2015 Exhibitions

 
Thirty-Six Views of the Bay Bridge by David Garnick

Thirty-Six Views of the Bay Bridge by David Garnick

December 12, 2015 - January 10, 2016
Gallery Walk & Talk, December 13, 2 pm
Reception: December 12, 5-7 pm

David Garnick’s series of photographs, Thirty-Six Views of the Bay Bridge, is inspired by a long tradition of artists who work in series to investigate a subject from multiple vantage points. In the 1830’s Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai published Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji, (a series of woodblock prints which includes the famous The Great Wave off Kanagawa, the first and best-known in the series). Garnick’s work carries on this tradition, with the Bay Bridge as his muse. The bridge is a constant visual anchor to life around it in his photographs, the iconic form sometimes dominating the landscape, at other times barely visible. Garnick’s technique for producing his series is digital, but his treatment of colors evokes the look of The Detroit Publishing Company’s photochrom postcards from the early 1900’s which grew out of the rich tradition of block printing. davidgarnick.photography

 
The American Car: A Family Portrait by Gale S. McKee

The American Car: A Family Portrait by Gale S. McKee

December 12, 2015 - January 10, 2016
Ron Collins Gallery
Reception: December 12, 5-7 pm

Gale S. McKee’s exhibit titled The American Car: A Family Portrait is inspired by vintage photographs of families, couples, and even dogs standing in front of their cars. McKee enlarges each photo, prints it on canvas and then starts to imagine and create the life of the people in the photos. McKee uses acrylic paint in an attempt to recover the story of the lives in the photo. Some images are sentimental, while others venture into humor or fantasy. She says, “When I process these imaginings I realize how similar feelings of family and pride are a constant emotion in human lives and how transient we humans really are.” galesmckee.com

 
Fall National Juried Exhibition: Drawing

Fall National Juried Exhibition: Drawing

October 31, 2015 - December 6, 2015
All Galleries
Reception: November 7, 5-7 pm

Marin Museum of Contemporary Art presents an exhibit on Drawing with its upcoming Fall National Exhibition. The juror is Jack Fischer, owner of Jack Fischer Gallery in San Francisco. Artists from all over the country apply to be included in the exhibition. You are invited to the opening reception on Saturday, November 7th from 5-7pm.

 
SECRETS: A Juried Artists of MarinMOCA Member Show

SECRETS: A Juried Artists of MarinMOCA Member Show

October 31, 2015 - December 6, 2015
Ron Collins Gallery
Reception: November 7, 5-7 pm

MarinMOCA’s Second Annual Juried Member Exhibit will be a tool for teaching the next generation of curators. Kate Eilertsen is a visiting professor at Sonoma State University & Executive Director at Sonoma Valley Museum of Art. She will lead her students for the Fall Curatorial Practice course in the curation and installation of this member exhibition. Join us at the reception on Saturday, November 7th from 5-7pm.

 
Emerging Artists of the Bay Area Exhibition

Emerging Artists of the Bay Area Exhibition

August 29, 2015 - October 4, 2015
All Galleries
Reception: August 29, 5-7 pm

Once a year, MarinMOCA offers exposure and exhibition space to talented emerging artists of the Bay Area through an expansive exhibition in both galleries of the museum. This exhibit features the work of five Bay Area artists:
Kyong Ae Kim
Ryan Carrington
Emanuela Harris-Sintamarian
Justin Pastores
Tibor Simon-Mazula.
Be sure to come to the opening reception to meet the artists in person on August 29th, 5-7pm.

 
“Collaboration” Artists of MarinMOCA Show

“Collaboration” Artists of MarinMOCA Show

July 11, 2015 - August 16, 2015
Main Galleries
Lori Austin and Barbra Fortier
Reception Date: July 11, 5-7 pm

Each of the works in this exhibition is a collaboration between a MarinMOCA member and one or more other artists. Lori Austin and Barbra Fortier will also work together to collaborate as jurors for this exhibition.

COLLABORATION Participants:
Sharon Kuhn & Linda Colnett
Linda Mueller, Kut Mueller & Ginette King
Norma Cili & Colleen Johnson
Jonathan Hyman & Charlie Kleiman
Nancy Nelson & Janet Bogardus
Gloria Matuszewski & Sarah O'Hala
Hines & Louise Bourdages
Kathleen Lack & Leslie Anne Webb
Kathryn Cirincione & Sue Dedina
Donna Solin & Judy Barnett & Geraldine Ganun
Chuck Galvin & Anna Ladyzhenskaya
Sandi Miot & Joel Yau
Louis Bording & Lori Brunette
Beryl Miler & Lee Nisbet
Cecily O'Connor & Sonny Rose
Barbara Klare & Joanne Salz
Jean Fisher & Harriet Burge
Bernard Healey, Sarah Gorman-Brown, Carine Rosenblatt
Mia Brown & Jaqui Quintanilla
Mario Bubbo & Michael Bubbo
Heidi LaGrasta & Andrew Lindsay
Nancy Bardach
Suzanne Golt & Linda Shearin
Linda Larsen & Joan Boosey
Nini Lion & Barbara Andine Stephenson
Bob Justice & Paul Miller
Hines & Louise Bourdages
Barbara McLain & Martin Lesinski
Susan Rothschild & Carl Heyward

 
Ambassadors of Hope and Opportunity

Ambassadors of Hope and Opportunity

July 11, 2015 - August 16, 2015
Ron Collins Gallery
Lori Austin and Barbra Fortier
Reception Date: July 11

MarinMOCA will display a panel mural created by youth from Ambassadors of Hope and Opportunity. Ambassadors of Hope and Opportunity (AHO) is a 501 (c) (3) organization designed for youth, by youth, for the future of youth who are homeless or at-risk of homelessness. Their vision is to eliminate youth homelessness in suburban and rural communities nationwide by providing a trained life coach, the essential resources and leadership opportunities to become financially self-sufficient contributing adults. For more information go to www.ahoproject.org.

 
Summer National Juried Exhibition

Summer National Juried Exhibition

May 30, 2015 - July 5, 2015
Nancy Meyer, Curatorial Assistant at Los Angeles Contemporary Museum of Art.
Reception: June 6, 5- 7pm

This exhibition features 40 contemporary artists from around the nation and includes sculpture, paintings and photography. This exhibition spans two galleries and is juried by Nancy Meyer, Curatorial Assistant at LACMA.

Featured Artists:
Nancy Bardach, Fault Lines
Juline Beier, Gridlock
Mike Callaghan, 55 ains
Georgia Carbone, Form Within Form, 3x9 rows
Jeanette Carr, Autumn's Bounty
Chenhung Chen, Reading Tao Te Ching
James Cooper, White Barn #4 - Point Reyes
Jeanne Dentzel, Poppy Glade
Lynne Deutch, Cuba 1
Jacqueline Duclos, Security Blankie #6
Joan Dyer, Coffee Tree
Dale Eastman, The Tree of Life
Bernadette J. Frank, Void/Emergence (Green)
Deborah S. Friedman, Frisson
Tracy Grubbs, Lost Landscape #3
Susan Jenkins, Vista
Beverly Kumar, Frozen Beach
Carol Ladewig, Weeks 46 and 47
Jill Lear, Halter Ranch PR Oak IV 4-panel
Fei Li, Red Singing in the Void II
Lisa Lightman, Color and Line Two
Andrew Lindsay, Zimm
Mari Marks, Meditations: Solar Flare
Justin Mata, On the Highway II
Lisa McCutcheon, Pruning Day series 5
Sam Metcalf, Device for simulating the motion of a tumbleweed
Beryl Miller, Grey Series A
Jenene Nagy, b15
April Dawn, Parker Refraction (diptych)
Dave Rowe, Curved Surface
Deborah Salomon, notice
Karen Scroggs, Brown Velvet Canyon
Linghao Shen, The Scenery in Heart-Shanghai No.02
Joshua West Smith, hacha
Joshua West Smith, Untitled 2014
Susan Sternberg, Untitled (Framing Infinity), What is real space?
Joni Marie Theodorsen, Sky Specific
Terry Thompson, Grey & Yellow - Painted House Series
Sarah Tortora, Primer
Frankie Tran, Anxiety
John Turner, OCEAN
Loren Unfried, California Sun
Katharine Weber, White Mountain
Erin Wiersma, Examen 8/22/2014
Judith Williams, Conversion
Vera Ximenes, Evanescence # !
June Yokell, A path taken

AWARD WINNERS

1st Place
Curved Surface, Dave Rowe

2nd Place
Sky Specific, Joni Marie Theodorsen

3rd Place
b15, Jenene Nagy

Honorable Mention
Security Blankie #6, Jacqueline Duclos
Untitled 2014, Joshua West Smith
Ocean, John Turner

 
Main Galleries: The 6th Annual Altered Book/Book Arts Exhibition & Fundraiser

Main Galleries: The 6th Annual Altered Book/Book Arts Exhibition & Fundraiser

April 18, 2015 - May 23, 2015
Donna Seager Juror and Book Arts Talk, 4-5 p.m.
Closing Live Auction Party: May 23, 5-8 p.m.
Opening Reception: April 18, 5-7 p.m.

Come explore Altered Books and Book Arts with MarinMOCA at this well-loved annual event.

The Sixth Annual Altered Book/Book Arts Exhibition and Fundraiser displays the work of over 100 Bay Area artists who re-construct and re-work books to produce a highly entertaining and remarkably varied exhibition. Attendees are invited to bring their friends and walk around the galleries to bid on their favorite book art.

The silent auction is posted for bidding during the exhibit from April 18-May 23. It will culminate in the live closing auction on May 23rd, where the auctioneer will auction off a selected group of altered books. Wine, tasty hors d'oeuvres and desserts will be served.

A concurrent exhibition in the Ron Collins Gallery is Bookworks: San Quentin Prison Arts Project. This program of the William James Association will display artworks created by inmates at San Quentin Prison and is dedicated to providing all individuals with the most meaningful art experience possible.

This event supports the Marin Museum of Contemporary Art’s ongoing exhibitions and community programs. MarinMOCA is committed to creating a unique model that merges the talent and leadership of artists with the qualities of a museum. The Altered Book Show exemplifies MarinMOCA’s ongoing mission to connect art and artists with the greater community.



Award Winners

1st Place:
It’s Coming Undone, Sandi Miot
2nd Place:
A Lady without a Squirrel and a Starling, Linda Mueller
3rd Place:
Paper Dolls, Ginger Burrell
Honorable Mention:
Altered Specimen Series: Chorinea a. Amazon, Rhiannon Alpers
Order 2, Quadrumana, Carolyn Batchelor
Study War No More, Kathleen Edwards
Reclaiming Mein Kampf, Tara Evans
Science French, Anne Gable
Commentaries, Janet Jones
Seed Pods, Hedi Kyle
The Catcher, Andrew Lindsay
Ballast, Pat Mayer
Salvinia, Eleanor Murray
Asian Vest, Sheri Rice
Aquittal Thread, Andrew Richardson
Zielnik (Herbarium), Maria Szczodrowska
50 Shades of Gray, Jennifer Tachera
A Last Dance?, Joel Yau
Forms on My Mind, Dorothy Yuki

 
 

Ron Collins Gallery: Bookworks: San Quentin Prison Arts Project

April 18, 2015 - May 23, 2015
Closing Auction: May 23
Opening Reception: April 18

The heart of MarinMOCA is to connect the arts, community and artistic expression. This year the museum is collaborating with the San Quentin Prison Arts Project to engage the arts community.

The Prison Arts Project is a major program of the William James Association. Their vision is based on the value of providing all individuals with the most meaningful art experience possible.

Inmates are exploring arts as a means to become someone who can reconnect with the outside. They are exposed to arts programs and are more likely to adjust to life outside prison. They are also less likely to become repeat offenders. The arts become a vehicle for expression, self-identification and self-direction.

Come see this exhibit and experience how art can be transformative.

 
Legends of the Bay Area: Lawrence Ferlinghetti

Legends of the Bay Area: Lawrence Ferlinghetti

February 28, 2015 - April 5, 2015
Opening Reception: February 28, 5-7 p.m.

Opening February 28th, the Marin Museum of Contemporary Art presents the 2015 Legends of the Bay Area Exhibition featuring Lawrence Ferlinghetti, a beloved Bay Area icon since 1953. Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s work, in both literature and art, is a drive for liberation, transformation, and union—through love, literature, political struggle, nature, humor, and art. This exhibit features Ferlinghetti’s love of painting with some supportive poetry and video. Exhibit runs from February 28 - April 5, 2015. Opening reception February 28 from 5-7pm.

By his own account, Ferlinghetti’s first foray into art began in the late 1940s almost by accident while in Paris working on his doctorate in literature at the Sorbonne. A roommate left his painting equipment behind and a little dabbling turned into an obsession. For the next three and a half years, Ferlinghetti sketched from live models and attended “open studios” in Paris. In 1950, Ferlinghetti produced what he considers his first significant painting, Deux, a Surrealist reverse image inspired by Jean Cocteau. Deux will be on display at MarinMOCA. Shortly after, he moved to San Francisco and entered the arts scene.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti (born March 24, 1919) is acclaimed as a poet, painter, liberal activist, and co-founder of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers in San Francisco. Jonathan Curiel reports from SF Weekly, “If Ferlinghetti had to choose between poetry and painting, Ferlinghetti says he would choose painting.” Ferlinghetti goes on to say, “Painting is more like play than work.” For more than sixty years, he has continued his passion for image-making in paintings, drawings, prints, and mixed media works that have been widely exhibited, including a major survey exhibition in 2010 in Rome and Calabria. More locally, recent solo exhibitions include a retrospective exhibition in 2012 at the Sonoma Valley Museum of Art and a solo exhibition in 2013 at the George Krevsky Gallery.

In the 1950s, Ferlinghetti created large-scale canvases filled with big-brush body-length gestures. He admired the artists of that time during the Beat Movement, but did not take on the same dark sentiment. Ferlinghetti contributed greatly to socio-political reform, particularly in the area of free speech. However in more recent times he has moved away from art that is politically dominated.

One of the paintings on display, Mother Russia (1999), Ferlinghetti creates a looming female figure with a small bird positioned at the bottom left of the large canvas. Mother Russia is painted as an iconic figure as her face is constructed using a hammer and sickle. Birds are a symbol throughout his work and here is representative of the spirit of the woman. Ferlinghetti has always aimed for the concrete and the ineffable no matter what his subject is. Allowing his art to be intuited rather than intellectualized is essential to retain the mystery of his work.

 
Metamorphosis: MarinMOCA Member Show

Metamorphosis: MarinMOCA Member Show

January 17, 2015 - February 22, 2015
Opening Reception: January 17, 5-7 p.m.

Not only artistic change can be defined by metamorphosis, but also life, personal or political changes. Marin Museum of Contemporary Art artist members fill both the Main Gallery and the Ron Collins Gallery with art depicting the various paths of transformation. Artists are given freedom to interpret this theme as defined by their art and experience.

Some of the MarinMOCA artist members sharing their perspectives and artist techniques are Doug Wilson, Sanda Manuila and Ayris Hatton.

Doug Wilson titled his piece ’Specimen‘. He says, ”It is ceramic stoneware that has gone from mud through fire to stone, and bears the scars of human contact.“ This work is about five feet wide and its ten separate pieces make up the overall shape. Doug likes to create larger scale and multi-component ceramic artworks and also makes paintings. He has previously taught ceramics and has shown his work throughout Marin.

Both Sanda Manuila and Ayris Hatton look to the butterfly for inspiration. With a very different interpretation, each artist created beautiful works of art. Manuila’s piece ”Je Reviens“ is an oil painting on canvas, which was developed very slowly, applying paint and glazes, layer after layer. By adding multiple impressions of light, Manuila created an inner landscape from which exude an allegorical quality. The image of the butterfly unveils the story of transformation. The painting is done in a classical style, but cropping the image to show only a part of the Monarch gives it a more contemporary feel. Manuila says that butterflies remind her that ”we are all on a long journey of the soul, encountering endless turns, shifts and experiences, times of vulnerability, moments of miraculous growth. Metamorphosis is the magic that insects teach us.“

”Candle Glow“ by Ayris Hatton is purposefully kept simple featuring a lit candle with butterfly. She underpaints the form and composition then takes on the challenge of applying color in the correct value. Finally glaze is applied to enhance the color and deepen tones. Hatton draws parallels between the danger and destruction of a butterfly to a flame and the danger and destruction that is happening to nature around us. ”As I paint, I become aware of the miraculous complexity of a simple object. The object as well as the act of painting are complex, quiet, and yet profound. The process becomes a metaphor and the painting becomes a symbol for the simplicity and stillness I seek in my life.“ says Hatton.

Prize Winners:
1st: Kristin Meuser
2nd: Julia Ross
3rd: Kathleen Lack

Honorable Mention:
Lucy Arnold
Diana Liu Benet
Kathryn Cirincione-Coles
Mary Comen
Toni Denmark
Geraldine Ganun-Owens
Sharon Kyle Kuhn
Patricia Leeds
Gary Marsh
Beryl Miller
Linda Mueller
Sarah O’Hala
Deborah Sullivan
Ron Vela
Judith Williams
Doug Wilson

 
deborah sullivan: Irregularities of Attention

deborah sullivan: Irregularities of Attention

December 6, 2014 - January 11, 2015
Reception For the Artist: December 6, 4-7 p.m.

The Marin Museum of Contemporary Art at Hamilton Field in Novato will present DEBORAH SULLIVAN: IRREGULARITIES OF ATTENTION, featuring the work of Bay Area artist, Deborah Sullivan. Sullivan employs a rich symbolic vocabulary that explores concepts such as home, temporality, technology, nature, and spirituality. The broad universality and appeal of such concepts is filtered through Sullivan's unique artistic voice in mixed-media artworks characterized by a gritty texture from which faint images emerge, inviting viewers to experience each piece patiently and carefully. This dynamic exhibition will include 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional artworks, some containing photographic images that, as Sullivan puts it, serve to “bridge past and present.” There is in Sullivan's work a vulnerable, yet brave exploration of self, but her deft juggling of personal journey with universal themes results in a body of work that tells a relatable, almost stream-of-consciousness story about struggle and triumph, fear and comfort, loss and love.

Of Deborah Sullivan’s work Lonner Holden a Bay Area Poet says, “In recent works presented by MarinMOCA, Deborah Sullivan bridges past, present and future with her two and three dimensional constructions using both cameraless and electronic images, combining the detritus of life in the last two centuries with relic elements from the BIG BANG.”

Deborah Sullivan is a San Francisco Bay Area photographer and mixed media artist. She was born on the East Coast, and has a B.A. in Fine Arts from Rutgers University. She has recently participated in Bay Area solo and group shows at the O'Hanlon Center for the Arts, Falkirk Cultural Center, and MarinMOCA, where she was awarded Second place. She also participated in a national exhibition at the Encaustic Art Institute in Santa Fe, NM, where her work has been included in the permanent collection.