When I first visited DAX gallery for its opening in 2013 owner Alex Amador had big plans for the Costa Mesa space that would bring fine urban art to Orange County. Over the past few years, in part due to how hard it can be to maintain a gallery, DAX has shuffled around some of its original aspirations. I was curious to see what the gallery was up to when I met with curator Alec Van Sealund for the August 13th opening of No Name. Van Sealund joined DAX in 2015 and explained the gallery...
Last Saturday Peter Blake celebrated his 50th birthday at his namesake gallery in Laguna Beach. Milestone birthdays have a way of causing us to re-evaluate our lives, and the world around us. It is in this vein that the work of Dutch artist Jan Maarten Voskuil was a fitting centerpiece to the event. The archetypal painting gives no acknowledgement to the canvass it’s created on, it serves as background and is meant to be regarded (if it is regarded as all) as a mere substrate to the art work....
California’s identity is inextricably tied to its landscape, and has one of the most varied geographies in the Union. Attempting to capture California landscape art and its evolution for over a century is already ambitious in scope. However, California Landscape Into Abstraction: Works from the Orange County Museum of Art, OCMA's current exhibit, goes beyond an examination of 19th and 20th century California landscape and - as a result of thematic organization, a broad definition of landscape,...
What do you do if you are a respected gallery owner and a highly anticipated show looks like it won’t come to fruition just one week before the opening? If you're Peter Blake you somehow pull together three solo shows of leading LA-based contemporary artists, within days of the opening event. On Saturday night at the Peter Blake Gallery in Laguna Beach it appeared as if this was the plan all along: the shows were as flawlessly put together as we have come to expect with this gallery,...
“Do some living and get yourself a typewriter.” ― Charles Bukowski, On a recent Friday night Tim Youd sits in front of a small table at the Grand Central Art Center in Santa Ana typing away on an Olympia SG-3 electric typewriter, shifting his gaze between the Phillip K. Dick novel to his left and the typewriter keys in front of him. When he reaches the bottom of the page he re-inserts the same sheet back in the typewriter and continues typing on what is now a rectangle of dense black ink, by...
Tis’ the Season for the December OC Art Walks! This month we highlight some of the special events at each location including openings, receptions, books signings and parties (Fullerton is looking pretty lively this month). Get out there, have some fun, see some art and tell us where the best eggnog is: Text by Natasha Shah, graphic by Jared Millar
I have been a fan of Maggie Taylor’s surreal dream-like images for almost a decade, ever since a friend used her digital collages as cover artwork for his homemade CDs. Taylor combines 19th century daguerreotypes, original photographs, scanned objects and old etchings, to produce fantastic, imaginative, and mysterious images. I first described her work while covering the Digital Darkroom exhibit at the Annenberg Space for Photography in 2011, and was excited to meet Taylor in person and...
Surreal, dream-like images inhabited by the solemn countenances of people from a bygone era, set in fantastical landscapes and surrounded by a strange assortment of animals, an arc of bees or random objects; these are the magical images of Maggie Taylor. Taylor creates astonishingly complex digital collages combining original photographs, 19th century daguerreotypes, scanned objects and vintage etchings, to produce imaginative and mysterious photographs. Walking through the Joanne Artman...
Orange County has solid museums, vibrant artists and several local art scenes, yet the cultural footprint of art in the community remains pretty shallow. Residents don’t venture too far from their neighborhood and the idea of a gallery event as part of an interesting night out doesn’t resonate with younger generations. So what’s missing? How can we break through suburban inertia and make the OC art scene something bigger? Alex Amador, owner of the new 4,500 square foot DAX Gallery, thinks he...
For November's Art Walk we feature three galleries that are elevating the Laguna Beach gallery scene (and one honorable mention) by exhibiting art and artists that stand out amongst the typical Orange County fare. Since the galleries are spread out along the coast we chose one to represent North, Central, and South Laguna (maps and gallery descriptions below). The current theme in Laguna Beach is Art & Nature though the artists we saw fused nature with industry or technology by using...
It’s that time again! The OC Art Walks are happening the first week of November. To help you celebrate after Halloween check out our OC Art Blog guide to the Orange County Art Walks (since October 31st falls on a Thursday Laguna Beach art walk is next week). Street maps for each of the walks with our highlights are below, let us know where you went and tell us some of your favorites. OC ART BLOG ART WALK GUIDE More information and our photos from the October art walks: THE GREAT ART...
Walking through Gods & Gifts: The Vatican Ethnological Collection is akin to traversing the globe while simultaneously travelling through time. Through February 9th over 70 objects from the Vatican Ethnological Museum are on display at the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, the largest collection to ever leave Vatican City. The exhibit spans all six inhabited continents as well as 7,000 years of human civilization, and several of the objects have never been seen outside the Vatican. Collectively...
Get a room together of the most prominent photojournalists working today and you’ll hear a discussion about whether they perceive and document their subjects as “the Other,” or stated more bluntly, is there legitimacy to the question “who is the white person holding the camera?” The latest photography exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston strongly underscores that in documentary photography it is very important who holds the camera. She Who Tells A Story: Women Photographers from Iran...
Concentrated on the pedestrian Second Street Promenade, Santa Ana had the liveliest street scene with DJs, street performers and multiple bands. The Santora Building has beautiful architecture but the galleries inside can be hit or miss. Get there anytime: from 6 to 10ish p.m. The Crowd: 20’s+, eclectic, families, and students The Art: Large scale installations, artists-in-residence, student art, performance art, video and everything in between What you won’t find: Established commercial...
We had the most fun at the Fullerton Art Walk. It’s a little spread out with three distinct areas (see map) VioletHour-PÄS-Hibberton, the Fullerton Museum Center four blocks away and in between the Carpe Diem Experience, a cluster of small galleries, craft tables and food trucks. You can find affordable art here, and we saw a lot of red dots. We enjoyed the industrial/renovated gallery interiors and blues at the Fullerton Museum Center open mike night. We recommend waiting out traffic: the...
Laguna Beach is the most extensive of the art walks stretching from North Laguna Beach, through “downtown” to South Laguna (see map). Being a weeknight we only covered the north and select downtown galleries, as well as the Laguna Beach Art Museum (free admission the night of art walk). The art carries a higher price tag than the other art walks, but we enjoyed the free admission to the Laguna Beach Art Museum and free wine in the galleries. We recommend getting there early: the walk starts at...
The concepts of war and fashion are seemingly disparate but in Andriy Halashyn’s oil paintings at SALT Fine Art in Laguna Beach soldiers and fashion models seamlessly co-exist on one canvas. In the aptly named War and Fashion series Halashyn cleverly fuses the imagery of combat and vogue into a single scene. The two are merged so naturally the deceptively cheery paintings create tension as the viewer tries to reconcile how the two can exist together. And yet, they do. Living in the United...
The OC Art Blog was created in 2004 as a way to build community and promote the marginalized but dynamic Orange County art scene.
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By Maggie Luy Paper decor fluttered overhead as baby doll dresses and flower crowns filled the crowd. Women-owned vendors lined the walkways as festivalgoers moved through the sunlight, surrounded by bursts of color and music. That vibrant atmosphere captured...
By Mason Fujikawa The Tipping Point is a two-story installation at the Laguna Art Museum by Einar and Jamex de la Torre. The de la Torre brothers, glassblowers by trade, are prolific mixed-media artists who have exhibited internationally for over thirty years. Born in...
By Maggie Luy Take another step and lean in. Ordinary objects reveal deeper stories than they first appear to hold. From delicate threads woven into a portrait to bold images capturing moments of social change, the 42nd Irvine Annual transforms familiar...
By Maggie Luy Where does the game end, and the art begin? A basketball court is usually defined by rules and competition. In “GAME! Basketball and Contemporary Art,” that definition expands as the court becomes a surface for design and intervention. The...
By Chris Hoff There’s a particular kind of vertigo that comes with watching a technology arrive faster than the culture can metabolize it. Photographers felt it in the 1840s. Painters felt it again when Photoshop showed up. Now it’s AI’s turn, and the stakes feel...
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