Organizers hope this iteration will continue to shine the spotlight on Orange County’s oldest museum with events and community connections.
When the Laguna Art Museum first launched its weeklong celebration of Art + Nature in 2013, it drew criticism from traditionalists since the event would replace the museum’s 14-year participation in the Laguna Plein Air Painters Association “Paint Out” and related soirees.
After all, they groused, the museum had been founded by artists who had taken inspiration from its bucolic canyon and sunny seaside surroundings and thus put Laguna Beach on the map.
However, the more farsighted sensed the birth of a new tradition married to contemporary relevance since the inaugural A+N had invited renowned land artist Jim Denevan to create on-site works inspired by his surroundings on Main Beach and Heisler Park. Here was a novel opportunity and approach to showcasing artists’ inspiration by nature, their increasing involvement in conservation and related environmental causes, fueled by a growing awareness of the perils of global warming.
As consternation about the latter and its ramifications reaches increasingly elevated pitches, Laguna Art Museum opens its 12th edition of Art and Nature between Nov. 2-11.
The public can look forward to a series of events under direction of executive director Julie Perlin Lee that will include exhibitions in the museum galleries along with an outdoor installation on Main Beach and Heisler Park by featured artist Christian Sampson titled “Ocean Ions.”
Events will kick off on Nov. 2 with “Upcycled Couture: Wearable Art for a Livable Planet,” a first-time fashion show of high-end clothing made from sustainable and recycled materials, based on collaborations between local fashion design students and community organizations dedicated to environmental protection. These groups include the Crystal Cove Conservancy, Laguna Greenbelt Inc., Laguna Bluebelt and others with community conservancy missions.
The week includes a free museum day with family activities involving juxtapositions of nature and art on Nov. 10, and concludes on Nov. 11.
Perlin Lee points to an expanded collaboration with Laguna Beach nature conservation, creative, education and also business communities. “Each year we are reevaluating the art program with the idea of putting community service first. We think of how we can be better stewards of today and tomorrow,” she said.
“This year, we use the fashion show to amplify our mission. Fashion design students from schools including Laguna College of Art + Design, Chapman University and UC Irvine will partner with community environmental organizations to emphasize sustainability.” She also said that the museum is strengthening its partnership with LCAD, utilizing the college’s galleries on Ocean Avenue for exhibits and events.
Perlin Lee mentioned the addition of more free events to attract larger crowds, including guests from local hotels and expanded ties with the business community at large. “We want people involved for multiple days, to consider other points of view in experiencing art and raising awareness of our environment,” she said.
Dancers from Volta Collective perform with sculptures by Christian Sampson. Photos courtesy of Monica Nouwens
Sampson Plays with Light
Born in 1974 in Bradenton, Florida, and working in Los Angeles, Sampson describes his “Ocean Ions” as not a literal approach to the meaning of the word “ion” in its Greek origin, but as a poetic approach to where light meets the environment.
“It’s multiple site-specific based on the variable of geometric shapes that will create a painting on the beach,” he said. “Light and medium and environment along with weather, ocean and beach is the very animated idea behind it.” He added that he wants to put viewers into nature and make them mentally focus on presence, their own included – to create a spiritual experience.
“The way that, for example, Cézanne would paint mountains and experience the moment, I want viewers to feel my work in real time,” he said.
To create his paintings made from light passing through objects like circles, spheres and other shapes made from resin and/or glass and objects that might be seen through them, he places them above neutral grounding such as sand, or, if inside, on windows while allowing the light to hit an opposing wall or the ground. A picture painting a picture with light comes to mind.
“I am interested in optical devices in painting and illusion making in the manner of (French landscape painter) Claude Lorrain. He put the sublime into the landscape,” Sampson said, while also mentioning his inspiration from the Light and Space movement of art.
The latter might be evident in his museum lobby installation which will cover all the windows. “I want viewers to interact with my pieces,” he said.
The Nov. 9 Main Beach unveiling of the installation will also incorporate dance movements performed by members of the Volta Collective and choreographed by its director, Mamie Green.
“Dancers will wear translucent costumes and hold sculptures on the evening beach that are covered in dichroic film (a film that refracts light) and project into each other like a kaleidoscope,” explained Sampson, adding that Ariel Dill, a painter and also his wife, painted the costumes.
Images by Jay Defeo. IMAGE 1: Untitled (Tree series), 1953. Tempera on paper. IMAGE 2: Untitled, 1972. Gelatin silver print. IMAGE 3: Untitled, 1972. Gelatin silver print. IMAGE 4: Untitled, 1973. Gelatin silver print. IMAGE 5: Untitled (Tree series), 1954. Tempera on paper. Images courtesy of The Jay DeFeo Foundation/ Artists Rights Society
Rare Pieces from DeFeo
Visitors to Art and Nature are also able to view two remarkable, nature-themed shows in the museum galleries: “Trees” (through Jan. 12) presents drawings and silver gelatin print photographs by Jay DeFeo, and “Fred Tomaselli: Second Nature,” (through Feb. 2) a multimedia show that delves not only into art and nature but the nature of societies and politics. LAM curatorial fellow Rochelle Steiner, Ph.D. curated both shows.
“Trees” consists of a rarely shown series of DeFeo’s tempera on paper drawings (two from LAM’s collection) completed between 1953-54 and several silver gelatin print photographs from the 1970s. While the abstracted drawings are engaging in their spontaneity of form, the photographs evidence DeFeo’s refined sense of composition and her intuitive sense of the interactions of elements in nature. For example, a close-up of tree roots hosting countless fungi shows the interdependence of ecological systems while also being simply beautiful.
On the other hand, the weathered stump of a badly cut-down tree suggests a human face in the throes of suffering.
DeFeo, a San Francisco Bay Area resident who is largely known among art people for her enormous white, one-ton oil with mica and wood painting/assemblage of a rose, was a versatile painter and photographer highly attuned to the elements of nature.
“The nine tree drawings she made had never been shown together but she wanted them shown together. The challenge was to correlate the group,” curator Steiner said. “Trees and nature permeated her photography as well and form related threads throughout her practice.”
Steiner said overall DeFeo’s photographs conveyed a variety of themes, with some being more abstract. “I chose the ones that would convey nature and trees specifically, selecting a span for the viewer to look at trees in the setting of a landscape – close-ups, far away, seasonal variants, creating a range of experiences,” she said. DeFeo passed away from lung cancer in Oakland in 1989.
Images by Fred Tomaselli. IMAGE 1: "Bear Cam 2," 2023, acrylic, photo collage, and resin on wood panel. Image courtesy of the artist, On White Wall and White Cube. IMAGE 2: "September 29, 2021," 2021, gouache, photo collage, and archival inkjet print on watercolor paper. Image courtesy of the artist and James Cohan. IMAGE 3: "July 18, 2021," 2021, gouache, photo collage, and archival inkjet print on watercolor paper. Image courtesy of the artist and White Cube. IMAGE 4: "Irwin’s Garden," 2023, acrylic, photo collage, leaves, and resin on wood panel. Image courtesy of the artist and Dan Bradica Studio
Tomaselli Puts Southern California Center Stage
Tomaselli’s “Second Nature” exhibition supports Steiner’s observation that the artist, born in 1956, raised in Southern California and working in New York since 1985, is interested in everything. “Everything is a possible subject, but his imagination is also still rooted in Southern California,” she said. “Many of his works shown address the ever-tightening intersections of social issues, environmental concerns and world politics through clever manipulations of the front pages of the New York Times. Here headlines are embellished with symbolic commentary in gouache and collage, such as an ocean tide rising to drown a pictured group of Afghani schoolgirls about to lose their human rights under the Taliban.
Then again, the painting “Bear Cam 2” points up beauty in the cruel hierarchy of nature with a bear hunting for fish in a mountain stream.
One of the more remarkable pieces here is “Irwin’s Garden,” a tribute to Robert Irwin’s central garden at the Getty Center. Unabashed in its beauty, it shows how Tomaselli, even while tending his own garden in New York, still has a tap root in California. This is his first show at LAM, and the there are no works by him in the museum’s permanent collection, remarked Steiner.
Meanwhile Perlin Lee is looking toward the future. “We are following artists from all over the world. When we are able to expand funding we can expand our roster and become more competitive. Financially we’re not quite there yet,” she said. “We are taking this initiative very seriously, making the program larger and a part of LAM’s identity. We hope for our audiences to get bigger, but we have received so many calls this year that we are flooded with people wanting to volunteer.”
Laguna Art Museum staff and supporters are hoping this year’s Art and Nature programming will be another step toward an even brighter, more auspicious future.
Art and Nature Events Calendar
Laguna Art Museum, 307 Cliff Drive, Laguna Beach
Museum Hours: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesdays through Sundays.
Nov. 2, 5-8 p.m.: Art and Nature: Upcycled Couture Fashion Show featuring creative synergy between fashion design students and the sustaining missions of LAM’s community partners.
Nov. 3, 1 p.m.: Laguna Live! at the museum
Nov. 7, 10 a.m.: “Ocean Ions” outdoor installation opening to the public at Main Beach and Heisler Park locations.
Nov. 7, after 5 p.m.: First Thursdays Art Walk. Free Admission past 6 p.m.
Nov. 9, 10 a.m.: Art and Nature: Portrait of Place, a community art workshop led by artist Oriana Poindexter. Participants will study ocean specimens with Poindexter and collaboratively create detailed artworks that celebrate underwater life. On Main Beach.
Nov. 9, 4 p.m.: “Ocean Ions” performance by the Volta Collective dancers centered on the Sampson installation on Main Beach.
Nov. 10, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.: Free Museum Day featuring activities for all ages, museum docent tours, refreshments, giveaways.
Nov. 11, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.: Drawing for the Planet Art Workshop
