Rachel Hakimian Emenaker’s Deep Roots Among Fallen Trees at Grand Central Art Center is a show that feels both urgent and elegiac, a visual essay on migration and memory that resists sentimentality while examining the deep, sometimes painful strata of movement and place. It’s the kind of exhibition that lands at exactly the right time and in exactly the right place, Santa Ana, a city shaped by migration, gentrification, and the slow churn of history underfoot. Emenaker, with a keen sense of...
This Saturday night at 205 N. Broadway in Santa Ana, longtime painter and OC resident Ryan Callis will open a show of new paintings. Oh No, I Seem Very Happy!!!” opens from 6-9 Saturday Sept 3rd, and will consist of new paintings, 100 posters for sale, and an accompanying zine for the first 50+ people in attendance. The OC Art Blog caught up with Ryan to ask a few questions about the show and his work. Enjoy! Painter Ryan Callis Can you start by telling us about your connection to the OC/Long...
By Walpa D'Mark I attended Albert Lopez Jr’s show at Crear Studio on September 4, 2021. It might seem like it’s a little too late to be talking about it, but the exhibition had many layers, and eventually it led me to think about Albert’s creative process. Full disclosure, I know Albert, we both attended Cal State Long Beach in the late 90’s, and I worked for him at OCMA in the 2010’s. Albert’s show at Crear Studio, titled “The Dollar Dance I Never Had!” featured works from different periods...
I recently had the opportunity to visit another exciting new space in Orange County, S/A Exhibitions. S/A Exhibitions is a nonprofit space headed up by curator Maurizzio Hector Pineda. Mr. Pineda background includes receiving his undergraduate degree in Interdisciplinary Studies from the San Francisco Art Institute in 2000. From 2001-2005 he was the owner and director of SWYS Gallery in Long Beach, CA, and has worked at the Santa Monica Museum of Art and for Regen Project in Beverly Hills. His...
By Mat Gleason Growing up on the county line revealed little difference between Orange County and Los Angeles County but illustrated the frisson of borders nonetheless. There was a place called “The Ditch” which was an open sewage channel that stunk but had great dirt hills to ride bikes. Located just beyond the fence in the back of Buena Park’s Big Tee Golf Course, was it in Orange County or Los Angeles County? When La Mirada residents rose up to complain of the stench, L.A. County said,...
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
Written by Jared Millar It was around 1976 that Philip K. Dick moved into a third-story condominium on Civic Center Drive just east of downtown Santa Ana, living and writing there until dying of a massive stroke just months before the release of the Ridley Scott-directed Blade Runner, the first in a long run of Hollywood adaptations of his novels and stories ... Starting tonight at Grand Central Art Center in downtown Santa Ana, artist Tim Youd will pay homage to the cult science fiction...
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...
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...
"You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time." If you have had any contact with the Orange County art scene over the past decade then you know what ISM: a community project is, what they do, why they do it and who they are. Right? Well, partially. In the spirit of the above saying by Abraham Lincoln, ISM is as an organization as elusive and open-ended as the classic definition of the term and that is...
When real estate investor Davin Gumm set out to refurbish the Pacific Building in the heart of the Santa Ana Artist's Village, he hoped that the office spaces would attract tenants who would use the lofts for "creative uses." Gumm's Copper Door beer bar in the basement of the Pacific Building has become a notable music venue that showcases quality local music, so it's only fitting that the Pacific Building lofts would attract artists immersed in the local scene. So far, a fashion...
Santa Ana Art Walk. First Saturday of every month @7-10pm. Pictures from March 5th. Danielle, Krystof Andres (photographer), and Joe at Raven Studios Andrea Harris at her printmaking studio next to Grand Central Art Center. You can come in her studio during the art walk and learn how to make prints! Liz, April, and Randi Evan Senn, an artist in her studio inside the Grand Central Art Center. Russell and Jeff Tweena Tran, Piano Instructor, in her studio Ste D: Tweena's...
Thursday, 03/03: The Plains of Id: Mapping Urban Intervention In Los Angeles On view: March 3 – April 17, 2011 Opening Reception: March 3, 5-8 PM WHERE: UNIVERSITY ART MUSEUM (UAM) College of the Arts California State University, Long Beach 1250 Bellflower Boulevard Long Beach, CA 90840-0004 //An exhibition that focuses on contemporary artists who intervene within a specific area of Los Angeles’ sprawling topography. Artists include: Sandra de la Loza, Patrick “Pato” Hebert, Joel...
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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