Looking Ahead for a Historical Perspective

What better time to look at the ghosts of art past than as we near the end of the 20th century? This year’s offerings in local museums and galleries are rich in historical surveys.

Topics for 1999 will range from ancient Colombian gold and ceramic objects to the first 100 years of stop-action animation. We’ll learn how painters put four American art colonies on the map in the early 1900s and witness 10 years in the creative life of Suvan Geer, one of Orange County’s most accomplished artists.

We’ll look at five decades of paintings of big-eyed children by the indefatigable Margaret Keane, four decades of Don Bachardy’s artist portraits and 30 years of contemporary art-making on a tiny scale.

The most truly ghostly subject among upcoming shows is likely to be Bas Jan Ader, a former UC Irvine art faculty member honored with a retrospective. He disappeared in the mid-1970s while engaged in what could only be called “extreme” performance art: sailing a 13-foot sailboat across the Atlantic Ocean.

January

* “Colonies of American Impressionism: Cos Cob, Old Lyme, Shinnecock and Laguna Beach.” How do Laguna Beach artists from the turn of the century compare with the painters populating Eastern art colonies in Connecticut and Long Island? This exhibit is guest-curated by art historian Deborah E. Solon. Jan. 9 through April 11 at Laguna Art Museum, 307 Cliff Drive, Laguna Beach. (949) 494-1530.

* “Canyons and Deserts: Picturing the Western Landscape.” This sampler from the museum’s collection by artists active in the early and late 20th century ranges from plein-air painter William Wendt to photographer Richard Misrach. Jan. 9 through April 25 at Orange County Museum of Art, South Coast Plaza Gallery, 3333 Bristol Street, Suite 1000, Costa Mesa. (714) 662-3366.

* Four monks from the Drepung Loesling Monastery in Tibet will construct one of the oldest forms of impermanent art: a mandala “painting” made of colored sand. This traditional purification rite, on view in the Irvine Barclay Theatre lobby, precedes ritual performances of chanting and dancing. Jan. 15 and 16 at the Barclay, 4242 Campus Drive, Irvine. (949) 854-4646.

* “Don Bachardy: Four Decades of Los Angeles Artists.” A celebrated portraitist’s images of more than five dozen of his peers include the faces of Chuck Arnoldi, Chris Burden, William Brice, Mary Corse, Frank Gehry, Robert Irwin, Ed Moses, Rene Petropolous, Al Ruppersberg, Ed Ruscha, Alexis Smith. Guest-curated by Penny Little Hawks. Jan. 16 through April 11 at Laguna Art Museum.

* “Rauschenberg in Transparency.” Thirty years of work employing transparent layers of Plexiglas and Mylar by this blue-chip modern artist. Organized by chief curator Bruce Guenther at the Orange County Museum of Art, Jan. 16 through April 18.

Also: “Houdini’s House,” an installation from the museum’s permanent collection by Tony DeLap.

* “Beethoven: Musical Treasures From the Age of Revolution and Romance.” A group of 18th century instruments, loaned by America’s Shrine to Music Museum at the Vermillion campus of the University of South Dakota, relates music history to economic, political and social developments in Europe. The exhibit is curated by music museum director Andre P. Larsen. Jan. 30 through March 21 at Bowers Museum, 2002 N. Main St., Santa Ana. (714) 567-3600.

February

* Solo exhibitions of work by Susan Hornbeak-Ortiz, whose sculptures transform industrial castoffs into explorations of anxiety and entrapment, and Barbara Benish, who works with organic materials and texts to make installations reflecting the spirit and history of their environment. The exhibition is guest-curated by Maggi Owens, co-director of the Guggenheim Gallery at Chapman University in Orange. Feb. 7 through April 4 at Huntington Beach Art Center, 538 Main St., Huntington Beach. (714) 374-1650.

Also: “A Rascal in Paradise, the Velvet Paintings of Edgar Leeteg.” A folk artist living in Tahiti, Leeteg painted some 1,700 images of island themes on velveteen between 1933 and 1953. Co-curated by John Turner, curator of American folk art at the San Francisco Craft and Folk Art Museum, and Greg Escalante, an HBAC board member whose projects include Juxtapoz magazine.

* “Suspended Animation, Part I.” Marking the centennial of the invention of stop-motion animation, this is a display of drawings, stills, models and figures by animators and special effects artists. The display is guest-curated by stop-motion specialist Chris Padilla. Feb. 7 through March 11, at Cal State Fullerton Main Art Gallery, 800 N. State College Blvd., Fullerton. (714) 278-3262.

* “Nelson Dudley Retrospective.” Retiring after teaching at Cypress College for 32 years, Dudley began affixing paper bags on canvases in the ‘60s and--after his attention shifted to photography--returned to the collage theme in the ‘80s, using envelopes in geometric shapes. Feb. 10 through Feb. 25 at Cypress College Fine Arts Gallery, 9200 Valley View Street, Cypress. (714) 826-5593.

* “Suspended Animation, Part II.” Cal State Fullerton’s new arts district annex opens with a show of computer-generated imaging, the newest twist in the animator’s art that created such commercial favorites as the movie “James and the Giant Peach” and the dancing California raisins commercial. Feb. 28 through May 15 at Grand Central Art Center, 200 W. Second Street, Santa Ana.

* “Bas Jan Ader: In Search Of.” A comprehensive look at the art and life of a UC Irvine studio arts faculty member who was an icon of ‘70s conceptual art includes photography, film, installations and drawings. The retrospective is curated by UCI Art Gallery director Brad Spence. Feb. 23 through March 20 at the Art Gallery, UC Irvine, School of the Arts (off Bridge Road), Irvine. (949) 824-6610.

April

* “1990 Art From Cuba.” Work made by five contemporary Cuban artists during U.S. residencies explores personal and social themes sparked by simmering relations between the two countries. It is organized by New York-based Longwood Arts Project and Art in General, April 1 through 24 at UC Irvine Art Gallery.

* “The Art of the Gold Rush.” In 1848, carpenter James M. Marshall found gold at his boss’ Sacramento Valley mill; in two years’ time, the hordes of would-be Midases swarming across the country gave California sufficient population to be admitted as a state. Paintings and drawings of the era document gold fever. Organized by the Crocker Museum in Sacramento and the Oakland Museum. April 17 through June 6 at Bowers Museum.

* “After the Photo-Secession: American Pictorial Photography 1910-1955.” Rejecting the crisp images espoused by Alfred Stieglitz and other modernists, these unabashedly romantic photographers--little known today--went in for soft-focus effects and manipulated printing processes. The exhibit is organized by the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. April 24 through July 11 at Laguna Art Museum.

Also: Patssi Valdez: A Precarious Comfort.” Work by the Los Angeles painter and printmaker spans more than 25 years. It is organized by the Mexican Museum in San Francisco.

May

* “Inaudible Whispers: Suvan Geer, a 10-Year Survey, 1989-1998.” Using everyday materials (salt, rice) and recorded sounds (whispers, breathing), Geer makes deeply evocative installations dealing with such themes as memory and the passage of time, self-sacrifice and nurturing. The exhibit is curated by Huntington Beach Art Center Curator of Programs, Tyler Stallings. May 2 throughJune 27 at the center.

July

* “A Winding River: Journey of Contemporary Art in Vietnam.” More than six dozen paintings and drawings by 45 artists reveal cultural influences from France, the former Soviet Union and the U.S. in addition to specifically indigenous sensibilities. The display is organized by the Meridian International Center in Washington, D.C. July 1 through Sept. 30 at Bowers Museum.

* “At the Threshold of the Visible: Minuscule and Small-Scale Art, 1964-96.” Working very small (most of these pieces are less than three inches in diameter) has been a tactic of contemporary artists dealing with intimacy and other issues. This show includes pieces by such artists as Chris Burden, Judy Fiskin, Yoko Ono, Joel Shapiro and others. The exhibition is being circulated by Independent Curators Inc., New York. July 11 through Sept. 5, at the Huntington Beach Art Center.

September

* “Ideas in Things.” Work by such artists as Lynn Aldrich, Tim Hawkinson, David Ireland, Charles Ray and Rachel Lachowicz explores the way ideas (about ritual, spirituality, obsession and other subjects) can emerge from looking closely at commonplace objects. It is curated by Tim Jahns, director of education programs at the Irvine Fine Arts Center. Sept. 10 through Oct. 31, at IFAC, 4321 Yale Ave., Irvine. (949) 724-6880.

* “Margaret Keane and Keanabilia.” Yes, she’s still living (in San Francisco) and still painting those big-eyed kids. This show documents five decades of her work, as well as other artists’ tributes and imitations. It was organized by the late Robert Weiss, a collector and independent curator, and Tyler Stallings, Sept. 19 through Nov. 7, at the Huntington Beach Art Center.

October

* “Shamans, Gods and Mythic Beasts: Colombian Gold and Ceramics in Antiquity.” Drawn from private and public collections in Columbia and the U.S., the exhibit presents recent discoveries and proposes a system for decoding the images of figures and animals. It is organized by the American Federation of the Arts and the Bowers. Oct. 29 through Jan. 9, 2000, at Bowers Museum.