Merely coming out of a striving year like 2020 may well come to feel like accomplishment plenty of, but go away it to artists to go a move more. The Bakersfield Museum of Art’s Visual Arts Festival, which debuts on-line Friday, highlights some of the creativity that sprung about the previous yr.
When the museum group was acquiring a concept for the biennial festival, curator Rachel Magnus explained they preferred to select one thing that reflected how collaborative the arts are in background and art earning.
“With a lack of community occurring in 2020, we are looking at artwork as a way to join us even when we were not related.”
The topic of “Self/Modern society” was also inclusive and open up to varied interpretation.
“I really like a single (topic) that can be interpreted in many methods,” Magnus claimed. “It can only be in approach or course of action, the software of paint but you can seem at it actually abstractly as nicely.”
The topic also displays the museum’s energy to change its concentrate in developing an chance to focus on how variety is represented in the arts.
That perception of self manifested by itself in the 79 works from 35 artists in an “very different way,” Magnus reported.
“Artists’ interpretations vary wildly — how do I fit into the context of society, personally and philosophically.”
In the spirit of that comprehending is artist Jay Olivo who approached the topic conceptually with their perform “Choose Care.”
Magnus said they “explored COVID-19 and the response to it, interpreting what does aid suggest.”
Olivo’s piece, which was awarded 3rd location honors, is a sculpture of stainless metal, universal white automotive enamel paint and 40 items of “emergency rescue tissue.”
Of the piece, artist and educator Jedediah Caesar, who juried the festival, wrote, “Just one of the staples of a juried exhibition like this one particular is the constraints it imposes, and this perform very effectively solutions and also subverts people constraints. Like the functions by (Felix) Gonzalez-Torres that Olivo references, the particular person silver ‘paintings’ that the audience is invited to take in backlink gifting and generosity to memorializing and reduction.”
Magnus explained she was grateful that the director of Cal State Bakersfield’s Todd Madigan Gallery was ready to provide as juror.
“He put in a lot of time with each individual of the pieces and the statements,” Magnus stated, noting his opinions on the selected works will be provided in the exhibition. “From a curatorial, traditional artwork knowledge of the perform, I was incredibly pleased with his alternatives.”
Individuals also include Prapat Sirnavarat’s “Daily life in Mother nature in March 3,” an immersive painting named best in exhibit Jennifer Williams-Cordova’s mixed-media narrative piece “Maria in Tijuana,” which gained second location and honorable mentions for “Octopus Garden by” Richard Mortensen and “Many Ways” by Morgan Vargas.
Magnus stated the honorable mentions reflect the varied media mirrored in the exhibition: Mortensen with a whimsical fused glass piece and Vargas functioning with cotton yarn and recycled sari silk ribbon for her fiber arts do the job.
The entire exhibition will be readily available to view on the BMoA’s site starting off Friday adopted by an on the web art sale, with a 50/50 break up in between the artist and the museum. This fundraiser will also stand in location of the ARTMIX sale, but enthusiasts of the annual occasion should not fret. Magnus stated there are programs for an in-person ARTMIX-type gathering that will also highlight “The Bakersfield Audio: Roll Out the Pink Carpet” show with a stay tunes aspect.
“We’re starting to come up with techniques to build far more articles for every of these exhibits to assure men and women are coming again for these exhibits,” Magnus said.
“This museum moves ahead in an activated method. We’re hunting forward to seeing what that usually means.”
Options consist of the return of the in-particular person lecture sequence, Art Following Darkish events and ARTMIX afterwards in the summer.
Stefani Dias can be attained at 661-395-7488. Follow her on Twitter at @realstefanidias.