Art I'm Looking at: Ruth Asawa, Paul McCartney, Kunié Sugiura, and Richard Diebenkorn

In the past six weeks or so, I've seen some of the major shows currently on view in San Francisco, mainly the Ruth Asawa show and work by Kunié Sugiura at SF MOMA, the Paul McCartney photographs at the De Young, and a small show of prints by Richard Diebenkorn at Crown Point Press. 

The Ruth Asawa show, which runs through September 2, brings together more than 300 pieces from all phases of Asawa's career. Like many people, I have been most familiar with her hanging wire sculptures. I was largely ignorant about the details of her career, however. The show, which is roughly chronological, offers an excellent opportunity to put the wire sculptures into context and to get a sense of the range of her activity. From the earliest work in the show, mainly from her time at Black Mountain College, to the last work she did, in San Francisco, where she eventually settled and raised a family of six children with her husband, architect Albert Lanier, it is evident that she had a deep interest in and understanding of natural forms, which appear to have been a constant inspiration. 

I particularly enjoyed seeing folded paper creations, early printed works, and some exquisite botanical contour drawings in the show, as well as drawings done using Screentone on matboard. Well worth a visit.  (Photos: Top – SF MOMA, installation view. Above, Mounted Paper Fold with Horizontal Stripes, ink on paper, 1952. Below, Photocopy of Ruth Asawa's Hand, not dated, photoelectric print.)

Also on at SF MOMA is a show of work by Kunié Sugiura, an artist I had never heard of, who appears to have been active mostly as a photographer. In the show are everything from small photomontages to very large photograms, but the show features what she refersto as "photopaintings." Sugiura's photopaintings are assemblages that combine photographic images with sculptural elements. Some of these put me in mind of Robert Rauschenberg's "combines." Others suggested Rothko with their simple pairings of diffuse, flat surfaces. I thought the photopaintings rather effective. The photographic elements function simultaneously as independent images and as abstract compositional elements within the whole of each piece. 

The show will be up through September 2025. If you're heading to SF MOMA to see the Ruth Asawa show, I recommend taking in the Sugiura show as well. (Photos: Above, SF MOMA installation view; below top, Introse BP3, toned silver gelatin print, 2002; below bottom Deadend Street, photographic emulsion and acrylic paint on canvas with wood, 1978.)

The Paul McCartney photographs now on view at the De Young I found interesting for their historical value; they present an intimate look at life behind the scenes with the Beatles just as Beatlemania was taking off, but I found the show a bit disappointing. With a few exceptions, the photos are not especially fine as photographs. Those on view are almost all digital prints from the negatives rather than silver gelatin prints (and where negatives have been lost, digital prints from scans of contemporary contact sheets), which would have been more authentic, and many of the shots were poorly focused (which is not to say that all photographs must be in sharp focus to be worthwhile). They mostly read as incidental snapshots – which, I suppose, is what they are; McCartney makes no claims to art here. Finally, not all of the photos on display are by McCartney. A fair number include McCartney's image, taken not by him but with his camera handed to someone else, and a couple of the best shots in the show are by other photographers entirely. Color photos in Miami reveal McCartney responding as a tourist. That said, any Beatles fan will enjoy seeing the collection presented here. I thought the photo of John Lennon in Paris and a shot of Ringo and George, both shown below, among the better images.

When Yale University Press in association with The Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and the Richard Diebenkorn Foundation, published the Richard Diebenkorn Catalog Raisonné in 2016, I acquired the set, as Diebenkorn is among my favorite artists, but I was disappointed to find that none of his many prints were included. I learned that a definitive catalog of the prints was to appear in a separate edition, and that has just appeared, almost ten years later. In honor of the publication, Crown Point Press in San Francisco (on Hawthorne St., a short walk from SF MOMA) is now doing a small show of some of the prints that Diebenkorn made at Crown Point Press. The show is small, with only about 25 pieces on the walls, but each is choice and one of the finished prints is shown alongside several proof versions, which allows a glimpse into the process of its creation. Worth a visit, but, checking the Crown Point Press website, it looks like this show may have just closed. I'd recommend calling in advance, but Crown Point Press is almost always worth a visit. 

Very close to Crown Point Press, walking along the sidewalk on Howard St., I noticed some pavement markings that looked very much like a Diebenkorn to me.  

Art I'm Looking At: Chris Beards—Sculpture at Paul Mahder Gallery in Healdsburg (through July 15, 2017)

Chris Beards And After opening reception, Paul Mahder Gallery

The Paul Mahder Gallery in Healdsburg opened an impressive show of new sculptural work by Santa Rosa artist Chris Beards last night (May 27). The artist was in attendance, along with many of the North Bay’s best artists, gallerists, and curators. I say sculptures—and they are sculptures—but all the pieces are wall-hung rather than freestanding, and they are dramatically lit, casting complex shadows on the white walls almost as interesting as the art itself.

Chris Beards, Siege (2017), detail

The show comprises about 12 pieces made from steel—mostly formed from sinewy, twisted strips or wrinkled sheets of steel—mummified in paper. Beards works by encasing steel armatures in multiple layers (sometimes as many as 20 layers) of paper bonded to the metal with thinned glue and other media. The paper and glue layers are then heavily worked. The layers are sanded, overlaid with more paper and glue, re-sanded, painted or shellacked or gessoed, sanded again and then further overlaid and finished in a laborious process that results in remarkably refined, sensuous, satiny surfaces, suggestive not of the raw steel underneath but of other metals—well-used bronze, smooth-worn iron, patina-green copper—or even softly eroded marble. The underlying steel is present in that it defines form here, but the surface finishes Beards achieves are as important as form. The sculptures have a skillfully crafted look in an age of art that often celebrates the opposite, and they are refreshingly appealing for that. There is something decidedly seductive about the work. You’ll want to touch it—caress it, even. Happily, the artist gives permission to touch the work a little.

Chris Beards in front of Within/Without (2016)

Beards has titled the show And After. A statement on the wall explains that the work is about how memory transforms experience—in particular, about the way time distils raw experience into something softer. The work, Beards says, is about the way our “narrative of the past becomes smoother,” the way the “sharp edges and thorns are softened and dulled.” He speaks of his sculptures not as depicting specific memories but rather as addressing the idea of memory itself. The finished pieces are presented as the softened remains of their underlying rough metal selves. He likens these sculptures to “time-tumbled driftwood or bones” and the metaphor is apt.

Chris Beards, After the Last (2013-2015)

Among my favorites pieces were Within/Without (2016, steel, paper, glue, spray paint, acrylic paint), After the Last (2013–2015, steel, paper, glue, spray paint, graphite, soft pastel, shellac), and Tiered (2017, steel, tracing paper, glue, gesso). The first of these suggests an unearthed artifact—a scrap of an obsolete, abandoned farm vehicle, perhaps—rusted but its surfaces polished as if long-caressed. After the Last is evocative of more organic forms. It kept suggesting to me part of the mummified remains of a frilled lizard, perhaps squashed flat on a roadway, or a fragment of a grasshopper—but the sculpture is again transformed into something sensuous by its satiny surfaces.

Chris Beards, Tiered (2017)

Tiered, my favorite piece in the show, reminded me of centuries-old stone steps worn smooth by the foot traffic of generations of pilgrims (the interior staircase of the leaning tower at Pisa, the steps inside Haghia Sophia, in Istanbul, came to mind) or the much-touched drapery of a recumbent figure on a white marble sarcophagus lid. These are only a few impressions, but Beards’s work is beautiful to look at and richly evocative.  And After will continue at Paul Mahder Gallery (222 Healdsburg Ave, Healdsburg, CA 95448, (707) 473-9150) through July 15, 2017 (although Paul Mahder now represents Beard and will therefore continue to handle his work after the show). Highly recommended.

Art I'm Looking At: Joey Enos Sculpture at Hammerfriar Gallery, Healdsburg

A new show at Hammerfriar Gallery, in Healdsburg, is something of a departure from the more sophisticated fare usually on display there (the just-ended show of photography by Elizabeth Sunday was superb). The gallery is now showing sculpture by Joey Enos, who works in what is essentially painted, plastic-covered styrofoam.

The sculptures (some free-standing, some fairly flat and wall-hung) are visually appealing; they are brightly colored, playful, and light-hearted. They evoke cartoons, theme park scenery, or the kind of theater set that aims to create a stylized façade rather than to imitate reality. Enos carves styrofoam to look like wood—not real wood but cartoon illustrations of wood—and so the "wood" is twice removed from actual wood. There are oversized, bent nails (these, too made of carved foam) in some pieces that look like something Wiley E. Coyote might have hastily hammered into a contraption for catching the Roadrunner. Other sculptures feature large "bolts." One piece is a large slice of Swiss cheese suspended by chains within a simple "wood" frame. Other works are a little more complex, totem-like, and resembling driftwood sculptures—albeit garishly painted ones.

The paint is actually pigmented resin sprayed onto the styrofoam forms, a process the artist subcontracts to a spraying plant. The effect is flat and un-nuanced. While Enos designs these pieces and oversees their production, a substantial portion of their creation is outsourced. There is no "hand of the artist" to see here and what there is to see is quickly absorbed. The sculptures are fun to look at, perhaps, and, having talked with the artist at the opening reception, I appreciate that he is in earnest, but I wonder if these works are capable of sustaining long interest?  

Places I'm Visiting: Carmel, Monterey, San Simeon (December 29, 2011-January 1, 2012)

On a short year-end trip to Carmel, Monterey, and San Simeon I visited the Hearst Castle for the first time in many years. The tours are set up in a much better way now than they once were. You can visit one or more of a few sets of rooms with a tour guide and then you're left free to walk around the gardens and visit the indoor pool at leisure. When I last went to San Simeon you could see the pool only on specific tours and you were never set free in the gardens. I took the Grand Rooms Tour, which lets you see the main living room, the dining room, the billiards room, and the theater. Other tours take you through the more private rooms in the house. One goes through the kitchen and other work rooms in the house.

There is much beautiful art in the house. I noticed a very nice altarpiece in the living room, but wasn't able to ask the guide about it. There were some good persian tiles, and a great deal of interesting furniture and architectural detail, much of it shipped over from Europe. Aside from the above-mentioned altarpiece, though, there aren't a lot of paintings in the house, which is a bit strange. Hearst's taste ran to the grandiose and it seems to have been best indulged by acquiring sculpture and buying pieces of buildings. I can't think of another man so wealthy that didn't accumulate a lot of paintings.

There's a great deal of sculpture in the gardens. Some of it beautiful, some of it in comical bad taste. The collections are very uneven. I wonder how much of Hearst's art collection consisted of things he liked, how much consisted of objects he bought because he could afford to and was advised to by others? I liked the lions on a large stone fountain in the gardens (top). A guard told me the fountain was Italian. Although it's topped with a replica of Donatello's David in Florence, the fountain looked more Spanish to me. The young woman with her arms raised at left is an example of one of the more kitschy works in the gardens. As they say, there's no accounting for taste.

I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking that the indoor Roman Pool is among the highlights of the castle. The entire place is decorated with gold and lapis tiles. The gold tiles are clear glass with gold leaf infused into them. Many of the mosaics show sea creatures. The gold patterns at the bottom of the pool are intended to evoke a starry night sky. The handrails at the pool exits and the posts supporting the distinctive lamps are made of lightly veined Vermont marble. The statues around the pool are modern copies of Greek and Roman originals made for Hearst in Italy. The pool is directly below a number of tennis courts with glass panels set into them that light the pool from above. One of the guards told me that architect Julia Morgan advised Hearst not to proceed with such a plan as it would surely leak and damage the ceiling, which it has. It remains a very special space nevertheless.