1996-1997

Fall 1996

Terry Acebo Davis, Dahil sa Yo ("Because of you" in Tagalog), an installation about support from family, friends, and one's adopted communities.

Families: Rebuilding, Reinventing, Recreating
11/21/96-1/30/97

Artists include Lenore Chinn, Johnny Coleman, Terry Acebo Davis, DIWA Arts, Jacqueline Yuke Lan Ford, Joe Bastida Rodriguez, Sara Leith-Tanous, Flo Oy Wong and Edward K. Wong, Art Family / Dinner Party installation artists Kim Anno, Lenore Chinn, Terry Acebo Davis, Jacqueline Ford, Eugenia Haney, Lissa Jones, Swati Kapoor, Yvonne Littleton, Laura Parker, Jan Rindfleisch, Anna Wong, Flo Oy Wong.

With representative works by Lucy Arai and Mary Chabiel, who exhibited in the companion exhibition Families, Stories and Practice. Curated with Flo Oy Wong and connections with Asian American Women Artists Association.

A focus on the value of family ties - so important, that we human beings come up with unique ways to rebuild, reinvent, and recreate families and ourselves - with kinship or without. Constructed families can include people whom we consider more than friends, who may be drawn from our work lives or spiritual lives. In addition to the presence of important people in our lives, there is also living with absence, separation. Painting, photography, sculpture, installations. Included installation Art Family/Dinner Party, created with Flo Oy Wong, with participation from artists at an "art family" dinner party organized in June. Artist Gatherings related to Art Family/Dinner Party installation in Families exhibition, organized with artist Flo Oy Wong. Dinner parties with slide presentations, discussions, held 6/1/96, 2/1/97 Announcement photos: Joe Bastida Rodriguez, In The Name of My Father, 1995. Mixed media installation, 8'x9'xl0'. Johnny Coleman, Homeschoolf Story teller: For Beulah's Youngest. Mixed media installation with canning jars, newspapers, book (Among the Missing), punctured inner tube, 8'x5'x3'. Flo Oy Wong, Baby Jack Rice Story, 1993. Mixed media installation with silk-screened images on rice sacks. Companion exhibition curated for Sunnyvale Creative Arts Center Gallery: Families: Stories and Practice, 11/7-12/21/96. Lucy Arai, mixed media with sashiko, traditional Japanese running-stitch embroidery, learned through a master-apprentice relationship with her mother. Mary Chabiel, paintings to illustrate Las Leyendas del Barrio, a storybook that Chabiel was creating with her daughter.

View ancillary materials for the Fall 1996 exhibitions.

Spring 1997

Land Values
2/25-4/24/97

Artists and organizations include Susan Leibovitz Steinman working with students, Mari Andrews, Antonio Castro, Jun Maeda, Guillermo Pulido, Karen Sjoholm, Marta Thoma, Brian Tripp, Tricia Ward, Kehinde Wiley, ARTScorpsLA, ARTSHIP Foundation.

A look at the values we place on land, and how these values relate to labor, history, culture, the environment, and our inner lives. Painting, sculpture, installations. Included Looking for the Creek on Stevens Creek Boulevard, a large outdoor installation by Susan Leibovitz Steinman working with students and instructors from different disciplines at De Anza College. Less than twenty years ago, land and farm labor were highly visible in Silicon Valley. Today the vital and historical connections of land to food to labor are hidden, as development takes over even in the Central Valley of California and farm labor camps are often placed out of sight, far from the road. Instead we pave over the land and fight to preserve some open space here, some access there. In our bigger cities, we try to reclaim parks from disuse and abuse, to recover derelict land, or plant a community garden for a little green, a little life, an "organic" vegetable, or a place for contemplating, connecting. The artists in Land Values shed light on these ideas through art and processes. With representative works by Mynor King and Rebecca Palmer, who exhibited in a companion show of Land Values in Sunnyvale. In April, the exhibition incorporated New Growth, a collaborative public artwork created by hundreds of local elementary school students through the Arts & Schools Program. Lecture by Susan Leibovitz Steinman regarding her work and Planning Sessions with students regarding her installation, 1/22. Then several weeks of Collaborative Outdoor Installation of Looking For the Creek on Stevens Creek Boulevard, in, around and on top of the Euphrat Museum. Collaboration with Duane Kubo, Warren Lucas, Elizabeth Mjelde regarding class presentation, installation, and performance in conjunction with Susan Leibovitz Steinman's installation for Land Values. Indoor Installation included writings from Kubo's Asian American Studies class. Lucas and his dance students created and performed a dance piece around some of the symbolic elements in Steinman's installation: automobile tires, shopping carts, and endangered river
Photos: Susan Leibovitz Steinman works with recycled materials, such as old car tires and shopping carts, in a manner that includes environmental and cultural awareness. (During a Euphrat performance a cart repossession agent actually tried to reclaim the shopping carts.) Jun Maeda, basket mural prepared for amphitheater renovation at Arroyo Viejo Park, Oakland, with plant materials from park, 11' diameter, 1996. Antonio Castro, Hoe Man, chalk pastel on burlap, 56"x62", 1995.
Companion exhibition curated for Sunnyvale Creative Arts Center Gallery, Land Values, 1/10-3/8/97. Two parts. Spring Leaves and Mountain Journeys, photographs by Rebecca Palmer; Taiwan Land and Heritage, drawings by Mynor King.
Companion exhibition curated for Sunnyvale Creative Arts Center Gallery: Perceptions, 3/21-5/10/97. Sculpture by Patricia L. Jauch and Mari Andrews.

View ancillary materials for the Spring 1997 exhibitions.