2003-2004

Fall 2003

Daily Dramas: Currents and Undercurrents
9/30-11/26/03

Artists include Mel Adamson, May Chan, Richard Godinez, Wayne Jiang, Linden Keiffer, George Rivera.

Daily Dramas featured the work of six artists who depicted people or implied human presence in various dramas of our day - some chosen freely, other imposed by systems or regimes. Wayne Jiang presented detailed paintings, life scenes of an extended Chinese American family. Mel Adamson, an art professor from San Jose State University, exhibited large paintings of generational differences, intimacy and distance. George Rivera, a painter who is also the Director of the Triton Museum, painted emotional states behind the roles he had to play. Painter Richard Godinez juxtaposed realities, such as a Norman Rockwell's Thanksgiving dinner and a family looking for food in a garbage dump. Using articles of clothing to stand in for people and the drama of our lives, May Chan's sculptural installation addressed maintaining and developing connections across the Pacific Ocean. Also several painting installations by Linden Keiffer, similar to stage sets with actors and props, constructed a world beyond the indignities of daily racism. Keiffer is the director of The You in Me organization in Oakland dedicated to multicultural and multiracial education. Artist presentation, Wayne Jiang, 10/23/03.

View ancillary materials for the Fall 2003 exhibitions.

Winter 2004

Closing The Distance
1/5-2/5/04

Artists include Binh Danh, Jim Gensheimer, Chen-Ju Pan, Soffia Saemundsdottir, Nazanin Shenasa.

Closing the Distance presented sculpture, photography, and mixed media installation about moving between one continent and another, about connections between the two locales, and how these connections change. It began with a project of two photographers, Binh Danh and Jim Gensheimer, entitled The Journey of Vietnamese Boat People. Danh presented photos of an abandoned Vietnamese refugee camp in Malaysia where he had lived. Gensheimer, a Mercury News photographer, presented photos from the South China Sea (1987) and from Vietnam (1989-2000). Nazanin Shenasa, a textile artist, created an installation related to the changes she saw in Iran, so different from what her parents had told her and what she had read about. Sculptor Chen-Ju Pan, originally from Taiwan, hung her 8'x14'x17' steel, poplar and fabric art kayak from the ceiling - a fantasy boat to escape traditional gender roles and explore new areas. Also on a very large scale were the 9'x13' charcoal drawings of Soffia Saemundsdottir from Iceland whose works were a journey in a landscape more symbolic than real. Artist Presentation Naz Shenasa, 2/3/04.

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Spring 2004

City Life
2/25-4/16/04

City Life presented art related to the urban experience. It highlighted urban transportation, work, architecture (buildings, landscape, and interiors), public art, neighborhoods, and life styles. Lewis Watts showed photographs of urban life in Oakland, selections from his series Evidence: The Oakland Cultural Landscape Project. Jessica Dunne created paintings of urban night scenes, including parking lots and freeways. Seyed Alavi photographed numerous people on Market Street in San Francisco and layered their facial images, six at a time, to create composite images displayed as large kiosk posters. Harriete Estel Berman's nine-foot-square sculpture of "grass" constructed from recycled tin consumer products called attention to the rampant consumerism in our city malls. Large photographs of Tokyo subway scenes by Kim Yasuda explored ideas of personal and public space in Japanese cities. Katherine Aoki created something new, an active urban world populated with women who provoke us to challenge gender-related expectations. Artist Presentations: Katherina Aoki, with Women's History Month Committee, 3/10/04, Lewis Watts, 4/8/04.

Katherine Aoki, Lawyer, 2000. Using cartoon styles, Aoki's active urban world is populated with women challenging gender-related expectations. One series is about women superheroes, such as the urban lawyer, who are just really good at their jobs.

Fundraising Event in Los Altos Hills, with Art Exhibition of five artists, 5/19/04. Honoring Margaret and Hsing Kung and Jerry Hiura and artists: Diana Pumpelly Bates, Sharon Chinen, Nina Koepcke, Dawn Nakanishi, Flo Oy Wong.

View ancillary materials for the Spring 2004 exhibitions.