Oakland Museum

BARTed to Oakland for dinner on a recent Thursday, and decided to go early and tie in a stop at the 12^th St BART Station, to see the Oakland Museum and the June Steingart Gallery at Laney College.      
        
After hearing so much about Oakland revival, I was surprised to find not much going on in the whole neighborhood except a sidewalk garage sale with many unique items.    Few people were in the Oakland museum.

Sculptors and stained glass artists speak highly of the Laney art program.   I was disappointed to find the open til 5PM Steingart Gallery at Laney was already closed at 3PM.  The Laney web site does say hours are subject to change.   After making a call to the number listed on the gallery page of the web site, I was informed that is not the number to call nor is the correct one available.   My thoughts drifted to all the welcoming Academy of Art galleries in SF, their MFA shows, etc.    

Future art trips to Oakland:  First Friday Art Walk of Oakland Art Murmur.  

Looking at map of Oakland Art Murmur made my head hurt, and also begged the question, is it called Art Mumu in Honolulu? 

From the murmurmap, it looks like the art movement is moving away from Oakland museum and nearby Laney College.  

I had not been to the Oakland Museum in a long time.  It is much larger than I remembered, with extensive grounds.   As the Museum’s primary focus is education and California history, I sped through those sections, having temporarily reached my limit recently through books, documentaries and other sources.      I stopped at one room with kids flopped on beanbags on the floor. They seemed to be enjoying a full wall video of what it is like to see the ocean from a slowly rocking boat, known in the interactive education arena as a seasick-o-tron.   Woozy from standing on the deck of the boat, I staggered from the room, holding the wall along the way to the coastal tide pool and beach found plastics collection, before heading to my favorite exhibits at the museum:

• Paintings by David Park and others with similar style 

• Inspiration Points: Masterpieces of California Landscape   now through Sunday, January 4, 2015

 

• The Smallest of Worlds    through August 31, 2014   dioramas from the collection of San Francisco artist Rex May, with figures created by the Aguilar family, artisans from Oaxaca, Mexico 

2013 SF Gate article about Rex May collection at SF Mexican Museum  

The upcoming SFMOMA collaborative Fertile Ground: Art and Community in California  opens September 20, 2014, runs through April 12, 2015 at Oakland Museum, 1000 Oak Street, Oakland, CA 94607

Posted by Phil Gravitt

2013 is off and running

I've written several columns for the Examiner, finished several pastel pieces and am now working on this watercolor/ink piece. After working small for so long, it's fun to work more loosely in a larger format. I just might call this guy "Hangover man" but I'm open to any suggestions.

New pieces at the Examiner: http://www.examiner.com/article/getty-museum-to-return-terracotta-head-of-the-greek-god-hades-to-sicily

http://www.examiner.com/article/second-burgulary-at-the-oakland-museum-less-than-two-months

http://www.examiner.com/article/coming-to-the-asian-2013

http://www.examiner.com/article/vermeer-s-girl-with-a-pearl-earring-coming-to-the-de-young-january-2013

Looking back at the year in art

"God created the Maharajas to provide a spectacle to humanity” wrote Rudyard Kipling, and the Asian did justice to his observation in their next big show, "Maharaja, Splendors of Indian's Royal Courts. There wasn’t an object in the show that wasn't embellished, inlaid with gems and gold, looped with sapphires and diamonds or outlined with pearls.The gaudy display was a reminder that today's 1% aren't alone in ignoring the misery outside their  mansions. 

The FAMSF gave us a feast of European art - from Pissarro to the splendors of the old masters to the subtle skill of 17th century Dutch painting in the Von Otterloo collection. 

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/masterworks-from-the-dutch-golden-age-at-the-legion-of-honor

Pissarro is probably the least well know of the impressionists and the show displayed his humanistic look at family, friends and the working people of the day as well as his political radicalism.

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/pissarro-s-people-at-the-legion

The behemoth blockbuster of the year was the two-museum tribute to the Stein family. Most of us know of Gertrude, the contrary, cantankerous and sometimes charming women who is notorious for saying 'There is no there, there" when referring to Oakland. Using a wealthy of archival material, the show brought to life her and Alice and a multitude of the famous and infamous of the Parisian avant-guard for decades.

 Right across the road, at SFMOMA was an eloquent tribute to the family as art collectors. Seldom have so few bought so much art with so little money. It's difficult to say which is more amazing - the low prices paid for now priceless paintings by Cezanne, Picasso and Matisse or the Steins' (particularly Sarah Stein's) courageous support of art that was then new, provocative and revolutionary.

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/masterworks-from-the-dutch-golden-age-at-the-legion-of-honor

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/the-steins-collect-matisse-picasso-the-parisian-avant-garde-review

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/seeing-gertrude-stein-five-stories-at-the-contemporary-jewish-museum-review

Across the bay, the Berkeley Art Museum hosted two unique shows, the first West Coast exhibit of the work of Karl Schwitters and "Create," a show of art made by artists with disabilities.

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/kurt-schwitters-color-and-collage-at-the-berkeley-art-museum-review

"Create" highlighted the extraordinary contributions of three of the foremost centers for artists with disabilities, all located in the Bay Area: Creativity Explored (San Francisco), Creative Growth Art Center (Oakland), and NIAD Art Center (Richmond, CA).

As I said at the time, "It's really a shame to call them "artists with disabilities" because they are artists first, and mentally challenged second. Yet, to ignore their condition is to make light of the difficulties they face.

Thanks to the lack of a safety net, the disabled roam our streets, beg on the sidewalks, mutter to themselves, are messy, dirty, frightening. They challenge us to define what it is to be human. They test the limits of what we can do, can afford to do, have the will to do. Unfortunately, they can't always communicate how extraordinary they can be, with help, with encouragement, with love and a support system."

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/create-at-the-berkeley-art-museum-review

The MoAD brought us a rare look at original works by Romare Bearden, the vibrant quilts of the Siddis, part of the African diaspora in India and "Textural Rhythms," swing, jazz and be-bop in fabric and thread,

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/soulful-stitching-patchwork-quilts-by-africans-siddis-india-at-the-moaf

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/textural-rhythms-at-the-museum-of-the-african-diaspora-review

The CJM brought us the work and tragic life of Charlotte Salomon, considered among the most innovative artists of mid-century Europe whose work defies categorization, and continues to influence artists in unusual ways.

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/cjm-presents-charlotte-salomon-life-or-theatre-review

In the galleries: Hosfelt bought up a rare look at works by Jay De Feo. Next year, a major traveling retrospective of Jay DeFeo's work, organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art, will be presented at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art in the autumn of 2012.

http://www.examiner.com/museum-in-san-francisco/jay-defeo-at-hosfelt-gallery

These are a few of my favorite things from the rich offerings from my favorite city by the bay. But none of this would be possible without the people behind the scenes at the museums. I want to give a shout of thanks to the following: Jill, Robin Wander, Cheryl McCain and Peter Cavagnaro at the Berkeley Art Museum, Libby Garrison and Robyn Wise at SFMOMA. If I left out your name, accept my apologies.

Cool: A Mash-Up

My pre-teen daughters recently excavated my high school yearbook from the archives and have been poring over it with dedicated concentration. Which both takes me back to those years in hell, and also puts me in mind of the whole concept of Cool, as I've felt the need to come to the defense of 80s trends that, in retrospect, are just plain ridiculous (e.g., rainbow suspenders, the Farrah flip, and boys stealing the Shaggy style from Scooby Doo--how did a nation of youth go so terribly wrong, I wonder. Lemminglike, we all shimmied into crayon-colored Ditto jeans and burned our hair with curling irons) by saying that it seemed Cool at the time.
It's not always easy to distinguish What Is Cool from What Is Not; sometimes the Not becomes Cool when placed in a new context, particularly if the context be fresh. However. We can definitively say that the 80s styles were Not. For one thing, those styles reek of effort and scream for attention, and nothing is less Cool. Cool is effortless (or at least appears as if it is). Cool doesn't care if you look or not. Cool needs nothing from you. And let us add to the criteria, that Cool is forever.
A mash-up of Cool Past and Present may now be viewed at the Oakland Museum in Birth of the Cool: California Art, Design, and Culture at Midcentury and Cool Remixed: Bay Area Urban Art + Culture Now. NPR did a little piece on the exhibition, and just as I was sighing, "Ah, me" upon hearing the exhibition was put together by the Orange County Museum of Art (which, by the way? Looks as if it's got some banging stuff going on right now, but I confess to a partiality for disorderliness), came the welcome surprise: the exhibition is here May 17 through August 17.

We did go, on Sunday, and we were especially charmed by what would fit in the center of the Venn diagram of Curvy + Cool if such a diagram existed. One of my daughters asked why furniture is not always as beautiful as, say, the Verner Panton stacking chair.



P.S. Speaking of mash-ups, I am still waiting for a mash-up with some hiphop beats and "Fat Bottom Girls."