See Line Gallery‘s main showroom currently hosts Room Mobile, a display of star-themed mobiles curated by the gallery’s director, Janet Levy. In addition to the eighteen artists who created mobiles, Levy also invited Mileece, a sonic artist, to transform the gallery’s project room into Soniferous Eden.  Mileece’s installation encompasses both terrestrial and astral elements, highlighting the inherent interconnectedness using what she describes as “Aesthetic Sonification.”

Soniferous Eden invites audiences to fully employ their senses, requiring one to be attuned to the aural, the tactile and the visual. A central orb of leafy plants are encircled by a dampened soil path that is best explored with bare feet.  As the eyes become adjusted to the dim light, one can more comfortably move around and observe the plants, which are barely lit by the reflective black-light paint speckled onto the installation’s surrounding walls.  The paint flecks give the ambiance of a star-studded galaxy, referencing the celestial theme of the mobiles in the main gallery.

The sounds that land on the participants’ eardrums are a result of the artist’s engagement with the electro-magnetic emissions of plants.  Mileece has gently adhered electrodes to plant leaves in order to capture their GSR and EEG signals.  The signals are then channeled through an interactive plant software, written by Mileece with Super Collider, an audio programming language.  The software allows the plant bio-emissions to generate quirky noises, such as ethereal bells, low hums, and other harmonic synthesized sounds.  The sounds ebb and flow throughout the exhibit, indicating both plant/plant and plant/man interaction.  As the participants spend time with the plants, brushing by them and touching their leaves, more noises are generated.  The overall experience is a total immersion in the slice of Eden that Mileece has created.

Mileece is originally from England and studied Sonic Art at Middlesex University and Sound Engineering at the School of Audio Engineering in London.  Her work is on permanent display at the Centre for Innovation at the London School of Economics.  She has also exhibited at such venues as the Migros Museum in Zurich, the Hayward Gallery, the Whitechapel Gallery, and the Thames Festival in London, and the Aldeburgh Festival in Suffolk.  Soniferous Eden will be on display at See Line Gallery at the Pacific Design Center in Los Angeles until June 29th, 2010.

Long May You Run, 2010 synthetic polymer on canvas 64 x 64 inches

Mark Moore Gallery‘s current exhibition, Decade, signifies Tim Bavington‘s tenth year of representation by the gallery, as well as the fifth solo presentation of his work at the gallery.  Bavington synthesizes aural and visual stimuli, organizing chromatic variations of both worlds onto the picture plane.  The artist pays homage to his favorite musicians, often by selecting one of their songs to interpret. In the work, Long May You Run, two rows of vertical stripes represent separate elements of Neil Young’s musical composition. The lower half of the painting denotes the bass line while the upper portion shows the guitar solo.  Another way the artist references music is by choosing album covers and mirroring their compositions.  Paintings like Blue Monday and Give ‘Em Enough Rope are Bavington’s interpretations of New Order and Clash album covers, respectively.  In addition, Bavington includes art historical references by emulating Kenneth Noland and Mark Rothko, tying the concentric circles of Noland to the New Order cover and Rothko-like horizons to the Clash album.

Bold As Love, 2010 synthetic polymer on canvas 72 x 72 inches

When discussing his conceptual process, Bavington stated “I generally read sheet music and start with that as a sketch.  Then, I go from there.  The color palette is pretty subjective, it’s not scientific or mathematical. You can’t imagine what sounds will come out when you look at a score.  Basically I do the same thing as a musician (when reading music), except I interpret the score with color instead of sound.  I’m not trying to capture sound– the nature of sound waves and light waves are completely different.”

Installation View

Bavington received his M.F.A. from University of Nevada, Las Vegas, in 1999.  His work is represented in prominent collections such as the Museum of Modern Art, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, and the Portland Art Museum.  Decade will be on view through May 29th, 2010.

On the edge of Culver City’s industrial area sits Scion Installation L.A. Space, currently hosting a group exhibition of artists whose mission was to transform the gallery into eight individual rooms.  Each room is indicative of a theme set forth by the artist or team of artists who designed and built it.   Artists and their rooms show an appetite for the urban, likely due to the exhibition curator’s own passion for street art.  The artists were chosen by Roger Gastman, best known for his assistance in bringing graffiti art into the limelight of the contemporary art world.   Gastman’s many art publications, like Swindle Magazine and his latest book, Freight Train Graffiti, often highlight street art as a prized aspect of pop culture.  Gastman also served as executive producer of the recent graffiti documentary, Infamy.

Within Chris Stain‘s installation, the viewer briefly navigates the nooks and crannies of a constricted space between two buildings. His corridor-like construction embodies subculture with multiple depictions of bricks, graffiti, and graphic renderings of telephone poles and electrical wires. Stain thinks of the space as “…a 3-D representation of the smaller paintings I make on metal, which capture the story of the struggling American.”

Similarly, Dan Monick and Caitlin Reilly collaborated to make their room into a bus stop with a partially enclosed waiting area and bench.  The team installed lighting meant to mimic the overhead illumination of a street lamp.  In addition, photographic images are installed on light boxes that surround the perimeter of the room.  These images, which are approximately the same size as bus windows, are portraits of passengers and their surroundings.

In contrast, some of Rooms’ artists indulged in investigating their own style as opposed to recreating a specific urban-inspired space.  Adam Wallacavage‘s installation is saturated with curving tendrils and undulating arms, both signatory elements of his personal aesthetic.  Four of his plaster cast octopus arm chandeliers are suspended from the ceiling.   Custom sconces, furniture, wallpaper, and candelabras function to unify Wallacavage’s eccentric room.

In addition to the aforementioned artists, works by Bill Daniel, Dueling VHS, Justin Van Hoy, Kime Buzzelli, and Rocky Grimes are also exhibited.  Rooms will be on display through May 15th, 2010.

Courtesy of Roberts & Tilton, Culver City, CA

The Primitive Electric, Faris McReynolds’s fourth exhibition at Roberts & Tilton in Los Angeles, CA, spurs a compelling conversation between divergent painting styles and assorted perspectives. While he explores social commentaries, McReynolds’s paint application varies in thickness and sensitivity.  Overall, the exhibit attests to the difficulty involved in reconciling society’s ever expanding attitudes and perspectives on popular culture.

In paintings like Speedway, McReynolds uses broad, gestural strokes to describe figures in various throws of action.  He works with a sense of immediacy; his style reminiscent of artists Willem De Kooning and Richard Diebenkorn of the Abstract Expressionist and Bay Area Figurative movements.  Colors resonate, contrasting both in tonality and hue, aiding the flagrant figures’ substantial mass. In these paintings, McReynolds composes panoptic scenes–particularly crude stills from popular culture.  In The Leaving Party, a crowd is crammed onto the platform of a military type vehicle that flees a chaotic, burning backdrop.  One of the main subjects joyously waives a pink and purple striped necktie like a flag while another is victoriously thrusting up a human head.

Courtesy of Roberts & Tilton, Culver City, CA

Conversely, McReynolds’s mixed media pieces, such as It’s No Journey and A World of Reflections are more subtle and softened, lending to a contemplative mood.  The subjects of these cinematic portraits portray emotions that range from disappointment and depression to sheer psychosis.  One can imagine the characters are undergoing a complex set of reactions, perhaps shocked and dismayed by the vulgarities represented in his more expressionistic works.  In other portraits, such as Water Mirror, McReynolds slices up facial features, aggressively distorting the face with impasto, palette knife marks.  Viewers could deduct that the multiple portions of flesh, eyes, nose, and mouth are a metaphor for the complexities involved in seeing various viewpoints at once.

McReynolds was born in Dallas, Texas in 1977 and received his BFA from Otis College of Art and Design in 2000.  He now lives in Los Angeles, showing his work both nationally and internationally at Goff & Rosenthal in Berlin, Gallery Min Min in Tokyo, and the Tim Van Laere Gallery in Antwerp.   The Primitive Electric is on display at Roberts & Tilton until November 14th, 2009.

Infinity, curated by Andrew Schoultz is a collection of 15 contemporary artists’ interpretations of a boundless theme. Scion Space in Los Angeles hosts the exhibit, which opened Saturday, October 10th, and will continue through November 7th, 2009. Prior to the opening, I chatted with some of the artists as well as the curator, who revealed how relative concepts are strategically woven into the pieces, whether through mathematics, metaphor, science, or technique.

Schoultz chose artists who frequently question life’s immeasurability, like Ryan Wallace. During the process of completing oil paintings such as Fulcrum, Wallace explained that he saves pieces of tape used to mask off sharp-edges. Wallace then uses the tape and other appropriate odds and ends in his studio to make pieces like Quest. Throughout his process, Wallace experiments with how variables involved in the chemistry of oils, alkyds, acrylics, mylar, paper, and tape affect the surface of his painting. He enjoys “letting each material have its own voice based on chemical properties.” Further, his imagery questions aspects of physics that might be in play. For example, Fulcrum features two intersecting walls; yet, one cannot determine which wall is acting as the support for the other. Therefore, the walls take on an endless “push-pull” scenario. Similarly, Quest features a central orb created by light tones in the center of the panel surrounded by darker vertical strips. The sphere-like shape hovers and can be seen as an ascending or descending point simultaneously.

Chris Natrop scrutinizes the concept of infinity on a more microscopic level in that he thinks of his cut out shapes as “molecular bombardments.” Infinity features one of Natrop’s first, stand-alone sculptures, different from the room-sized installation pieces he is used to creating. In all of Natrop’s work, he deals with shapes that he has captured from his memory–spindling, interweaving forms he spontaneously cuts with a knife and hangs with transparent string. Also new to his work is the inclusion of two-way, acrylic mirrors that he had fabricated specifically for the piece displayed at Scion.

Contemporary collage artist, Hilary Pecis, is represented in the show by two of her collages. One of her works were created specifically for Infinity, as well as some of her new video installations. Pecis’s collages stay true to her fundamental aesthetics. She continues to entrance viewers with meticulous depictions of angular patterns, whether they are the varying facets of cut gemstones or the repetitive planes of her trademark ink drawings. Pecis pointed out the underlying theme of “limitless combinations” in her work. For example, she sought out multiple sources to represent white in her new collage. In the past, she may have used a single source, like fabric from a wedding dress, to fill the white spaces. Now, however, she has substituted many different magazine images in addition to other white fabrics. As usual, Pecis depicts cosmic landscapes brimming with glimpses of society’s prized commodities. She reiterated that the landscapes are basically the same place, but the seasons are different. Seasons change in her work due to the fact that the countless magazines she uses change intervals from spring, summer, fall or winter. Pecis admitted that her reliance on print media will likely shift as digital media becomes more relevant. Her video installations feature segments of her multi-faceted ink drawings interspersed with translucent, floating, shapes, some of them different types of diamonds. In one of the videos, crows horde a pile of diamonds, CD’s, and other “bling”–metaphorically showing that the “continuum of desire is never fulfilled.”

In addition to curating the show, Schoultz contributed an intricate ink drawing that speaks to “the infinite unraveling of history.” The drawing, which is reminiscent of both Indian miniature painting and 14th century German map-making, is chock full of military symbolism. The upper half of the composition is dominated by a labyrinthine mixture of vertical flags, all emblazoned with the masonic eye, and a variety of unraveling ribbons, culminating into the shape of a horizontal 8–the undeniable symbol of infinity. The lower half of the composition shows a military horse carrying a turban-clad man with his eyes closed and hands raised as if in meditation. To Schoultz, it is important to portray the duality involved, so there are references to peace as well as war, just as the infinite must also contain the finite.

Other artists who participate in the show are Ryan Travis Christian, Richard Colman, N. Dash, Noah Davis, Chris Duncan, Andres Guerrero, Joseph Hart, Andy Diaz Hope, Xylor Jane, Butt Johnson, and Aaron Noble.

Mica-encrusted, ebony swirls weave through Camille Rose Garcia‘s most recent body of work, Hydra of Babylon, on display at Merry Karnowsky Gallery in Los Angeles, CA through October 10th, 2009. In addition to her highly calligraphic black lines, Garcia layers translucent hues, silver leaf, and iridescent sheens to depict her usual suspects – winged creatures and desperate divas, all signaling disdain for the world around them. If oozing toxic drips, tear stained eyes, or nonchalant hand gestures don’t fully reveal the artist’s message, viewers can usually find a title written on an embedded coil of ribbon within the piece. Titles include names like Gloom and Doom, Destroying Angels, Poisons for Unthinkable Pains, and The Witch of Silent Spring, to name a few.

Garcia’s most persistent subjects are the illustrative animals that populate her melancholy scenes. In the 60″ x 84″ acrylic on panel painting, The Hydra of Babylon, a nine-headed serpent fatally injures an eagle, which weeps incessantly as it’s strangled with writhing tentacles. Most likely, Babylon is a geographical reference that, in conjunction with the dying eagle, is meant to summon ideas of annihilation, grief, and war in the Middle East.

Sickness and pain are also recurrent themes, seen in doe-eyed fawns that choke on malignancies that thoroughly permeate scenes like The Witch of Silent Spring. Ironically, there are tonics that promise solace and healing, but those solutions are the same deadly ones that infiltrate the animals’ surroundings, subsequently furthering their demise. In the midst of all the malaise are trumpet-like Easter Lilies, the quintessential symbol of virtue and hope. Those same lilies are present in Why Can’t You Just Be Happy, a painting of a quite corpulent vulture stewing in her woeful sorrow.

Occasional splashes of warm color and hopeful metaphors are planted sporadically throughout these psychedelic views, making them more accessible and alluring. Garcia creates a world of her own, yet one that is heavily influenced by the kaleidoscopic realities of Lewis Carroll‘s Alice In Wonderland, or, perhaps more pertinent to her Orange County upbringing, Tim Burton‘s Edward Scissorhands. It was no surprise to find out that Garcia is currently working on an illustrated Alice In Wonderland book that will be released from Harper/Collins in March of 2010. This will be the fourth published book featuring her work, the others being The Saddest Place on Earth, 2005, The Magic Bottle, 2006, and Tragic Kingdom, 2007.

Other publications that have showcased Garcia’s work are Flaunt Magazine, Nylon, Paper Magazine, Modern Painters, Art Prostitute, Juxtapoz, and Hi-Fructose.

Tucked away amidst a tranquil, tree-shaded park in North Berkeley is the Berkeley Art Center, currently hosting an exhibition of mostly Bay Area artists who each have a refreshing take on traditional media. Eighteen artists were chosen by distinguished curators Rene de Guzman and Kate Eilersten, who have a wealth of experience in visual arts programming at cultural hubs like the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Oakland Museum of California, and the Museum of Folk and Craft Art. Eilersten and de Guzman chose artists whose technical expertise and conceptual ideas come together as equal factions in a quotient yielding sublimity. Ultimately, the theme of JURIED@BAC: Works on Paper is transcendence–an evasion of the perceived constraints of a two dimensional media.

Leigh Barbier

Leigh Barbier contributed paintings from her series, Mushroomville, an exploration of her fantasy world filled with women and their adolescent daughters on a mission to understand the insidious aspects of reality. The mothers take on a didactic role, using nature, particularly mushrooms, to explain the difference between the harmful and the nutritious. The scenes are absent of housework and other domestic chores, allowing the female characters to fully delve into their surroundings. Barbier’s ground planes are rocky and angular, treacherously winding underfoot, sometimes even extending out into the space of the viewer. Pushing out of the picture plane is a tactic that is reminiscent of the Byzantine painter, Giotto. However, Barbier’s figures are more volumetric and show more emotion than her Medieval predecessor.

Collaging, piercing, and weaving were some of the other techniques artists used to go beyond the flatness inherent to paper. Iris Charabi-Berggren‘s piece, Bird Watching-Gyrfalcom literally weaves itself off the wall. Graphite tones describe the bird’s markings, texture, and brain-like headpiece, which flow into an undulating warp and weave. Julie Garner uses a similar technique in her work, Sugar Factory as she weaves multiple images of the same subject into one single image. Buoyant pneumatocysts and algae permeate the surface of Emily Clawson‘s pinhole drawings that she creates by puncturing the paper with the sharp point of a needle or pin. Masako Miki demonstrates how shaded planes of patterned paper can indicate linear perspective and bring order to her precariously stacked items.

In addition to the aforementioned artists, works by Henrique Bagulho, Mariet Braakman, Morgan Ford, John Hundt, Lisa Martin, Liz Maxwell, Anthony Lazorko, Camilla Newhagen, Henry Navarro, Sarah Newton, Jonathan Solo, Hyewon Yoon, and Alex Zecca are also exhibited. The show will be on display through September 20th, 2009.

Federal Art Project (FAP) in downtown LA recently hosted Mixtape Volume 1, a show featuring artists who use music subculture as impetus for their work. Shizu Saldamando‘s 5′ x 3′ graphite on wood piece, Maria Daniela y su Sonido Lazer Concert, Azusa, CA, was hung in the forefront of the gallery, begging viewers to take a closer look at her skilled draftmanship. With fluid strokes, Saldamando delivers accurate textures of hair, clothing, gestures, and expressions as well as the overall energy of a moment. According to Saldamando, the musician’s role is subsidiary while the collective spirit of the audience is key.

Three of Jacob Rhodes‘ quilt series, Candy Skins, were also included in Mixtape. Candy Skins are Rhode’s fictional characters whose subculture is influenced by that of Skinheads with a heightened fashion sense (Candy Skins make all their own clothing.) Rhodes uses embroidery floss to stitch Candy Skin scenes onto quilts made out of denim, nylon, and gingham–the fabrics of the Candy Skin’s everyday lives.

In some cases, specific songs, lyrics, or rock ‘n’ roll sayings were referenced by the exhibit’s artists. For example, in a 30″ x 30″ piece of steel, Rich Shelton plasma cut the words, “It’s better to burn out than fade away” and seamlessly installed the steel along with the kino flo lights that backlit the script into the gallery’s wall.

In addition to the artists mentioned above, the exhibit included digital installations by Irina Contreras, Marco Dimas Sanchez, and Juan Capistran as well as Xerox and Light Jet Prints by Sandra de la Loza and Hazel Mandujano.

Saturday, July 25th, PERFORM! NOW! commenced on Chung King Road in Los Angeles’s Chinatown. Pendulous rows of scarlet lanterns lit the streets and walkways for spectators who gathered to watch performances by more than 30 artists. It was the area’s first event featuring new visual and sound art performances; a collaborative effort on the part of 12 different Chinatown galleries. One of the more convoluted conceptual performances of the evening was by Lucas Murdiga, who had his art gallery debut in LA with (w)hole at Charlie James Gallery. Murdiga is a San Francisco artist who is known for pieces relating to behavioral science, deconstruction of the 5 senses, and control/submission as it influences or predicts the future. For (w)hole, the artist constructed 2 wooden cabinets resembling refrigerators, inside which were placed the refreshments that accompanied Saturday’s opening. Attached to the refrigerator doors were a rope and pulley system that connected to an apparatus in Murdiga’s mouth. Every time someone opened or closed the cabinet doors to get food, the ropes pulled the corners of Murdiga’s mouth into a smile. As the artist explained, his interest in animal behavior, particularly herding, motivated him to build the installation. Just as trainers use food as a reward for conditioning animals, Murdiga used drinks and hors d’oeuvres to influence audience participation. Further, Murdiga had a direct connection with viewers as their movement through the gallery also had a physical effect upon him whenever their actions forced his grin. Another aspect of the piece that pertained to control/submission was a wooden table on which participants could recline while Murdiga inserted a gloved finger in his or her mouth. The idea was for Murdiga to apply pressure to a point in the roof of the mouth–a spot known to calm a person who holds stress or tension in the jaw. While Murdiga gave the acupressure treatments to volunteers in the gallery, he gave vivid descriptions of other pertinent projects he has completed. He spoke about Muster Retrodiction at 667Shotwell, a project space in a San Francisco residential home. He also gave accounts of other projects, which are documented by large photographs on display at Charlie James Gallery through the 22nd of August.

Another conceptual performance that touched on the self-reflective was Maura Brewer‘s Face Transplantation and Depression at Chung King Project. In her performance, Brewer played two characters; a public speaker/psychoanalyst who was holding a seminar on Face Transplantation and Depression, and the speaker’s satellite interviewee, artist Maura Brewer. Brewer projected video clips of herself answering questions asked by the psychoanalyst, who could empathize with her subject’s depression due to her previous experience enduring a face transplant. During the interview, Brewer exhibits all the classic symptoms of depression from binge eating to paranoia and self-destructive tendencies. Brewer’s strength is bringing sarcastic humor to the blunt and abrasive topics of disease and mental health.

Sarcasm was no stranger to PERFORM! NOW! as Aaron Sandnes walked around with his flag that read, IF I RULED THE UNIVERSE I’D KILL TIME SO THIS GENOCIDE WOULD LAST FOREVER and John Kilduff made a statement on multi-tasking with his piece Let’s Paint TV in front of Jancar Gallery. In addition to painting on canvas, Kilduff simultaneously runs on a treadmill, blends drinks, cooks, and answers questions from the public. The show was interrupted by multiple power outages due to overloaded circuits at Jancar, which allowed for impromptu modifications that only a live performance can yield. You can see more live segments of Let’s Paint TV every weekday from 11am-12 noon on Stickam.com and even call in with questions for the artist!

Samuel Freeman, formerly known as the Patricia Faure Gallery, features an eclectic sampling of contemporary sculptures and a few token paintings at, Mostly Sculpture (Damn It). Mr. Freeman initially sought to show new paintings, but ended up with sculptures instead, hence the parenthetical “Damn It.” From the get-go, the show flaunted a hipster flare, offering an ice cream social in lieu of traditional wine and cheese selections at its late afternoon opening on July 11th. Gallery goers appreciated the oasis that the folks at Coolhaus conjured, queueing up outside the gallery to indulge in alternative twists to old-school ice cream sandwiches.

Inside the gallery, a plethora of contributing artists enliven omnipresent themes by transcendental means. For example, The Reverend Ethan Acres, an artist who has graced the gallery with at least 4 solo exhibitions since 1997, installed his own shrine. The small reliquary is partitioned off with plexi-glass and features relics like Weapon, a 6″ x 8″ x 6″ military tank. Acres used a bible to represent the tank’s turret and a horizontally placed crucifix as the tank’s main gun.

The press release for Mostly Sculpture (Damn It) states it “remains dedicated to the absurd, the delicate, and the impossible within contemporary sculpture.” Outstanding in the stated genres is Jheri Redding’s wall of 406 cast wax hammers hung 11 rows high. The hammers’ hues vacillate from crimson reds, through pastels and neutrals, to phthalo greens. Also living up to the Freeman manifesto are Cal Lane‘s plasma cut steel shovels. Lane uses a plasma torch to cut ornate, lacy patterns into steel objects. More of her work can be seen at the Foley Gallery in New York.

In addition to Acres, Redding, and Lane are the following artists: Todd Squires, Jake Longstreth, Michelle Wiener, Jessica Rath, Al Farrow, Rebecca Myers and Tim Berg, Kristian Kozul, Jae Ko, Hedi Sorger, Steve Hollinger, Jeremy Thomas, Kazuo Kadonaga, Ewerdt Hilgemann, Dustin Yellin, George Herms, Chuck Arnoldi, Masami Teraoka, Ana Rodriguez, and Billy Al Bengston. The show runs through August 29th, 2009.

Beset with bling and astral opulence, Hilary Pecis‘ collages are popping up everywhere; in contemporary art blogs, and reputable print publications. Currently, the artist has work in a solo exhibition titled Intricacies of Phantom Content, on view at San Francisco’s multi-disciplinary art space, Triple Base Gallery and in the exibition Remix at Catherine Clark Gallery. Pecis is an emerging Bay Area artist whose work has been featured in Juxtapoz Magazine and twice in New American Paintings. In 2008, Pecis received the SF Examiner’s Mastermind Grant and the San Francisco Arts Commission‘s Murphy and Cadogan Fellowship. Over the past five years, while garnering awards and gallery shows, Pecis managed to complete both her BFA and MFA degrees from California College of the Arts.

Pecis entrances viewers with meticulous depictions of angular patterns, whether they are the varying facets of cut gemstones or the repetitive planes of her trademark ink doodles. She utilizes the four C’s of diamond grading in her own work: carat, cut, color, and clarity. All are working to entice and bedazzle the eye. Her collages are compositionally sound, linked by ribbons, shards, and broad patches of CMYK color. Cosmic landscapes are brimming with glimpses of society’s prized commodities, however, they are void of humanity itself. The absence of a human population evokes a post-apocalyptic feeling and causes us to contemplate the lifestyle that may very well lead to our demise.

Intricacies of Phantom Content will be on display at Triple Base until July 26th. A video Installation by Elyse Mallouk, Trickle-down: Yours for the Mining, accompanies the exhibit in the gallery’s basement. In addition, Pecis and Mallouk will curate a performance series throughout the month of July. The closing reception is on Sunday, July 26th from 3-6pm. There will be special performances by Raphael Noz & Trap Doors (Michael Guidetti.)

Survival Game , Misako Inaoka‘s, motley menagerie of animal hybrids, is currently on display through June 20th at the David Salow Gallery in Los Angeles, CA. The gallery is lined with tiny eye-level platforms staging metallic conglomerations in mid-stride. Perhaps they are on their way to complete utilitarian tasks for which their bodies have evolved industrial, and sometimes, military adaptations. Two chess boards complete with sets of dueling pawns, rooks, queens, knights, and bishops are also included in the show.

Inaoka creates these miniatures by seamlessly fusing plastic and rubber toys. She applies a metallic finish that enhances the textural details of the figurines and gives them the initial appearance of cast metal. Sometimes, she even uses battery operated motion sensors that detect changes in light or sound. As a result, when viewing Survival Game, a bird-walrus-chimpanzee with a shark on its rear end may begin to wiggle and chirp as you approach. But, Inaoka doesn’t need bells and whistles to entice viewers. She taps into the endless possibilities of adaptive radiation, a principle of animal classification that relates to evolution and metamorphosis within a group of organisms as they adapt to new ecological environments. The creatures’ radical combinations of animal species and man-made mechanisms are a challenge to the logic of natural selection and therefore, a catalyst to the imagination. In Inaoka’s world, an inefficient adaptation as seen in Sharksend or Double Deer Horns can be an asset simply because the form is so captivating.

San Francisco galleries have been featuring Inaoka’s solo exhibits since 2002 when The Back Room Gallery presented The Microfiche. Her resume shows off an extensive list of awards, grants, and residencies ranging from her alma mater, Rhode Island School of Design‘s European Honors Program to a National Endowment for the Arts Artistic Excellence Grant for her MacDowell residency. Survival Game is Inaoka’s solo debut in southern California.

Swedish painter, Sigrid Sandstrom, exhibits twelve of her newest abstract paintings at The Company in downtown Los Angeles from March 14th through April 18th. Sandstrom’s strength is revealing the paradoxical in both painting and nature. Even the artist’s preferred technique is an oxymoron–the transparent layering of opaque whites. Decision making, editing, working, and reworking are crucial elements of Sandstrom’s finished work. She purposefully leaves behind squeegee smears, paint drips, and brush marks that not only reference her process, but also signifies her work. Milky acrylic washes, often of snowcapped mountains and angular glaciers, sit underneath layers of planar geometric shapes. The polygonal shapes contrast in a variety of ways: irregular vs. regular, convex vs. concave, and rough/torn edges vs. hard/masked edges. Though the shapes are painted, they are made to look as though they are torn paper collage, textured pieces of wood, or see-through strips of masking tape. The shapes’ faux edges are yet another reference to painterly fabrication and thus, process. In her artist statement, Sandstrom mentions ” the cumulative activity of adding layer-upon-layer is the evidential aftermath of mental engagement which, in turn, insinuates and provokes the next painterly response.” By constantly juggling interactive variables, the artist explores the self-reflexive nature of decision-making and the creative process.

In 1997, Sandstrom received her B.F.A. from Academie Minerva in The Netherlands, and in 2001, an M.F.A. in painting and printmaking from Yale University. She is the 2008 recipient of The Joan Mitchell Foundation: Painters and Sculptors Grant as well as the 2008 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship. Sandstrom’s paintings are in permanent collections at the Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; Ulrich Museum of Art, Wichita KS; and Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT. Currently, she lives and works in Stockholm.

Eye of the Needle, Eye of the Heart is a celebratory exhibition honoring the creative accomplishment of Ethiopia’s most prolific contemporary artist , Elias Sime. The scope of the work is staggering– the Santa Monica Museum‘s main gallery is completely filled with a selection of more than 100 of his mixed media pieces, all done within the last 20 years. Sime fabricates sculptures, stuffs goat skins, stitches canvases, and assembles thrones while thoroughly utilizing scraps from his surroundings. His intense labor of love elevates street culture, transforming trash and debris into treasured artifacts.

Sime was born and raised in the rough, crowded neighborhood of Cherqos, Addis Abeba, Ethiopia, where he continues to live and work. Growing up in an area known for prostitution and the sale of contraband goods could have made for a grim childhood, but instead, Sime uses the experience to gleam his artistic vision. His intense connection to life in Cherqos is integral to his work. Sime frequently depicts vibrant open market scenes, stitching texture and atmosphere with varying hues of yarn and cloth. Hand stitching is intrinsic to Sime’s process, each scrap of yarn intentionally placed and purposefully sewn with the utmost care. Buttons, plastic, clothing, and bottle caps are flawlessly embedded in his compositions. For the children of Cherqos, Sime is a true model of resourcefulness and sustainability. Enchanted youth bring weekly offerings of rusty bottle caps and street detritus that permeate his work.

Eye of the Needle Eye of the Heart, was co-curated by world renown theater director and UCLA professor, Peter Sellars and revered Ethiopian curator and anthropologist, Meskerem Assegued. Together, they chose pieces in which Sime’s subject matter, symbolism, and iconography highlight the ineffable qualities of love. His stuffed goat skins are arranged in twosomes, as if embracing or communicating tender feelings. These sculptures share the name, What Is Love?, also the title of a previous exhibit curated by Assegued in Addis Abeba in February 2008.

Many pieces from What Is Love are present in Eye of the Needle, Eye of the Heart. Sellars also worked with Sime in 2006, when he included the artist in New Crowned Hope, the Viennese festival that celebrated the 250th anniversary of Mozart’s birth. Sellars’ enthusiasm for Sime is contagious, transferred to us through his role as narrator in a documentary film that accompanies the exhibition. The acclaimed filmmakers, Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton, met Sime in Ethiopia in December 2008 to document his daily life and bring insight to his process. Faris and Dayton’s work is an integral part of the exhibition. Without their visual journal of Sime’s life, we would not understand the full extent to which he integrates life and art. Especially impressive is the footage of Sime mixing mud and straw with his feet, then using the mixture to construct the home he is currently building in Addis Abeba. Like his art, Sime’s structure is a sanctuary of affection, kinship, and underlying oneness with nature.

Encouraged by his father, Elias Sime began making art at a young age. He taught himself how to sew and repair furniture, always collecting and recycling materials along the way. In 1986, he passed the rigorous entrance exam required to attend Addis Abeba University’s School of Fine Art and Design. There, he obtained a degree in graphic design. Sime has had numerous solo shows, and has participated in many group exhibitions including the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York; the Dak’Art Biennale 2004, in Dakar, Senegal; the Zoma Contemporary Art Center and the National Museum in Addis Abeba. In mid-April, Sime’s thrones will be featured in Peter Sellars’ production of Stravinsky’s Oedipus Rex at Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles.