Santa Barbara Museum of Art announces upcoming September – November 2017 events.
The museum is at 1130 State St., Santa Barbara, CA. Open Tuesday-Sunday 11 am – 5 pm, Free Thursday Evening 5 to 8 p.m. — 805.963.4364 www.sbma.net
Exhibition Opening
Valeska Soares, Any Moment Now…, 2014. 365 vintage dust jackets mounted on linen panels and 4 vintage library ladders. Installation view Eleven Rivington Gallery, 2014. Courtesy Fortes D’Aloia & Gabriel, São Paulo. Photo Credit: Charles Benton. Image courtesy of the Artist.
Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now
September 17 – December 31, 2017
Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now brings together 49 artworks, consisting of installation, sculpture, photography, and video, dating from the early 1990s to the present. A distinctive figure in the international legacy of installation art, Soares interweaves themes of love, desire, memory, and time in her minimal, conceptual, and multi-sensorial bodies of work. Sourcing collected and found objects, such as books, light fixtures, antique stools, carpets, mirrors, anonymous portrait paintings, and even flowers, the artist repurposes such materials, subverting their original use and inviting new meaning. The referent installation, Any Moment Now… (2014), for instance, is a series of 365 vintage dust jackets that are by transformed by Soares into a subjective mapping of a year’s time. The images and titles of each cover, from books such as Long Day’s Journey Into Night, The Morning After, and Now or Never, combine together in this installation to generate new and ever-shifting narratives. This exhibition represents the artist’s second survey exhibition and her first major solo museum exhibition in the Western United States, and is co-organized by the Phoenix Art Museum, where it will be on view in spring 2018.
Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now is part of the major initiative, Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA, a far-reaching and ambitious exploration of Latin American and Latino art in dialogue with Los Angeles taking place from September 2017 through January 2018.
Exhibitions On View
Claude Monet, Villas in Bordighera, 1884. Oil on canvas. SBMA, Bequest of Katharine Dexter McCormick in memory of her husband, Stanley McCormick.
Highlights of the Permanent Collection
Ongoing
In celebration of the Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s 75th Anniversary in 2016, this installation highlights some of the most important works of art from SBMA’s permanent collection, as well as several of the most exciting gifts and acquisitions in the areas of modern and contemporary art, photography, and the arts of Asia. The small works on paper gallery features favorite photographs of former curator, Karen Sinsheimer, as a tribute to her vision in the building of the permanent collection. This eclectic group of objects, meant to sample the breadth and diversity of the permanent collection while some of the Museum’s galleries are temporarily closed for renovation, includes favorites such as the sensual life-size bronze Bather Putting Up Her Hair (1932) by Aristide Maillol, the haunting Yuan dynasty Seated Luohan (13th century), and the important, early painting by the famed Bay Area Figuration artist Richard Diebenkorn. Ridley-Tree Gallery also continues to showcase favorites of 19th-century Impressionism, such as the beloved Villas in Bordighera (1884) by Claude Monet, along with the long-term loans from the Armand Hammer Foundation and the collection of Michael Armand Hammer. Works of art honoring the collecting acumen of Karen Sinsheimer include photographs such as Michael Light’s captivating appropriation of Southern Lunar Hemisphere(1999)—a work that demonstrates the late curator’s fascination with innovative intersections of art and science.
Sleep of Reason
June 20 – September 24, 2017
Yinka Shonibare, The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters (Asia), 2008, from the series, “The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters.” Chromogenic print mounted on aluminum. SBMA, Museum Purchase, the Austin Fund in Honor of Wright S. Ludington.
British artist Yinka Shonibare’s grand photograph The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters (Asia) (2008) provided the inspiration for this installation of photographs that conjure up scenes of unease and the uncanny, which—despite our best efforts to rationally dispel them—can seem to surround us every day. Raising probing, often disquieting questions about the intertwined cultures of Africa and Europe in the post-colonial era, Shonibare based his sumptuous yet compellingly unnerving work on the famous 1797 etching of the same name by Spanish artist Francisco Goya (1746–1828). Many interpretations of Goya’s haunting image have been put forward. One suggests that when the alert mind goes slack and lets down its guard, corrosive forces of ignorance, mistrust and fear can arise, creating situations in which our sense of mental and moral order can easily be dislodged—or collapse. Not perhaps as directly allegorical, the other photographs in this gallery by a range of American and European artists present scenarios that similarly make our sense of certainty vulnerable. Everyday things, people, and places become vague or slightly strange via each artist harnessing photography’s unique, split-second power to shift what we think of as normal reality into incongruous, absurd, and even ominous realms. Less than dreams but more than mere records, these photographs (all in the Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s collection) exist in a middle space between the actual and the imagined. This effect is made all the more startling by the fact that such mesmerizing images were drawn not from fantasy but the quite apparently real world around us, one perpetually in flux and challenging in its infinite potential to perplex and disarm the eye and mind.
Story-Telling: Narrative Paintings in Asian Art
From September 30, 2017
Dawn in the Geisha Quarters, Japanese, mid-17th century. Ink and color on paper; hanging scroll. SBMA, Museum purchase in memory of C. Ann Booth with funds provided by Mrs. Peter Colefax, Beatrice Farwell Duncan, Mrs. Rowe Giesen, Henry C. Huglin, Prudence R. Myer, Mr. and Mrs. John Rex, Robert Skiles, Mrs. Burwell B. Smith, Carol L. Valentine, F. Bailey Vanderhoef, Jr., Mr. and Mrs.Otto Wittmann Mr. and Mrs. David Y. Wong, and the Friends of Asian Art.
Pictures that tell stories serve as powerful vehicles to illuminate important events, promote cultural and religious values, or express personal views. This exhibition features eight narrative paintings from China, Japan, India, and Tibet, showcasing the diversity of the format and expressive versatility of these Asian cultures. Dating from the 17th through 19th centuries, the paintings offer a variety of distinct approaches to pictorial storytelling. This includes, among others, examples of continuous narration within a single frame, a handscroll annotated with extensive text, and a monumental textile panel comprising dozens of successive scenes. The exhibition is drawn from the Museum’s permanent collection and coincides with the contemporary survey Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now, exploring Soares’ experimentation with temporality, memory, and narrative.
Events
Thursdays, September 7; October 5; November 2, 5:30 – 7:30 pm
Family 1st Thursdays
Bring the whole family and enjoy 1st Thursday together in SBMA’s Family Resource Center located across from the Museum Café on the Lower Level. Museum teaching artists will assist families in creating special exhibition-based art projects. Afterwards, enjoy galleries until 8pm.
SBMA’s Family Resource Center
Free
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September 7: Shadow and Reflection Drawings
Create shadow and reflection drawings using gray chalk pastel on mid-tone charcoal paper inspired by the black and white photographs of Andre Kertesz, on view in Sleep of Reason.
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October 5; November 2
Museum teaching artists assist families in creating special exhibition-based art projects, inspired by Valeska Saores: Any Moment Now.
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Sundays, September 10; October 8; November 12, 1:30 – 4:30 pm
Studio Sundays on the Front Steps
Visitors of all ages are welcome to participate in this hands-on workshop with SBMA Teaching Artists on the Museum’s front steps. Each month explore a different medium, including clay, metal, ink, wood, photography, and paper, and gain inspiration from works of art in the Museum’s permanent collection or special exhibitions.
Front Steps of the Museum
Free
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Thursdays, September 14; October 19; November 16, 5:30 – 6:30 pm
Sketching in the Galleries
All skill levels are invited to experience the tradition of sketching from original works of art in the Museum’s galleries. Museum Teaching Artists provide general guidance and all materials. Each program is open to 10 participants.
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September 14: Shapes & Patterns in Highlights of the Permanent Collection
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October 19; November 16: Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now
Free
To reserve a spot, contact Kelly Almeida at 884.6457 or kalmeida@sbma.net.
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Thursdays, September 14 – December 7, 6 – 9 pm
Fall Adult Ceramics Class
This 12-week series inspired by the exhibition Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now introduces participants to both sculptural and functional techniques of ceramics through hand-building, throwing, surface decoration, and glazing techniques. Suitable for beginners, the class features small group instruction and individual attention. Course includes all materials, firings, and a docent-led tour of the Museum.
Location: SBMA’s Ridley-Tree Education Center at McCormick House, 1600 Santa Barbara Street
$400 SBMA Members/$485 Non-Members
To enroll, visit register.sbma.net.
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Sunday, September 17, 1 – 2:30 pm
Push Pull Taffy Performance
The performance Push Pull, stemming from Valeska Soares’ explorations with sugar, features sun-warmed masses of salt water taffy hanging from metal hooks. Performers stretch and pull the candy while inviting visitors to consume chunks of these slowly stretching sculptures, resulting in a sensual and conceptual exchange. Push Pull parodies the line between art object and spectator, highlighting ideas of excess, overconsumption as well as the consumer’s pursuit of delectable pleasures.
Free
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Sunday, September 17, 2:30 – 4 pm
Panel Discussion with Valeska Soares, and Curators Julie Joyce and Vanessa Davidson
Featuring Valeska Soares, SBMA’s Julie Joyce, and PAM’s Vanessa Davidson, this conversation aims to provide background and insight into the artist’s multisensorial bodies of work.
Mary Craig Auditorium
Free
Reserve tickets at the Museum Visitor Services desks, or online at tickets.sbma.net.
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Sunday, October 1, 2:30 pm
Parallel Stories: Richard Rodriguez in Conversation
Noted author, essayist, and commentator Richard Rodriguez explores the color brown as a metaphor for mixture, and thus the key to our cosmopolitan societies where lives interact and borrow from one another. In his lyrical, resonant interweaving of family, food, religion, history, language, California, America, Mexico, we may find a new way of placing ourselves in the 21st century.
Mary Craig Auditorium
Free SBMA Members/$10 Non-Members/$6 Senior Non-Members
Reserve or purchase tickets at the Museum Visitor Services desks, or online at tickets.sbma.net.
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Thursdays, October 12; November 9; December 14
Latin American Film Series: Unrest, Distance, and the Future
Alluding to speculative futures and spaces, irrevocable pasts, gender perspectives, and living with fear as a condition of contemporary life, the films represented in this series delve into relationships between cinema and truth, individuals and their environment, and the place of stories as engaged social practice. Organized by SBMA and curated by UCSB Professor of Film and Media Studies, Cristina Venegas, this special series correlates to three of the Santa Barbara-based exhibitions that are part of the Getty-led PST: LA/LA: Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now (SBMA); Guatemala from 33,000 km: Contemporary Art, 1960 – Present (MCASB); and The Schoolhouse and the Bus: Mobility, Pedagogy, and Engagement, Two Projects by Pablo Helguera and Suzanne Lacy / Pilar Riaño-Alcalá (AD&A Museum).
Free
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Thursday, October 12, 5:30 pm
Neighboring Sounds
(Kleber Mendonça Filho, 2012)
On a quiet city block in the coastal city of Recife, ruled by an aging patriarch and his sons, a recent spate of petty crime has rattled the nerves of the well-to-do residents. When a mysterious security firm is brought in to watch over the neighborhood, it sparks the fears and anxieties of a divided society still haunted by its past. Portuguese with English subtitles (131 min.)
Mary Craig Auditorium/Santa Barbara Museum of Art
Free
Reserve tickets at the Museum Visitor Services desks, or online at tickets.sbma.net.
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Thursday, November 9, 7 pm
Tempestad
(Tatiana Huezo, 2016) Documentary
The emotional journeys of two women victimized by corruption and injustice in Mexico and of the love, dignity, and resistance that allowed them to survive. The film maker Tatiana Huezo will introduce the film. Spanish with English subtitles (105 min.)
Pollock Theater/Carsey-Wolf Center/UCSB
Free
Visit carseywolf.ucsb.edu/pollock/events/tempestad to reserve tickets and guarantee a seat.
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Thursday, December 14, 5:30 pm
Ixcanul
(Volcano, Jayro Bustamante, 2015)
The brilliant debut by Guatemalan filmmaker Jayro Bustamante is a mesmerizing fusion of fact and fable, a dreamlike depiction of the daily lives of Kaqchikel-speaking Mayans on a coffee plantation at the base of an active volcano. Immersing us in its characters’ customs and beliefs, Ixcanul chronicles with unblinking realism, a disappearing tradition and a disappearing people. Spanish and Kaqchikel with English subtitles (91 min.)
Mary Craig Auditorium/Santa Barbara Museum of Art
Free
Reserve tickets at the Museum Visitor Services desks, or online at tickets.sbma.net.
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Sunday, October 22, 1 – 4 pm
Sensory Studio
Inspired by the exhibition Valeska Soares: Any Moment Now, discover pop-up talks and playful artistic activations involving taste, touch, sight, and scent. Participate or simply enjoy the art, and stop and smell the roses.
Free
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Sunday, October 22, 2:30 – 4 pm
Lecture: Jens Hoffman
Jens Hoffman, Senior Curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit and Director of Special Exhibitions and Public Programs, Jewish Museum, NY, speaks about the work of Valeska Soares.
Mary Craig Auditorium
Free
Reserve tickets at the Museum Visitor Services desks, or online at tickets.sbma.net.
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Thursday, November 30, 5:30 – 7 pm
Lecture: Tanya Barson
Chief Curator, Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona speaks about the work of Valeska Soares.
Free
Reserve tickets at the Museum Visitor Services desks, or online at tickets.sbma.net.