Campus Art Center Bustling

The idyllic property in Camarillo that was for decades the state hospital has been in a state of suspended animation and transition, gearing up for its opening as the newest campus of the Cal State University system. But one corner of the compound has been notably active for the last few years.

At the moment, the expansive gallery and studio space known as Studio Channel Islands Art Center is hosting three distinct exhibitions, a feat normally reserved for museums. In the back gallery, usually the site of group shows by resident artists, a sibling exhibition by former Ojai residents Kate and Arthur Hughes highlights a pleasant landscape-loving collection of batik works, paintings and photographs.

Meanwhile, the hallways are given over to a traveling exhibition called “Liquid Art,” sponsored by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. A display of photographs documents mostly public sculptural works around Los Angeles. Among the works pictured is “Source Figure,” one of Robert Graham’s trademark statue-esque female nude figures, this one an African American woman, atop a pillar in a fountain.

From a local angle, the show includes paintings of swimmers in fluid motion by Camarillo resident Roxie Ray-Bordelon and a photo of the rhythmic water-spouting fountain by the Ventura pier, by Ventura sculptor Mark Lere.

In SCIAC’s main gallery is an eclectic group show of Asian American artists. Curated by artist and Ventura College teacher Hiroko Yoshimoto, the art is loosely gathered under the idealistic title “Asian American Experience.” Said experience, in this showing, is a varied one, ranging from Seiko Tachibana’s elegant scrolls suspended from the gallery ceiling to K.T. Otama’s “Monet’s Garden,” an impressionist painting refreshed by its view through the prism of post-Modernist thinking.

Yoshimoto’s own contribution is a series of her incisive close-up portraits, in profile, of Asian women. Scott Kattano’s silk-screen words--”panacea” and “Sayyes”--on gleaming plastic ovals reminds us of Craig Kaufman’s Pop Art lozenges, mixed with contemporary Japanese pop aesthetics.

Layered imagery appears prominently in work by more than one artist here. Hei Myung Hyun’s “Ancestral Garden” series presents a background of varnished-over hieroglyphic text and flowery overlays of acrylic paint, creating an appealing tension of foreground and background sources. Ann Phong’s “The Baskets” is a dreamy pictorial scene with a barely discernible rougher, louder surface of goopy abstraction. The suggestion is that of a pleasant, recessive memory struggling for clarity.

* “Asian American Experience,” “Liquid Art” and art by Kate and Arthur Hughes, Studio Channel Islands Art Center, Cal State Channel Islands, Camarillo. Ends May 18. Gallery hours: Thursdays-Saturdays, noon-3 p.m. (805) 383-1368.

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Mobile Jazz Series: Jazz is more a state of mind than a location, so don’t be confused by the two different locations of the two Ventura Vanguard concerts this week. On Tuesday, the Vanguard series will host a band led by saxists Paul Carman and Kim Richmond in its original location, downstairs at the Laurel Theater. Tonight, veteran saxist Gary Foster will appear as the operation moves to the Church of Religious Science, a space that, unlike the Laurel or the Village Vanguard namesake, is not in the basement jazz club tradition, but has its sure ambient charms.

The good news is that the series is bringing worthwhile jazz culture to Ventura, on what looks to be an ongoing basis. Cumulatively, the pair of shows demonstrates the diversity of musical energies in the Los Angeles jazz scene. Foster, whose band includes solid pianist Tom Ranier, bassist Chuck Berghofer and drummer Kendall Kay, holds down the mainstream jazz fort beautifully, while saxists Carman and Richmond lean leftward toward the adventurous end of the spectrum. They’ll appear in their symmetrical Flying V group, with twin bassists Chris Symer and Trey Henry, and percussionists Kay and Brad Dutz. In all, a hardy week for jazz in Ventura.

* Ventura Vanguard Jazz Club concerts: Gary Foster today, Church of Religious Science, 101 S. Laurel St., Ventura, 8 p.m.; Paul Carman/Kim Richmond, Flying V, Tuesday, Laurel Theater, 1006 E. Main St., Ventura, 8 p.m. Advance, $18; at the door, $20. (805) 644-9247.

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Grand Requiem: Verdi’s Requiem is one of the most moving, grand-scale works in his repertory, which makes this weekend’s New West Symphony program of special interest. They’ll be performing the classic in Oxnard and Thousand Oaks, with the additional choral forces of both the Los Robles and Ventura master chorales, and a stellar list of soloists: soprano Sharol Azrieli, mezzo-soprano Wendy Hillhouse, tenor Francisco Casanova and bass Louis Legherz.

* New West Symphony, Friday at Oxnard Performing Arts Center, 800 Hobson Way; Saturday at Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza, 2100 E. Thousand Oaks Blvd. Both performances, 8 p.m. $8 to $67. (800) NEW-WEST.