Tuesday, September 17, 2019

Now playing in the film nook: Verónica Vides


We are very excited to have on loan from the Mario Cader-Frech Collection the artist film- La Barrida. Now showing through October 25. Introduced to us by curator Clair Breukel, from Yes Contemporary

















Veronica Vides
La Barrida
Video
Duration: 3 mins
On loan from the Mario Cader-Frech Collection
“La Barrida” depicts a group of twenty ex-combatants, each of whom suffered immense hardship during the Salvadoran Civil War (1979-1991), sweeping the ruins of the Aguacayo church. The church is in ruins, and is one of many living examples of the destruction caused by armed conflict in the country. The video proposes that the activity of cleaning could somehow improve the situation, but in the end the action only serves to absurdly multiply the dirt, adding to the burden.  
Verónica Vides
La Barrida
Video
Duración: 3 minutos
Préstamo de la Colección Mario Cader-Frech
"La Barrida" representa a un grupo de veinte excombatientes, cada uno de los cuales sufrió enormes dificultades durante la Guerra Civil Salvadoreña (1979-1991), barriendo las ruinas de la iglesia de Aguacayo. La iglesia está en ruinas, y es uno de los muchos ejemplos vivientes de la destrucción causada por el conflicto armado en el país. El video propone que la actividad de limpieza podría de alguna manera mejorar la situación, pero al final la acción solo sirve para multiplicar absurdamente la suciedad, lo que aumenta la carga.
 About the artist:

Verónica Vides (El Salvador, 1970) 
Veronica Vides is a Salvadoran artist with a background in Graphic Design. An early accolade included winning first place at the JUANNIO art contest in Guatemala in 2003. That same year she was invited to participate in Arte Paiz Biennial and HABITART in El Salvador. In 2004, Vides received honorable mention at the IV Central American Biennial, and in 2010 was selected to participate in the 1st Triennial of the Caribbean, Dominican Republic as well as the VII Central American Biennial. In 2011, Vides participated in CHANGE at the World Bank in Washington, D.C., USA , and in 2014 was awarded the Honor Prize at Salón Artes Plásticas in Esquel, Argentina. In 2016 she participated in the Plan de Evasion residency at the Tunca Foundation, and the X Biennial of Central America in Costa Rica.  In 2018, Vides participated in the exhibition Donde hubo fuego… at Museum of Art in El Salvador (MARTE).
Her artwork is part of many public collections, including: Ministerio Relaciones Exteriores, México; World Bank, USA; MADC and TEOR/éTica in Costa Rica; Museum of Art in El Salvador Collection; and the Ortiz Gurdián Foundation Collection, Nicaragua.  Currently, she lives and works in Patagonia, Argentina.

Verónica Vides (El Salvador, 1970)
Verónica Vides es una artista Salvadoreña con experiencia en Diseño Gráfico. Uno de los primeros galardones que recibió  fue ganar el primer lugar en el concurso de arte JUANNIO en Guatemala en 2003. Ese mismo año fue invitada a participar en la Bienal Arte Paiz y HABITART en El Salvador. En 2004, Vides recibió mención honorífica en la IV Bienal Centroamericana, y en 2010 fue seleccionado para participar en la 1ra Trienal del Caribe, República Dominicana, así como en la VII Bienal Centroamericana. En 2011, Vides participó en CHANGE en el Banco Mundial en Washington, D.C., EE. UU., Y en 2014 recibió el Premio de Honor en Salón Artes Plásticas en Esquel, Argentina. En 2016 participó en la residencia Plan de Evasion en la Fundación Tunca y en la X Bienal de América Central en Costa Rica. En 2018, Vides participó en la exposición Donde hubo fuego... en el Museo de Arte de El Salvador (MARTE).
Su obra de arte es parte de muchas colecciones públicas, entre ellas: Ministerio Relaciones Exteriores, México; Banco Mundial, Estados Unidos; MADC y TEOR / éTica en Costa Rica; Museo de Arte en la Colección El Salvador; y la Colección de la Fundación Ortiz Gurdián, Nicaragua. Actualmente, ella vive y trabaja en la Patagonia, Argentina.


Friday, September 6, 2019

Considering color and aesthetics in the artwork of Nicole Galluccio.

















Looking at a painting by Nicole Galluccio induces a feeling of calmness and joy. With everything going on in the world right now, this is exactly what I needed to see. When you walk into her studio you walk into a bold, bright flower garden [evoked by her paintings] with a hot pink floor, and leave unexpectedly, with a smile on your face.

This is no accident. The work is process oriented. She established her painting practice on Color theory, which is the combination of art and science that determines what colors look good together. The bold designs mimic the color wheel and are rooted in the philosophy of aesthetics; studying how the mind and emotions appreciate beauty.

Her work references nature. Emerson said, “The simple perception of natural forms is a delight.” Nature dazzles the senses (Popejoy). Galluccio relies on this by using reoccurring motifs of flowers, sunshine rays, and character art based on wildlife. Everyone loves a good Disney film and her bird characters could be plucked right out of a Snow white picture. She relies heavily on geometric structure and often references the mandala, which denotes the universe in Buddhist symbolism.















Flowers have been one of the most beloved subjects to paint throughout art history.  From Bosschaert and Cassatt to Warhol and Quinn you can find many styles and techniques using flowers. The latter most resembling Galluccio’s intentions. Investigating contemporary artists, and looking at some of Galluccio’s older works [that include collage], my mind immediately references Brazilian artist Beatriz Milhazes. Mihazes also utilizes a rigorous geometric structure with recurring motifs. Like Galluccio, Milhazes feels her technique is most important to the work. Milhazes work intentionally creates a visual dissonance so the “viewer has something to do” when looking at the work. Galluccio’s work has the opposite, calming effect, but has similar qualities.




Moving on to Galluccio’s newer works, which include a smiling sun and flowers, I am of course instantly reminded of Takashi Murakami’s work. His work has historical techniques but heavily references pop culture, anime and cartoons which is directly in line with what I see in Galluccio’s work. I am drawn to the flatness of her work. The comic, printmaking techniques she achieves with a paintbrush are impressive. No one does a black line [freehand] better than she does. Murakami coined the term "superflat", which describes both the aesthetic characteristics of the Japanese artistic tradition and the nature of post-war Japanese culture and society. The artwork of Nicole Galluccio fits nicely into this contemporary art movement.





































In the modern world artists are pushed to market themselves and sell their artistic output [Conversation]. Marketing yourself is now a necessity. Galluccio is well on her way to establishing herself as a brand. She not only paints, but also does an array of products [jewelry, furniture, and clothing]. Murakami has established himself as a pioneer of promoting art as a brand (Artnet). It will be interesting to see her development and collaborations if she continues moving in this direction.


















For more information about Nicole Gallucio you can find her at the following
Instagram:  @nicolegalluccioart


The John D. MacArthur Campus Library will be hosting a small exhibition of her work 
Nov 15 – Jan 10, 2019(20)                                                                                    

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Artist spotlight: Jackie Kern




I would like to introduce you to the artist Jackie Kern. Although we have been working with Kern for years and have showcased her earlier work, I feel the summer of 2019 marks the point in Jackie Kern's art career where she found her voice. The current body of work fits into the category of Abstract Expressionism.

There are two type of abstract painters: the action ones like Jackson Pollock who seem manic and attack the work with big gesture and color. Then the second type, often referred to as the color field painters such as Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman. They were more interested in allegory and the response of the audience to their work.

Looking at her new body of work, I can see hints of both styles of abstract expressionism. There are some similarities to Lee Krasner and even Willem De Kooning, but Kern’s color palette is more reminiscent of the primitivism movement or indigenous works of art. This immediately attracts me to the work.  In her work Remembrance [shown above], I can see some of the frantic emotional input with her ink scribble lines and her repetitive oval shapes. With Declaration [shown below], she also utilized very bold frantic outlines surrounding her reoccurring oval shapes. In all of these works I see a deeper, implied use of shape that in my mind conjures human forms. Regardless if this is Intentional by Kern or invented by my penchant for narrative work; I react with an emotional response to her work that does not happen with most abstract expressionist work.

I feel this body of work is more contemporary than the past abstract expressionists. I can see similarities to Justine Hill’s work. Her work combines Abstract Expressionism, Minimalism, and Primitivism. She uses misshapen canvases that ultimately turn her abstract works into creatures. Her bold use of lines and limited color palette remind me of Kern’s work.

This library has a very special history with contemporary art. After having several long conversations with a retired Harvard Literature professor, Benito Rakower, I introduced this new body of work to him. He had the same reaction as I did. Rakower spoke highly of the work, “I immediately understood Kern to be an intelligent painter and very skilled. She understands what she is painting and teaches us to understand her work by the mark making and decisive style of the work”. He also saw the human figure and stories enmeshed within the abstraction of the work.

Enjoy more images of the new work below:




Dr. Jaqueline Kern
BFA [Painting/Drawing] Purchase College State Univ. of NY
MS Education [concentration in visual arts] Univ. of North Dakota
PhD Teaching & Learning [concentration in visual arts] Univ. of North Dakota
Artist website: www.jackiekern.com

Artist Statement
The formal work that I have created throughout my professional career contained imagery of places, objects, people, and animals heightened by bright colors, expressive lines, and vibrant patterns. As I approach this next phase of work, the places, objects, people, and animals have disappeared to reveal my focus on colors, lines, and forms. My emphasis on the nonobjective (devoid of people, places, and things) seeks to explore and express the dimensions of feelings without the trappings of recognizable imagery. Unburdened with having to recreate recognizable imagery from life, I feel most free. In this freedom, the compositions unfold on the canvas and paper in fresh, lively, and authentic statements—raw, honest, open, unfussed with, primitive, and sophisticated. 



Monday, August 5, 2019

Exploring character development in the art works of Dana Donaty

Written by Diane Arrieta

             Dana Donaty. Maestro. Acrylic on canvas. 2016


When you first encounter the work of Dana Donaty, you are hit with a profusion of color and fairytale-like narratives that explode on her canvases. It takes a while to settle into one of her paintings. But when you do, you can get lost for hours discovering the characters and the stories summoned by her stockpiled memories. How did they get there? Do they exist outside of Donaty’s paintings and imagination? Why are some of them so familiar to us?

To examine how her character art becomes transformed into picture, there are two important aspects of the work that must be examined: the how and the why. Many artists focus on the “how” they make their art, while others focus on the “why” they make their art. Donaty’s work demands viewers to examine both the how and the why. The process and the purpose of her work are rooted in her cultural identity of growing up in an American nuclear family. This idea is very apparent when studying the work of artist Jaune Quick-to-See Smith. Her cultural identity and socio-political views are embedded in her art and cannot be separated (Quick-to-See Smith, 2019). Although Donaty employs a more subtle approach with her social views, the how and the why should not be separated when considering Donaty’s work.


An overview of Character Art:

Character art refers to an original figure that an artist, illustrator or animated film designer creates from scratch. The concept, style, physical characteristics and personality traits of the character (human or otherwise) are all decided by the designer. Developing a new character requires the artist to embark on “a creative dive into the unknown and from the abyss, pull out a new design” (Concept Art Empire, 2019).

There is no wrong way to approach character development, and each artist or designer settles into their own methods. They gain inspiration everywhere from animated film, television, advertisements, cereal boxes, and more (Creative Blog, 2019). Designing a 2-D character is slightly different than designing for an animated 3-D film. For a painting, the artists needs to consider one angle. A 3-D character requires the character to be seen from all angles. One interesting aspect of Donaty’s art is that her characters begin flat in the painting; however, she also explores bringing them to life outside of the painting into the 3-D realm. One of her first characters that has made the leap outside of a painting is Captain Money Pants (shown below). Donaty is currently working toward bringing several of her characters to life by means of a variety of different mediums.
                                                                  


                                                                            Captain Money, Pants. Mixed Media. 2017

The How:

Indulging a Donaty painting begins with exploring her unique process of employing Visual Pareidolia.  “Pareidolia is the interpretation of previously unseen and unrelated objects as familiar due to previous learning” (Akdeniz, et al., 2018). Pareidolia in the visual arts has been discussed since the time of Leonardo da Vinci (McCurdy, 1923) and is still in use today by several contemporary artists. Artist Gigi Chen, an animator and painter uses nature and urban artifacts when she engages her version of pareidolia to her work (Chen, 2019). Italian artist Maggio uses coffee stains for the base of his work (Maggio, nd) and Illustrator Keith Larson also develops characters out of inanimate urban objects he encounters (Marini, 2017).

The scientific reasoning for the phenomenon of pareidolia stems from the fact that our brains use parallel processing. We find patterns and make associations that are sifted through our memory. This is an active constructive process. We quickly find a possible match and assign it a name. For example when you see a duck in the clouds. You assign it that name, and the brain fills in the details to make the cloud resemble your assigned name for it (Allen, 2018).

Donaty’s process begins each painting with a large canvas on the ground used as a drop cloth where splattered paint, offloading of brushes and dirty water are all caught on this blank canvas as she paints on a separate canvas above it. The backstory of this process relates to her practical physician father and his “waste not want not” conditioning of Donaty, when she worked in his medical office as a child. Because of her upbringing, she now recycles everything. This has had a direct influence on her art practice and character development.

The process of employing visual pareidolia for her character development, begins when she lifts the dirty canvas up onto the wall as the base for her next work of art (illustrated below). She stands back and starts to explore the emerging characters that form a narrative for the work. She chalks them out and then constructs a guided storyline.



                                                        Studio shot: Dana Donaty Fine Art
                             
Just like the visual development artists at Disney animation studios, Donaty is a master at manipulating her pictorial environment while her characters form an emotional connection (Disney, 2019) through her technical prowess with a brush. She manipulates the scene to direct the viewer on the start of a magical journey that leads wherever their own imagination and social recall takes them. As the story develops, Donaty always adds in a larger than life human into the mix. The characters determine the providence of her humans within the context of the painting.

The why:

As stated above, inspiration for character development can come from a wide variety of sources and stored memory. One aspect to understanding the context of the character worlds found in a Donaty painting requires consideration of the impact American television has had on culture and society (Novak Djokovic Foundation, nd). Early television programming during the 60s and 70s, was created for the presumed White audience. It intentionally avoided social issues and real-life concerns in order to not offend or alienate viewers (Encyclopedia.com, 2019). Conversely, popular in that time were Saturday morning cartoons. Cartoons teach kids how things function in real life, while offering ways of dealing with difficult situations (Novak Djokovic Foundation, nd).

The most prevalent shows for adults of that era were domestic comedies—generic, character-based shows set within the home (UMass, 2019). Donaty was being conditioned to avoid conflict through comedy, but was also given the license to add in social commentary, predisposed by weekly cartoons. After interviewing Donaty in a recent studio visit, she mentioned two main influences that were core to her childhood memory: Carol Burnett and Charles Schultz. 

Carol Burnett broke a lot of barriers in society by starring in her own variety show, and today is viewed as a feminist comedic hero. Not by the content or intent of her show, but by the mere fact that she was fearless and did what no other women were doing at the time (Duca, 2015). Donaty grew up watching Burnett’s cast of fictional characters act out scenarios for a big laugh, week after week. I can see similar qualities in Donaty herself—bucking the trends in the art world and sticking with her often underestimated character world. Her paintings are a kind of variety show with each painting a new episode of zany scenes and characters offering Donaty’s take on society.

There have been many cultural studies on how humor can be a tool that helps people deal with complex and often contradictory messages in our brains (Weems, 2014).  Donaty’s paintings can be viewed as ordered chaos. At first confusing, but looking closer, you start to see familiar faces and text integrated into a burst of color. It offers an entry point of exploration through a societal lens of icons and meanings derived from our collective consciousness [Sociology Index, 2001].

Humor as an artistic tool has been used throughout art history. When we look at the work of John Baldessari, his humor calls attention to existing absurdities (Mizota, 2010). Artists have been using objects as joke since the infamous Duchamp urinal, while Richard Prince recasts found objects to make us rethink how culture operates (Lee, 2017). The one artist that gives off the same vibe as Donaty is David Shrigley. As Lee states, his works are true and relatable as much as they are discomforting and just plain weird (Lee, 2017). One could have similar feelings about a Donaty painting.
Charles Schultz, creator of the famous Peanuts comic strip and subsequent television shows, is part of most [White] American family memories. What most people didn’t realize, is that Schultz was very religious. “By mixing Snoopy with spirituality, he made his readers laugh while inviting them into a depth of conversation uncommon to the funny pages” (Merritt, 2016).
                           

                                           Dana Donaty. Top Dog. 60 x 48 inches. Acrylic on canvas

Many of Shultz’s comics were cryptic and with blanks where the audience must fill in the gaps. As Merritt states, “the result is that readers become participants of the strip’s conversation instead of merely spectators” (Merritt, 2016). The same can be said about Donaty’s works. They are starting points for stories that can be directed by the viewer. We can see this in the work pictured above (Top Dog). It could have several different interpretations. Is the human the corporate pied piper calling on the masses to follow along, or are the characters critics analyzing the musician’s performance? The possibilities are endless and open to interpretation. Donaty sneaks in clever text and images that need to be deciphered by the viewer. There is even reference [in Top Dog] to Marcel Duchamp and the Mona Lisa, with the L.H.O.O.Q. text providing a glimpse into the understated humor of Donaty.

The characters in Schultz’s body of work are immediately endearing. They give hope, but at the same time offer a bit of skepticism. Donaty’s characters do the same. From Captain Money Pants to hints of Donald Duck and Yosemite Sam, the viewer instantly becomes reminiscent of their own childhood that these invented and borrowed characters conjure up. The added text and scenes often have a bite like the cynical retort found in a Peanuts comic. Schultz’s Linus character offers up “I love mankind… it’s people I can’t stand” (Charles Schultz Museum, 2011), which falls directly into the psyche of Donaty herself.

Peanuts comics are a spectacle of little children afflicted with adult concerns (Charles Schultz Museum, 2011). Donaty’s work may appeal to children at first sight, but is entertaining adults with advanced topics and subtle commentary. Just look at the sculptural Captain Money Pants’ hand gestures. Who is that directed too? Society, the art world, nay-sayers of her work? You decide. The reoccurring dollar signs in many of her paintings give a new layer of context to the work. They could allude to the consumer driven cartoons and commercials that try to sell products to children (Klein, 2010) or the money driven art world.
Donaty’s skill at using her own unique character design mingled with iconic characters of Disney and other relevant popular cartoons allows a sense of nostalgia for childhood. They do their job at creating an inviting environment to explore. Donaty offers the same journey of escapism of the comedic variety show, while proposing the chance of a larger conversation hidden within cartoons—for those willing to enter the mesmerizing world that is the art of Dana Donaty. 

References: 

Akdeniz,G., Toker, S.  and Ibrahim Atli , 2018. Neural mechanisms underlying visual pareidolia processing: An fMRI study. Pakistan Journal of Medical Sciences, 31 Dec. 2018, p. 1560. Health Reference Center Academic,  http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A565606403/HRCA?u=gale15691&sid=HRCA&xid=2681521e . [Accessed 6/18/2019].

Allen, M., 2018. This Is the Evolutionary Reason We Often See Human Faces Not on Humans. Inverse.com. Online. Available at: https://www.inverse.com/article/49527-what-is-pareidolia  [Accessed on 6/28/2019].

Charles Schultz Museum, 2011. Peanuts Philosophies. Online. Available at: https://schulzmuseum.org/explore/press-room/peanuts-philosophies/   [Accessed on 6/27/2019].

Chen, G., 2009. Seeing Things in Things. Artist Network. Online. Available at: https://www.artistsnetwork.com/art-subjects/seeing-faces-in-objects-pareidolia-gig-chen/ [Accessed on 6/26/2019].
Concept Art Empire, 2019. What is Character Design? And What Does A Character Designer Do?. Online. Available at: https://conceptartempire.com/character-design/   [Accessed on 6/28/2019].

Creative Blog, 2019. 27 top character design tips. Online. Available at: https://www.creativebloq.com/character-design/tips-5132643  [Accessed on 6/28/2019].
Disney, 2019 Visual Development. Online. Available at: https://www.disneyanimation.com/careers/opportunities/developing-appealing-characters [Accessed on 6/25/2019].

Duca, Lauren, 2015.  Carol Burnett Is A Feminist Hero Whether She Knows It Or Not. Huffington Post. Online. Available at: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/carol-burnett-feminist-hero_n_55f866a3e4b00e2cd5e835b8  [Accessed on 6/25/2019].
Encyclopedia.com, nd. "Television's Impact on American Society and Culture." Television in American Society Reference Library.  Online. Available at https://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/televisions-impact-american-society-and-culture  [Accessed on 25, 2019]

Klein, S., 2010. Study: Cartoon characters attract kids to junk food. CNN Online. Available at: http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/06/21/cartoon.characters.junk.food/index.html [Accessed on 6/28/2019].
Lee, S., 2017. LOL: A Brief History of Comedy in Art since Duchamp's "Fountain". Artspace. Online. Available at: https://www.artspace.com/magazine/art_101/lists/lol_a_brief_history_of_comedy_in_art_since_duchamps_fountain-55132 [Accessed on 6/28/2019].

Maggio, 2017. Pareidolia: I Draw The Images I See In Stains. Bored Panda. Online. Available at: https://www.boredpanda.com/pareidolic-art-drawing-on-stains-maggio-modlin/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic  [Accessed on 6/25/2019].

Marini, A., 2017. This Guy Illustrates The Faces He Sees In Inanimate Objects. A Plus. Online. Available at: https://articles.aplus.com/art-seen/keith-larsen-faces-in-inanimate-objects?no_monetization=true [Accessed on 6/26/2019].
Mizota, S., 2010. It's OK for serious art to be funny. LA Times. Online. Available at: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2010-aug-15-la-ca-art-humor-20100815-story.html [Accessed on 6/28/2019].

McCurdy, E., 1923. Leonardo Da Vinci S Note-Books Arranged And Rendered Into English. Empire State Book Company, NY, New York.

MERRITT, J., 2016. The Spirituality of Snoopy: How the faith of Charles Schulz, creator of the Peanuts comic strip, shaped his work. Online. Available at: https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2016/04/the-spirituality-of-snoopy/479664/  [Accessed on 6/27/2019].

Quick-to-See Smith, 2019. Biography. Online. Available at: https://www.jaunequicktoseesmith.org/ [Accessed on 6/28/2019].
Sociology Index, 2001. Collective Identity and Social Movements. Annual Review of Sociology, Vol. 27: 283-305 Online. Available at: http://sociologyindex.com/collective-identity.htm  [Accessed on 6/27/2019].

UMass, nd. The Relationship Between Television and Culture. UNDERSTANDING MEDIA AND CULTURE: AN INTRODUCTION TO MASS COMMUNICATION. Class Notes. University of Massachusetts. Online. Available at: https://open.lib.umn.edu/mediaandculture/chapter/9-2-the-relationship-between-television-and-culture/ [Accessed on 6/25/2019].

Weems, Scott, 2014. Ha! The science of when we laugh and why. Basic Books. New York, N.Y.

Author Biography
Diane Arrieta is the Outreach and exhibitions coordinator at the John D. MacArthur Campus Library at Florida Atlantic University. She has been curating contemporary exhibitions since 2005. Arrieta, a visual artist herself, works with sculpture, video and illustration. She is currently exploring environmental themes in her work. Arrieta was born and raised in Western Pa, now living in South Florida. She holds a BFA in ceramic sculpture from Florida Atlantic University and an MSc in Biodiversity and Wildlife Health from the University of Edinburgh, U.K.
Personal website: http://www.birdsarenice.com

Artist information
Dana Donaty
Dana Donaty was raised in New Jersey, coming with a unique blend of Colombian, Peruvian, Italian, Irish and American backgrounds. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Drawing from Moore College of Art & Design in Philadelphia, PA. After living in London, England for twelve years she relocated in 2006 to Florida, where she now lives and works.

Friday, August 2, 2019

SHIFT by Jaun Carlos Zaldivar and Phonograph Films

After a short summer hiatus, our film nook returns to kick off the fall semester with an amazing film short by Juan Carlos Zaldivar. The film will be showing through September.



Cuban-born, Zaldívar lives and works in the United States. Zaldivar completed both an BFA and a Masters of Fine Arts at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, and also taught as an adjunct faculty there. He is tenured as full-time faculty at Miami International University's Institute of Art and Design. Zaldivar started a film career as a sound editor and designer, and worked in Academy Nominated films such as Ang Lee's "Sense and Sensibility;" "On the ropes" and on HBO’s America Undercover, for which he garnered an Emmy nomination.

He has had video art works  screened at many festivals worldwide and broadcast on PBS, ABC, IFC, Showtime and WE. Zaldivar has also  received numerous grants and awards. His directing credits include "90 Miles" (PBS), "The Story of the Red Rose" (Showtime), "Palingenesis" and "Soldiers Pay" (IFC), co-directed with David O. Russell (Three Kings, The Fighter) and Tricia Regan (Autism, the musical). Zaldivar  has served as a Juror for several mayor film festivals including the Sundance International Film Festivaland is a Sundance Film Institute alumnus.

He recently tenured with Doc Society (previously Britdoc Foundation) as the Outreach Director for Good Pitch Miami 2017 https://goodpitch.org/events/gpmia2017;  associate produced the theatrical feature doc "Buena Vista Social Club, Adios" 2017; co-produced the VR film "A history of Cuban dance" (Sundance & SXSW 2016); is currently touring "SwampScapes” a VR experience with Elizabeth Miller and Kim Grinfeder; and is producing Phonograph Films' first fiction feature film.

ARTIST STATEMENT
My film and visual art projects explore the transformation of physical form --and our perceptions of it. My work is often interactive. I am interested in the relationship between nature and artificiality because it often triggers larger questions about our humanity.

I do experiments with light, sound and kinetics, which are what films and videos are made of. I do this because film and video are optical illusions, yet they are widely accepted as veridic or “truthful” in our culture and have become an integral to how we understand and create our reality. My work explores the tension between reality (which may be subjective and often relates to perception) and actuality (which often relates to the effect of actions of a body in existence). I find that a dialogue between these two elements often spins other dialogues regarding identity, history, transculturalism and acceptance at large.

I apply these notions to places and bodies as well. I believe that humor is often the best tool to communicate complex ideas and concepts. I like loose narratives. I love Butoh dance and time-lapse animation (both of which deconstruct movement and time, respectively). I respect the defining properties of negative space and the invisible. This includes sound and magnetism, which often create fantastic and bewildering effects.

I worked as a sound editor and designer for many years. I often do not use sound in my video
installations, but when I do, it is an essential part of the work.

Artist Website here and here



Tuesday, May 21, 2019

Jeanne Jaffe at Arts Warehouse in Delray Beach

This is a repost of an event listing at the Arts Warehouse from their website


Jeanne Jaffe “Past, Present…”

April 20 - May 29

 

A solo Exhibition by Installation and Sculpture Artist, Jeanne Jaffe, titled “Past, Present…”

How people create meaning from the complexity of sensation, memory, myth, and cultural history is the overarching theme of all of Jaffe’s work. Specifically, Jaffe uses her sculpture and installations to explore how identity is constructed from early pre-verbal bodily experience, and later influences of language and culture. The work selected for “Past, Present…” are examples of this exploration.
The pre-verbal sculptures give concrete form to intangible sensations and early bodily experiences by creating hybrid forms –fusions of animate and inanimate worlds – thus appearing simultaneously familiar, yet strange. Throughout Jaffe’s more recent body of work, well-known folktales, history, and poetry are re-imagined through a contemporary lens. This theme is specifically showcased in the “Past, Present…” exhibition as an installation based on poet T. S. Eliot’s “Four Quartet’s”, a Buddhist-like meditation about letting go of all attachments.

Jeanne Jaffe is a multi-disciplinary artist who is Professor Emeritus in Multi-disciplinary Fine Arts at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, a visiting artist/professor at Xian Academy of Fine Arts in China each fall and the coordinator of International Projects at the Jaffe Center for Book Arts. Ms. Jaffe is the recipient of fellowship grants from the Gottlieb Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, the Mid Atlantic/NEA, Mino Artist Residency in Japan, the Leeway Foundation and the Virginia A. Groot Foundation among many others. Works by Ms. Jaffe were reviewed in Art in America, Sculpture Magazine, and exhibited both nationally and internationally.

Special Programming: During the run dates of the Exhibition, Jaffe will be working onsite in a gallery-adjacent studio space for a two-week Residency Exchange, May 13th – May 27th 2:30pm – 6pm most days. If you’d like to confirm if Jaffe is in the gallery, please call ahead. Visitors will have the opportunity to watch Jaffe at work in the studio, study her process, and use of materials and even contribute to the work. Her focus during the Residency Exchange will be completing one piece for Past, Present…, which will be continuously installed and added on to in the gallery during the residency period. This piece will involve participation from the public visiting the gallery as it progresses. Viewers can become collaborators, and create fragments to be used in future work displayed in the exhibition. In-Gallery Hours will be posted soon!

Workshop: Jaffe will be hosting a Shadow Puppet Workshop on May 21st from 6 PM – 9 PM. Register for this class through Eventbrite by clicking here.


Jeanne Jaffe is part of our Jaffe Collection family at FAU libraries. She is the Coordinator of International Programs. You can find out more about the Jaffe Collection by following this link.