Sculptures, paintings mix at museum
Both museums adopt new names
By Shari Kaplan
Not only does it have a new installation by two artists to begin the new year, but a familiar Los Gatos venue has also taken on two new names.
Formerly The Los Gatos Museum of Art & Natural History, the building at 4 Tait Ave. is now divided into The Art Museum of Los Gatos, for the galleries upstairs, and The Science Museum of Los Gatos, for the collection downstairs of plants, animals, minerals and exhibits on natural science.
The new show, which runs through March 2, consists of paintings and sculptures by James Morris of Emeryville and paintings and aquatints by San Franciscan Jessica Dunne.
Morris, who holds bachelor's and master's degrees in fine arts, draws much artistic inspiration from roadside America: "Fanciful, quirky commercial architecture and artifacts intended to catch the eye of passing motorists," as he describes it.
Many of the sights he replicates as tiny painted ceramic sculptures were once common in the West, Southwest or Midwest. "As a child passenger on long summer road trips, our family was more likely to speed by these oddities than to stop and check them out. But I was always fascinated by them and their unabashed obtrusiveness," he reveals in his artist's statement.
Among these are "The Need to Believe" and "The Squeeze," which show lemon- and orange-shaped fruit stands, respectively, in the middle of dusty stretches of nowhere. Other pieces include "Youthful Indiscretion," "Overlooking the Obvious" and "Lingering Notion," which depict, respectively, a hot dog stand shaped like a hot dog, a red house resembling an apple, and a teepee-shaped house or camping facility.
Morris also ventures into paintings that also possess thought-provoking titles. They include "Suspicion," which shows nothing but a large puffy cloud in the clear blue sky above the ocean; and "Endurance," in which flat brushland stretches as far as the eye can see.
Dunne, who holds a bachelor's degree in fine arts, with years of additional studies under her belt, also recreates views as seen from a passing car. Hers, however, are mostly at night.
The idea came, she says in her artist's statement, when she was driving during a power outage. Her attention was drawn to the glow from cars' headlights and taillights, while her memory was drawn back to the days before greenish-white mercury vapor and orange-pink sodium vapor streetlights cast unnatural glows on landscapes and cityscapes.
Two samples of her paintings are "Approaching S.F." and "Wet Pavement." The first is a driver's-eye view of a Bay Area bridge at either dusk or dawn; the second shows a wide, wet and deserted street illumined by the bright glare of streetlights and traffic signals.
Dunne is also exhibiting "spit-bite" aqua-tints of trains, freeways and buildings. This black-and-white technique consists of using a mixture of acid and saliva to burn an image directly into a rosin-coated copper plate, which then is used for making prints.
The Art Museum of Los Gatos is open Wednesday through Sunday, noon to 4 p.m. For more information, call 408.354.2646.
Los Gatos, California Since 1881
