woman hand-drying her clothes in a modest backyard with other shirts hanging to dry behind her.

This particular piece drew third year English major Antonio Molina to the gallery, because it’s “gritty” and relatable.

“It’s all over the place,” Molina. “There’s a structure, but it’s not actually structurized.”

Aldo Avelar, 21-year-old School of Art major, wandered into the gallery and cited “Your Lost Little Girl” by Christian Nunez as his favorite piece, noting his love for the “color palette” for its “dark and mysterious” nature.

Hanging on the wall nearby is the large and captivating piece, “Stolen Lights” by Samantha Reynolds, which is made up of various art materials including paint, cardboard and other physical standouts. The piece, which illustrates a hill filled with homes and lights, also features abstract breakout images of houses and a small area of a residential zone, standing at an astonishing five feet tall.

The work encapsulates the exhibit’s theme of recreating memories of certain landmarks and locations from the past. In illustrating a dark hill with various sections of the nearby city, it does well to recreate what a young artist would have seen and how they would remember it.

The Gatov East Gallery is currently home to the “Feminine Introspective” exhibition, which is comprised of photography by Jessie Penprase, Nieves Maria, Norma Nava and Suzanne Mitchell. The group’s goal is to use their work to dive into their “perspectives on femininity” and to illustrate the “world around us.”

“Our work embodies the deconstruction of representation, cycles of womanhood, empowering sensuality, and embracing spirituality,” the artist statement reads. “We are inspired by our own sensibilities and experience, to explore concepts of femininity as individual artists and as a collective.”

The exhibition is made up of various styles of photography, with one wall featuring photos taken on a beach of a woman dressed in white holding a rope.

Another wall showcases a photo series of a woman, with the first showing fear in her eyes and her face divided in half, the second illustrating two different expressions imposed over one another and the final showing her blowing a kiss in two different positions with the third manipulated by a negative filter.

Once finished in the Gatov galleries, spectators can then progress across the way to the Werby Gallery to witness the peaceful majesty that is “Spring Breeze,” featuring work made by transfer scholar ChunLi Liu from China.

Liu uses flowers throughout the gallery in various art forms, ranging from drawings and paintings to ceramics made in the traditional Chinese style with “a little modern” influence from the artist.

She found influence for her work in the flowers seen around campus, taking pictures and recreating them in different styles of art. Liu said the theme of flowers was meant to represent an ancient Chinese proverb.

“A flower is not just a flower, but is also [symbolic] of the whole world,” Liu said.

The exhibit also features an interactive element for students in which they can paint Chinese characters on rice paper. In her artist statement, Liu writes that she “would like to pay tribute to the philosophical origin found in the art of Dunhuang” and that she hopes her “audience may experience a moment of Buddhist Zen” when viewing the work on display.

The exhibits will be on display through Feb. 15 before a new wave of work is exhibited beginning Feb. 18.

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