Feminist work in Hippie Modernism

I started writing my Exhibition Review all wrong so I decided to paste what I wrote about Sheila Levrant de Bretteville here:

Pink and Everywoman

Sheila Levrant de Bretteville is an American artist and graphic designer whose feminist principles drive her work. She worked as an instructor at CalArts where she met Judy Chicago, one of the leading ladies of feminist art at the time, and Arlene Raven, a feminist art historian who co-founded various feminist art organizations in Los Angeles. The three of them founded the Feminist Studio Workshop and the Los Angeles Woman’s Building, which was a nonprofit feminist cultural center.

close up of Pink

De Bretteville also created a feminist newspaper called Everywoman in 1971 in which all of the women featured in the paper got two full spreads to work with. This piece was displayed in a glass case below Pink, an offset lithograph on paper created in 1971. Both Everywoman and Pink are very minimal in color, using only grey and pink. For Pink, the responses to the color by different women were stitched together in a quilt like graphic. Another minimalistic quality is the usage of such a grid system, however the powerful feminist messages within the work conceptualize the piece. Strong images of young women and girls were sparingly placed next to phrases such as “Little girls don’t know why, but, little girls are pink,” and, “Pink is childish. I’m not pink now.” Some associated the term to love or a memory of their childhood. Some messages embraced pink, some rejected, some spoke of the journey through both such as one woman saying “And then I HATED PINK. Now pink has become a symbol of liberation for me.” De Bretteville wanted to show how much of a strong association women tie to feminism through the color pink and how social constructs shape women’s depictions of a simple color.

Hip-hip Hooray for Hippie Modernism

Outside of BAMPFA

Hippie Modernism at the UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archival (BAMPFA) showcased a variety of artists that represented hippie counterculture and the historical events that occurred globally during the 60’s and 70’s. Hippies were members of liberal counterculture that advocated ideas such as a close relationship with nature, spirit, communal living, artistic experimentation, and recreational drugs. They were advocates for the environment and peacefully protested for equal rights during the fight for Civil Rights and for peace during the Vietnam War. Their counterculture aesthetic rarely has this kind of attention in history or even a gallery showcasing their contribution to their culture.

Lower floor of the gallery

            On April 22^nd, the museum was free. Protestors marched the streets outside and people of all ages were walking around the neighborhood. For a busy Saturday evening, BAMPFA was not as crowded as expected. Overall the gallery was spacious. It was almost like a maze the way the different sections of the gallery space were broken up, especially on the lower floor with the split-level area that opens into another room. The show was split onto two levels because of the amount of work. There were two larger installations that people could go inside of. Those were placed into the center of the rooms, which utilized the large rooms well because a lot of the work were screen-printed posters and photographs that were hung on the walls alongside video and performance art displayed on flat screen TVs.

Corita Kent's silkscreen posters

The colorful array of psychedelic colors signature to the hippie aesthetic were utilized in a variety of forms in photography, print, sculpture, and installation. The signature poster style of Hippie culture was demonstrated by Corita Kent in her silkscreen anti-war posters that utilized text as well as incredibly vibrant neon colors next to more neutral yet still saturated colors.

USCO's two pieces with guard trying to sneak away

The installations were very engaging and immersive. However, some installations were weaker because of how intense the lighting is in the gallery. The flashing lights in USCO’s installations may have had a more powerful effect if it were in a room with dimmer lighting.  Shiva (1965) was a massive painting with electric lights around the perimeter that would blink in a timely manner however, the red lights could only be seen if paying attention up close. When further away, the gallery lights wash out the red bulbs. Drop City’s The Ultimate Painting (1968/2011) digital print with strobe lights and a motor did not have that same problem because it was encapsulated in their dome titled 8-Fold “Polar Zonohedron” (1966/2011) made of painted wood, mylar, and composite panels.

            Revisiting and reflecting upon the sociopolitical issues that we are still fighting today made Hippie Modernism a great contemporary show to see. Although it is questionable if the architecture of BAMPFA helped the show with the split-levels, but for what they had to work with, the gallery space was used up in a meaningful way that did not take too much attention away from the art. It was informative of the key movements and ideas in the art making of the time and brought to light a counterculture that does not get the recognition it deserves. Hippie Modernism is on display at BAMPFA until May 21, 2017.

Frances Butler fused traditional quilting
with exuberant colors

Being a part of art while looking at art

The Diggers were a theater group and helped
their community by promoting art and
giving goods for free

One of the best installations in show

Channeling modern weab culture with hippie counterculture

Crown Point Press

Signage at the bottom of the stairs

The printmaking class' annual visit to Crown Point Press at 20 Hawthorne St in San Francisco was on March 16. Every semester, Professor Mark Emerson takes his printmaking class to visit Crown Point Press, a well established printmaking studio founded by Kathan Brown in 1962. Crown Point invites artists who are not printmakers to work with their printers and experiment with various printing processes for a week. They are also the creators of Magical Secrets, an instructional book on the many different etching processes and the in depth guide on everything you need to know to use them. Famous artists such as Wayne Thiebaud and Richard Diebenkorn worked with Crown Point occasionally. Their pieces can be seen in the gallery from time to time.
The building is an old newspaper facility in the Yerba Buena area. I absolutely love this place! A very welcoming vibe and a peaceful energy that flows throughout the building. Up the winding staircase to the second floor, the door is open and inviting you to step inside where the magic happens. The ceilings are high and the windows are large, flooding daylight into the space. Their gallery is small but the shows are phenomenal showing a variety of ways artists could use the same etching techniques.
We started our field trip with a guided tour from Sasha Baguskas, the editor and publications manager at Crown Point. She explained the history of Crown Point and talked about the processes of prints currently exhibited in their gallery. Usually there aren't many relief prints but this time around there were a few. Focusing mainly on intaglio prints, the discussion was mainly about dry point, aquatint, sugar lift, spit bite, and both hard and soft ground etchings. (I would explain them all but it would take all day.) Baguskas talked about the quality of line that is created through etching that is very different from that of a drawing. She said that Diebenkorn appreciated the velvety quality of the softness of the ink. He collaged different pieces of paper to come up with a composition that read easily
After the tour of the gallery, Baguskas took us on an exclusive tour into the back rooms to the studio space. She explained each room, taking us around until we reached the largest press beds where the printers, Emily York, Sam Carr-Prindle, and Courtney Sennish, were busy inking plates. They were working on a three color photo gravure print. The artists are never working when we visit, so our class examined the inking and printing processes of the printers. I love the thud of the press bed when the plate finishes going through and the plop of the blankets when they systematically throw them over the roller. Sadly my phone ran out of memory before the plop. Next time... Anyways Sennish explained the photo gravure process better than I did in my previous post so check out the video! (hopefully I can get it to work soon)

Diebenkorn's proofing process

Staring at the proofs hoping to absorb some knowledge

Baguskas (right) explaining the collaging Diebenkorn used to proof Green (1986)
with Professor Emerson and super awesome relief printer Luis

Love the windows! Tom Marioni prints on the left side.

Just to show how far back the space stretches

Smaller press bed

Tools!!!

Left to right: Sam Carr-Prindle, Courtney Sennish, and Emily York

Check out their website: https://crownpoint.com/

Breuer's take on Printmaking

Noah Breuer is up for consideration for the printmaking position at Sac State. He had an artist talk in Mendocino Hall on March 15, 2017. He talked about utilizing printmaking in various ways beyond the traditional ink on paper, delving into his experience with lithography, screen prints, and relief printing. He studied traditional woodblock printing in it's birthplace: Japan. Breuer's process of idea building was from personal material that he would gather and mold into a body of work. For example, he layered screen prints on cut foam core and lithographs of baseball cards to create textures. One of my classmates did not find the compositions clear. He explained that the effect would probably be more meaningful if he used one less color. I agree with him because although he was using image as texture, his main concept got lost in the textures that were created by the layering of multiple colors especially in his baseball prints. Breuer was utilizing the dot pattern layered over collaged litho printed cards plus four to five colors all at once and although the initial idea was interesting, the image does not engage the viewer to look deeper into the piece because there is so much going on.
The interesting fact about his work is that he utilizes digital media in the carving of his plates. Mixing vectorized images carved into the wood with a machine, he layered images and used them in a variety of ways. However, I question whether that is fine art or more commercialized art. Printmaking has always been on that borderline because of the ability to reproduce an image, but they are limited in how many copies they can make before the plate or etch starts to fall apart. Because of the addition of technology, identical plates can be cut and inked again with precision and ease. Although the integrity of the plate may degrade over time, the reproducibility of the plate itself makes it easier to make mass productions of the same piece.

Third row seat for the lecture.

Breuer is hella tall.

MOMA post coming soon!

Here's some photos created through the #SelfComposed exhibit at SFMOMA. This was my favorite second to the Diebenkorn/Matisse show (coming soon).

Funny Little Story My Friend Sent

Here's the link to the original story: http://www.knowable.com/a/people-share-their-most-heartwarming-stories-of-super-smart-kids/p-2

The recess art society.

A few years ago when I was teaching a class of five and six year olds, a child came in and asked to do show and tell. He showed a wrapped candy. He told us that he had taken it from an art gallery, from an exhibit that was a pile of candies in a corner.

A few of the kids then blew my mind completely by having an intense debate about whether or not such a piece truly constituted art. It was unbelievable. I just sat back and marvelled at the amazing depth of their discussion.

A young fella said (and please bear in mind that he was five years old at the time):

"I keep wondering if it's still art when all the candies have been taken and it's back to being an empty corner."

Some of the other comments I remember specifically are:

"It can't be art because it's not in a frame.”

"It's art because it's in an art gallery." 

"But people are in an art gallery and they're not art." 

"Yes they are!”

"I think candy on the floor is littering.”

It was the most awe inspiring day of my teaching career so far.

Emma-Francis Rutherford

Behind the Scenes: Curious Curating

Nancy Wylie explaining the zone system

Nancy Wylie started curating in 2003 as a student at Sac State. She had no prior experience and had to do a lot of research in how to care for the collection that had accumulated over the years. Wylie laughed when she told the horror story of pulling the works out from a closet with a water heater in it. The collection itself dates back to the 60's and there used to be records of the art but those were somehow destroyed in 2007. Wylie did not state what happened and we did not dare to ask. The place where the art is stored is incredibly small. There were three adjacent rooms: the first was a meeting space with a large table and chairs, the second was the main storage for the art, and the third was a workspace with a mat cutter, several flat files, and binders of records. There were talks about accessioning new works into the collection and Wylie stated that unless it is a deal too good to pass, the answer is generally no because space is limited and the location that the work is kept is not the best place. She mentioned that although the temperature and light regulations of the rooms are ideal, the space is too small and being in the basement level gives risk to flooding during the rainy season.

Unwrapping Montoya's print

Wylie pulled out a few prints that were featured in last year's Ink on Paper show including prints by Jose Montoya, Andy Warhol, and Picasso. A fellow student asked about a James Kaneko print so Wylie pulled out the binder, found exactly where the print was stored, and pulled it out for us to see.
The process of caring for each piece was intriguing. Dealing with a limited budget, large sheets of archival paper was used to create folders for each print instead of archival folders. Acid free sheets of translucent paper cover the surface of each print. A cut mat sandwiched the paper and print together in the folder which is also usable for when the print needs to be framed for display.

Third room, Wylie explaining preservation techniques used on a budget

Showing off the old slide system

Storage units

Wylie is currently working towards creating a curatorial class next semester. The class would involve learning about proper care of the artwork, organization, and exhibition design. Hopefully that class is approved because I would definitely try to fit it into my schedule. This experience was very exciting and interesting!

Picasso lithograph (left), Warhol print (right)

James Kaneko lithograph

Mandatory selfie with storage shelves behind me