Contemporary Art

Drawn from the collection of Sandra and Bram Dijkstra, Art for the People explores paintings created in the United States between the 1929 stock market crash and World War II. The exhibition focuses on federal Works Progress Administration artists of the 1930s and early 1940s who were employed by the government to help stimulate the post-Depression economy. More than 10,000 artists participated, creating works that represented the nation and its people and seeking to express fundamental human concerns, basic democratic principles, and the plight of the dispossessed.

 

Sundays, Mondays, & Wednesdays  – Saturdays 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

This landmark exhibition presents a range of works from Charles Bibbs’™ personal art collection as well as the artist’s original paintings and drawings. Through Sacred Spaces, Bibbs seeks to not only share this artistic journey but also send a message about the power of art in everyday life. He believes in a vital connection between the art that people see in public spaces and the lives they live in the spaces they inhabit every day. Sacred Spaces brings together these concepts in the hope that visitors will experience a connection with art that they take back into the sacred spaces of their own homes.

 

Riverside Art Museum is proud to present the second West Coast solo exhibition of Rico Gatson’s work. An interdisciplinary, Brooklyn-based artist, Gatson grew up in Riverside, California. His work is bold and graphic with art historical references to Russian Constructivism and Op art, while his wholly unique style highlights the complexities of Black life and its impact on American popular culture.

The exhibition is on view from Saturday, November 18, 2023 through Sunday, April 7, 2024 at the Riverside Art Museum in the Art Alliance Gallery.

 

Renowned American artist Betye Saar’s large-scale work Drifting Toward Twilight—recently commissioned by The Huntington—is a site-specific installation that features a 17-foot-long vintage wooden canoe and found objects, including birdcages, antlers, and natural materials harvested by Saar from The Huntington’s grounds.

 

“Betye Saar: Drifting Toward Twilight” transforms an entire room in the Scott Galleries into what the artist calls a “cocoon-like environment.” The walls are painted in an oceanic blue gradient, featuring a poem by Saar and phases of the moon. Shifting lighting effects in the gallery emulate phases of daylight to twilight, evening to night, and night to dawn. Inside the canoe, Saar positions mysterious “passengers,” including antlers in metal birdcages, children’s chairs, and architectural elements—all drawn from the artist’s ever-evolving collection of found objects. The space beneath the canoe is illuminated by a cool neon glow, highlighting plant material.

 

Betye Saar (b. 1926) is one of the most significant American artists. Over her six-decade career, she has created assemblage works exploring themes of racial oppression, mysticism, the occult, family, memory, and identity. She fashions her assemblage artworks from found objects, antiques, and family heirlooms that she collects. Emerging as an important artistic voice during the feminist and Civil Rights movements, Saar is a pioneer of Black feminist art who connected the personal with the political, taking on such subject matter as the legacies of enslavement and the impacts of racism.

The work of New York-based artist Sanford Biggers (b. 1970, Los Angeles) inaugurates the museum’s outdoor sculpture pedestal at Wilshire Boulevard and Glendon Avenue. Anchoring this corner is Oracle (2021), a cast bronze figure weighing 7.64 US tons (15,280 pounds) and standing at 25 feet tall. This monumental commission from Biggers continues his “Chimera” series that hybridizes the canonical figures and gestures of Greco-Roman sculpture with an assortment of iconic African objects from the 14th–20th centuries.

Sanford Biggers: Oracle is organized by Connie Butler, chief curator, with Ikechukwu Onyewuenyi, curatorial assistant.

This moving, seminal, visual arts project was conceptualized and developed by the Arts Center Director, Rosie Lee Hooks who commissioned 13 artists from the community to use shovels as a canvas to honor the legacy of our ancestors. Each of the world-renowned, master artists who accepted the challenge have a history of building arts institutions in Watts and the greater Los Angeles community.  

Join us in the gallery at Angels Gate Cultural Center (AGCC) for a Closing Reception and Artist Talk for Seven Visions X Seven Artists on Saturday, February 24th. The public will have a final opportunity to see the work in-person and ask questions in a conversation with the curator and artists.

Sign up on Eventbrite to receive reminder emails: http://tinyurl.com/49nhce3u

Seven Visions X Seven Artists is curated by Georgia Freedman-Harvey and features the 2023 recipients of the MRH Fund for Artists grant:

Cesar Garcia, nominated by Arts Connection, San Bernardino Arts Council
Trinh Mai, nominated by Arts Council for Long Beach
Rebekah Mei, nominated by Angels Gate Cultural Center
Nguyen Ly, nominated by Angels Gate Cultural Center
Jas Parker, nominated by HOLA Heart of Los Angeles
Edwin Vasquez, nominated by AIR Art in Residence
Patricia Yossen, nominated by HOLA Heart of Los Angeles

Please note that pets are not allowed inside our buildings. For questions, please email annie@angelsgateart.org.

Visit angelsgateart.org to learn more and plan your visit.
AGCC Gallery Hours are Thursday — Saturday, 10am to 4pm.

Cover photo credit: Jordan Rodriguez

This exhibition is supported by Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, California Natural Resources Agency for the Museum Grant Program under the California Cultural and Historical Endowment, and the Perenchio Foundation.

Before the city’s first dedicated contemporary art museum was established, Los Angeles was home to disparate, heterogeneous art scenes with artists forming different nodes and establishing tight networks throughout the city—from Venice to East LA, and from the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) in the north to the Brockman Gallery in Leimert Park. Artists utilized unconventional contexts including the street, the studio, the art school, and other public spaces to show and present their art while embracing performative and ephemeral actions to engage the public in more immediate ways. In doing so, artists were responding to the possibilities of a burgeoning art scene and the urban sprawl and dispersed landscape of LA.

 

Timed reservations required: Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays 11:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.,
Thursdays 11:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m., Saturdays and Sundays 11:00 a.m. – 6:00 p.m.

The Museum of Latin American Art is pleased to present Alexandre Arrechea: Intersected Horizons, the first solo museum show in California that explores the artistic practices of the well-known and multidisciplinary artist Alexandre Arrechea. A contemporary Afro-Cuban artist based between Spain and the USA for more than two decades and the former co-founder of the Los Carpinteros collective,

 

In this exhibit, Arrechea’s method of transgressing the limits of traditional artifacts and materials as a point of examination is redefined as a social and political exploration that melds art, history, and archaeological forms.

 

Adults – $15 Seniors & Students – $10, Members and Children under 12 Free,
Free Admission every Sunday