Modern Book Exhibition

Just a quick post to share a few photographs from my exhibition at Modern Book Gallery in Palo Alto, CA. This two-woman show includes new works from my three series - Evocations, Sanctuary, and Bottle Dreams - as well as some very interesting 3-D pieces by Claudia Kunin from her series, Myth. A frame-junkee myself, I was entranced by Claudia's intricate frames and enjoyed the interactive feature of putting the 3-D glasses to my eyes that made each mythogical scene seem to pop off the wall. Mark, Bryan, and Niniane at Modern Book did the installation, and it's always fun to see my work in a new context. I particularly enjoy the way they clustered different pedestals together to showcase the Bottle Dreams work - see the first picture here. This show is up until June 3, and Modern Book keeps nice long hours - open daily from 11am into the evening at 494 University Street in Palo Alto, CA. If you are in the area, I hope you will get to see the show.

Photos below show my work, the second to last image shows some of Claudia Kunin's work, and the last photo shows the artists with the Modern Book crew - from left to right: me, Mark, Niniane, Danny, Bryan, and Claudia.

Incubation

Lately, my creative energy has been channeled into a whole new kind of endeavor. I am almost eight months pregnant with my first child, due on May 14. It is quite a miracle to feel this little being kicking around inside me. One unexpected side effect of this pregnancy has been that the more my belly swells, the less verbal I feel. Rather than initiate anything new, I have been filled with the burning desire for closure and completion of anything in progress. I imagine on the other side of birth, in the midst of parenting, new ideas for art will come to me. For now, I sort and organize, getting my nest ready to welcome this new life.

The image here, Evocation #017, was created just a month before I became pregnant and I look back on it now and see it as a fertility piece. The belly nests on soft feathers, the flower is drying up and going to seed, and the bottle is a vessel containing and protecting this process while embraced by the natural world around it. It truly amazes me how the intuitive process of art can be so previsionary.

Center for Photographic Art

I just got word that my exhibition at the Center for Photographic Art (CPA) has been extended an entire month! It will now close on May 23.

Dennis High and everyone at the CPA did a beautiful job with the installation. I love the dark wall color with the spotlighting - it really lets the work glow against darkness. One of the unique things about this exhibit is the inclusion of vitrines filled with items from my studio. It was a last minute request from Dennis, and at first I was concerned it might distract from the art, but once I got down there and arranged the bits of collage material into the glass cases, I really could see what a nice dimension they add to the show. This is one of the most comprehensive exhibits of my collage work with 59 artworks on display. It is so satisfying to see so many pieces, spanning 10 years of creative work, all up together in one space - they begin to hum and talk to each other in new ways.