The term “Valley Girl” was introduced to popular culture in the early 1980s via a record by Frank Zappa and a film starring Nicolas Cage. It referred to young women from the San Fernando Valley who were portrayed as “ditzy,” “airheaded,” and committed to conspicuous...
Sara Gernsbacher’s wall works are not paintings. They are compositions of simple colors and shapes that suggest, rather than indicate, juxtapositions, combinations, interconnections, meldings and separations. Spray painted, trimmed and further layered, they evoke a...
“Inter-Natural,” the title of Patricia Piccinini’s solo exhibition, links two ideas, “inter” implying spaces between, and “natural” the realm of unspoiled nature. For over two decades, the Australian artist has been exploring just this liminal space, where nature...
The two-person exhibition, “The End & The Beginning,” with works by Berlin-based, Canadian visual artist Alice Gibney and multimedia American artist Sarah Irvin, addresses themes of life and death. Irvin’s work in the exhibit revolves around her experience of...
Beverly Pepper's renown for large-scale outdoor sculptures makes her lesser-known small works seem particularly fresh and intimate. "New Particles from the Sun" features 25 modestly-sized indoor sculptures, mostly on pedestals, and a larger one in the courtyard at...
“Parergon,” a two-part exhibition at Blum & Poe, puts a spotlight on an influential yet unfamiliar era of Japanese contemporary art of the 1980s and ’90s that was shaped by political, economic, and social upheaval. Curated by Mika Yoshitake, the show offers a...
One transparent parabolic-lens sculpture by Fred Eversley offers a dynamic experience. Ten offer something closer to awe. Individually, they call forth orbicular celestial bodies; en masse, they encompass a galaxy of evocations. Each of his untitled resin sculptures...
Drawing parallels between seashells, glass and the human body, Kelly Akashi's exhibition, "Figure Shifter," is a mystical mise-en-scène whose cryptic press release reads as a brief fairytale written in the first person by some mythical spiritual entity. This dimly lit...
Emily Fromm’s solo exhibition currently on display at 111 Minna Gallery, “No Vacancy,” is the painter’s comic-book style depiction of bustling corners of San Francisco. The exhibition shows over 40 works from the California native painter who studied at San Francisco...
A mood of musing remembrance pervades "Rearranging My Furniture," Farnaz Shadravan's show presenting sculptural reconfigurations of household items. In Shadravan's hands, parts of once-utilitarian objects such as chairs and doors become meditative totems of...
“Take My Money / Take My Body” at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions is Narei Choi and Nicolas Orozco-Valdivia’s conceptually ambitious curatorial debut as a collaborators. As contemporary Korean pop music was expressly manufactured to generate the global fanaticism...
Helen Lundeberg (1908-1999) wrote in 1942 that her aim was "to calculate, and reconsider, every element in a painting with regard to its function in the whole organization." The renowned Post-Surrealist's precision of shape, color and composition is amply displayed in...
Paige Jiyoung Moon's small-sized acrylic paintings on canvas and panel (all between 6 and 18 inches square) are expansive narratives. Beautifully rendered in exacting detail, they depict everyday moments that, like going on a hike or hanging out with a friend, are...
Almost always, recognizing something as “beautiful” comes automatically, instantly—handed to you by a long function of evolution, culture and memory. Yet, at much slower rate, observation can generate a more conscious kind of awe, especially in nature, where hidden...
"A Piebald Era" at Garis & Hahn showcases Lisa Adams' latest explorations of painting's potential for capturing modern life's contradictions and irrationalities. Evoking derelict urban landscapes filtered through surreal reveries, Adams' new paintings lead viewers...
Jane Brucker’s work has often revolved around memory and how it resides in objects, especially objects that have been worn or used by people we have known. Incorporating notions of ephemerality and decay, her work has a poignancy that touches on our sense of loss. ...
The first thing one notices upon entering Caitlin Cherry's show at Luis De Jesus is her sensational palette so improbable that it seems to have dropped from outer space. Clashing vibrant colors contrast, oscillate and dazzle as though her paintings were a laser light...
African painter Amoako Boafo is bringing a fresh and unique perspective to portraiture and figurative painting. Based in Vienna since about 2014, the young Ghanaian is now showing a series of new works titled “Black Diaspora” that cast a subtle, but probing look at...
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