© Cowell College, 2008
Maintained by Sebastian Wolff ().

Winter Quarter Smith Gallery Exhibitions

PRESS RELEASE * PRESS RELEASE * PRESS RELEASE

FROM: ELOISE PICKARD SMITH GALLERY
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
COWELL COLLEGE
SANTA CRUZ, CA 95064

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

In the Main Gallery:
Claire Lerner
"The Relaxation Project"
recent mixed media works

In the Annex Gallery:
Jimmy Chen
"Sleepwalking"
night paintings

WHEN:
January 20 - March 8, 2008
The opening reception for both o exhibits is on
Sunday, January 20, from 2-4 pm.
The artists will be present. The public is invited.

WHERE: ELOISE PICKARD SMITH GALLERY
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA (UCSC)
COWELL COLLEGE
SANTA CRUZ, CALIFORNIA, 95064

HOURS: TUESDAY - SUNDAY, 11 AM - 5PM

TELEPHONE: (831) 459 - 2953

CONTACT: LINDA POPE, DIRECTOR/CURATOR

Exemplary Contemporary award winner, Claire Lerner's exhibit "The Relaxation Project" opens in the main gallery on January 20, 2008, at the Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery, Cowell College, UCSC and continues through March 8. Consecutively, in the Cowell's Annex Gallery, San Francisco artist, and UCSC Alumni, Jimmy Chen is exhibiting his night paintings in an exhibit aptly titled, "Sleepwalking."

Meet the artists at the opening reception on Sunday, January 20, 2008, 2 - 4 p.m.

Regular gallery hours are 11 A.M.--5 P.M., Tuesday - Sunday. For more information please call 831-459-2953.

Claire Lerner:
Claire Lerner's exhibition "The Relaxation Project" began when, always feeling at a loss on how to relax, she started visiting swimming pools and local beaches, trying to teach herself to relax and, to enjoy her summertime off, away teaching. She found herself asking, "How do I relax? What is relaxation? Do I need to be surrounded by beauty to relax?"

Gravitating toward formal elements that elicited a nostalgic response and an effortless sense of well being, Lerner brought her camera and started recording "abstractions" of her surroundings. " And, I brought my notepad to write down overheard conversations." During this process of documentation she began to enjoy visiting these places and once, when she actually left her camera and notepad at home, she realized she had begun to relax.

Back in the studio these bits and pieces of her experiences were rearranged in new and impossible contexts permitting the viewer a new perspective on what may have "previously gone unobserved or dismissed as simply banal."

The reconstructed images and words in "The Relaxation Project" were created on her journey. Lerner quotes from the French poet Baudelaire's refrain in "Invitation to the Voyage"...

"There, there is nothing else but grace and measure,
Richness, quietness, and pleasure."
more

Jimmy Chen:
With titles to his work like - Let Forever Be Delayed and Your Heartbeat is a Boring Song , UCSC Alumni and San Francisco artist, Jimmy Chen, centers his work around forays into the night and into the psyche of suburban comfort, in his solo exhibit at the Annex Gallery, Cowell College, January 20 through March 8.

Chen has written a 5-page document to accompany the exhibit, which begins first with a disclaimer and then his statement:

"Comfort, suburbia's most heralded attribute, is clarified in the manicured lawns, large houses, wide streets, and bright afternoon skies. For the majority, it is the optimal place to raise children, lead out safe lives, accrue wealth, and retire. Yet such prosaic pleasantries fall under scrutiny at night as if the absence of light's veil brings an end to the day's charade. Night--only then does the endless sleep of our days come to life."