Art Picks, August 2010

Posted on August 3, 2010 – 1:10 AM | by OldManFoster
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5th National Juried Exhibition
Axis Gallery
August 7 – 29
Receptions: August 12, 6 – 8PM
August 14, 6 – 9 PM

Thank goodness for the Axis Gallery.  August is a s-l-o-w month for art in most places, and Sac is no exception.  Some galleries (including B Sakata Garo and Skinner Howard) take a cue from the Europeans and just close for the month.  Not Axis. Instead, the collective offers up what is always one of their best shows of the season – their National Juried Exhibition.  This year’s juror was Joe Amrhein, Director of New York’s Pierogi Gallery, and brother of well-known local artist, and Axis member, Phil Amrhein.   In his juror’s statement Amrhein says “art can transcend the realm of consciousness… if making art is only about technique then it is of less interest.”  Both the statement, and the list of selected artists implies that the work picked for the show will be on the more ambitious side of the equation.  As is usual with this exhibition, the work showcases a wide range of practices (and geographic origination), from  figurative paintings with strange psychological narratives (Forrest Solis and Nicole McCormick Santiago) to conceptual work (Colleen Ellis and Brad Thiele) to photography (including the strange insect documentions of Brittany Ransom).

1517 19th Street

Hours: Saturday – Sunday, Noon – 5PM

Brown Bag Art Chat:
Stephen Kaltenbach’s A Time to Cast Away Stones
August 18, Noon
Is there anything Stephen Kaltenbach can’t do?  He started out in the sixties making highly-theoretical conceptual work (including his iconic Time Capsule series) that set the art world of the time on fire; in the seventies he turned to representational painting, and produced Portrait of My Father, probably the best piece of art on public display in Sacramento; still later he began making massive Hellenic-influenced figural sculpture which immediately started showing up in the region’s public arts commissions.  One such piece is A Time to Cast Away Stones, a 1998 fountain/sculpture which welcomes visitors to the west entrance to the Convention Center at 13th and K.  The piece will be the focus of this month’s Brown Bag Chat, a series of talks about local public art sponsored by the Crocker and the Metropolitan Arts Commission.  Each conversation highlights a public artwork by an artist who is a part of the Crocker’s permanent collection.  It’s free, seating is provided, but reservations are required. To register, call (916) 808-5499 or email education@crockerartmuseum.org. Grab your lunch and venture out of the office for a 30-minute art chat.

Corner of 13th & K Streets

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