Aazam Irilian Creates Beautiful Peace

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At the Poway Center for Performing Arts through March 24th, artist Aazam Irilian offers a series of dynamic, vibrant worka that exudes, at the same time, a sense of Zen-like stillness and serenity. Stillness in Chaos features immersive mixed media works that are contemplative in nature and focused on the delicate beauty, precious resilience, and lush colors of the earth. The images offer succor and solace, but also serve as a fierce call to protect our planet.

 

Irilian says her inspiration for the exhibition began during her pandemic lockdown period. “It was during the time that the whole world was in turmoil. In addition to the outside world, my personal life was also changing rapidly.” After 43 years of marriage, Irilian’s husband was diagnosed with dementia which progressed rapidly. “Between the outside world and  what was happening at home, everything seemed to be in chaos anywhere I looked,” she relates.

Calling her painted works here “layered in meaning,” she explains that a rush of thoughts led from one to the next even within the act of creating. “ Each step, action, and stroke would take a different meaning,” she attests.

According to Irilian, in her Indigo Dreaming series, her use of the color blue served as a metaphor for the uniqueness of race, culture, and gender, by introducing only one color additional to blue in each painting. This allowed a fluid and organic flow that moved each into the other, forming new colors. “The message I was communicating was [that] if we allow natural interactions and interconnections to take place, each individual, regardless of race, gender, or culture shines in its own beauty, and we will have a more cohesive human community.”

Along with this sense of purpose and meaning in her palette, Irilian notes that her process would also return a sense of calm, and to memories of her experiences in nature. It was the calm engendered by her process that shaped the exhibition title.

The artist considers her work to be “multi-perspective…meaning that the viewer needs to bring their own experience into each piece and decide what it is they are looking at.” Each work makes a fresh kind of landscape, in which the viewer alone determines what they are seeing and their point of view, including aspects such as whether they are looking into, down, or up at a given landscape.  Viewers are likewise encouraged to determine if a particular image reminds them of a location or experience.

“Take your time,” Irilian says, “really see how a piece makes you feel, what or why you resonate with it—experience being in the moment and letting go of the craziness of your day.”  The richness of Irilian’s palette encourages this type of contemplation. Of it, she says “I believe life is beautiful and filled with joy, regardless all its challenges.”

Combining both original paintings and limited-edition digital assemblages that mirror the artist’s painting style, the exhibition’s open and light-filled space at the Performing Arts Center reflects the show’s creative energy and overall sense of poetry. “Regardless of the medium or the type of art, [my] process is visualizing this energy as waves of light and color, dancing and moving through me, flowing through my hands, and landing onto the canvas or the surface I am working on. I create in a state of mind that I want my viewers to feel when looking at my art.”

While the exhibition blissfully utilizes Irilian’s signature fluid, flowing style, some pieces indicate a transition for the artist in the use of sharper, more angular strokes that fill a full canvas.

Overall, the show is lush in its abundance, as flowing as water or wind; it is lustrous work that shimmers with purpose and passion.

Irilian will be present for a Meet the Artist Event on Saturday, March 23, from 2 – 4 pm.
Poway Center for the Performing arts is located at 15498 Espola Rd, Poway, CA 92064
Gallery Hours: Tuesday – Thursday: 10 am to 2 pm, Friday: 1 to 6 pm, Saturday: 1 to 6 pm

  • Genie Davis; images provided by the artist

 

Hardly a Bit of Blah in “bLAh bLAh bLAh” at Launch Gallery

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Snezana Saraswati Petrovic and Chenhung Chen both weave. They weave artistic magic. They weave respectively using recyclable plastics and recycled metals and wire.

The result is something fascinating and fabulous in their paired solo exhibitions at Launch Gallery in mid-city. From paintings created from silvery staples to mesh wire basket and bell shapes from Chen to 3D-printed plastic corals from Petrovic, this work is lush and lovely, while also speaking to climate change, lost legacies, recyled materials, and reshaped hopes.

What do we envision for ourselves? Can we recreate the world and make it new again? These artists believe the answer is yes. Petrovic gives us dying and healthy corals in a variety of shapes and sizes, AR viewable images of sealife; Chen provides floral and fauna that are as delicate and sweet as any flower, but are shaped from metal and mesh and copper wire.

This immersive exhibition looks at our realities and issues,  crocheting, weaving, binding, shaping, and forming the new from the old; envisioning the interconnectedness of human beings, our planet, and social constructs that divide and unite us, sometimes paradoxically at the same time.

It is gorgeous art; it is also meaningful, looking at both who we are as a species and what we might be, and what our world may become. Can we shape it more gracefully and wonderfully, as these artists have done?

Dream-like and elegant, this is an exhibition that thrills with its creativity and understated beauty. Using unique materials, both artists shape classically brilliant work that resonates visually and emotionally.

Exhibition runs through March 2nd, so be sure to step inside the terrific web of unique sculptural forms these artists wove.

  • Genie Davis; photos by Genie Davis

Torrance Art Museum, Angels Gate Cultural Center, and Palos Verdes Art Center Make the South Bay Shine

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A collection of fine exhibitions makes the South Bay dazzle with their first 2024 exhibitions. So swing on down just below LAX and take in 6 terrific art events in three different spaces.

At the Torrance Art Museum, two perfectly realized exhibitions offer fresh, vibrant art. In Gallery One, don’t miss the group exhibition Western Values an exciting take on the mythos of the old west from cowboy tropes to historical implications.

Each piece is frankly outstanding, reinventing the powerful tales of Western fortitude and cultural heft in thoughtful works that vibrate with color. Outstanding video art from Julie Orser shapes a feminist version of gunslinger lore, with overlapping images on three giant screens. Shot in the Joshua Tree area, it’s cinematically stunning, and sharply pointed.

Curated by Sue-Na-Gay and Max Presneill, this is an exciting cultural reinvention and an artistic gem.

Exhibiting artists include Cara Romero, Dana Claxton, Edie Winograde, Ishi Glinsky, Julie Orser, Kyla Hansen, Manuello Paganelli, Pascual Sisto, River Garza, Rosson Crow.

Kyla Hansen’s neon-ribboned “Psychic” and Rosson Crow’s spray paint, oil, and acrylic rhapsody in reds, “Proud to be an American” are among the standouts.

In Gallery 2, the solo exhibition also resonates. “Everything You Say Can and Will Be Used Against You” from artist Brian Singer, uses a variety of sculptural objects to explore and expose our country’s responses to refugees, gentrification, surveillance, and other issues. Singer’s mother was interned during WWII, making both the beauty and the harsh truths behind these artworks as personal as they are potent.

Both exhibitions run through March 2nd. Torrance Art Museum is located at 3320 Civic Center Drive in Torrance, CA 90503

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In San Pedro, Angels Gate Cultural Center also has two exhibits, both group shows at this venue. 7 Visions X 7 Artists (above) features new and expansive creative works shaped under the auspices of the MRH Fund for Artists grant. This program follows Southern California artists on a year-long journey expanding their professional artist practice. Well curated by Georgia Freedman-Harvey, works include installations, sculptures, wall art by artists Cesar Garcia, Trinh Mai, Rebekah Mei, Nguyen Ly, Jas Parker, Edwin Vasquez, Patricia Yossen. You can read more about Vasquez’s work here. 

The exhibition ran through February 24th.

Upstairs, phenomenal works using print making and found objects fill the larger gallery, with the stellar Printmaking with Recycled Materials, a group exhibition by LYNK Collective, curated by Christina Yasmin Fesmire and Jared Millar.  Dramatic works utilize everything from fabric to melted plastic; it is a wonderfully dimensional and involving printmaking exhibitions that will exceed your ideas of what print making reveals. Artists include Yeansoo Aum, Elisabeth Beck, Andra Broekelschen, Alexandra Chiara, Christina Yasmin Fesmire, Karen Fiorito, Carole Gelker, Bill Jaros, Nguyen Ly, Diane McLeod, Jared Millar, William Myers, Marina Polic, Francisco Rogido, Olga Ryabtsova, Laura Shapiro, Tracy Loreque Skinner, Mary Lawrence Test, Paula Voss, Zana Zupur and guest artists: Karen Feuer-Schwager, Kim Kei, Wendy Murray, Jackie Nach, MJ Rado, Victor Rosas, Fred Rose, Marianne Sadowski, Jillian Thompson and Katie Thompson-Peer. Ly’s work is particularly mesmerizing.

There will be a closing event and talk on March 23rd from 2-4.  Angels Gate is located at3601 S Gaffey St, San Pedro, CA 90731.

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And, at the Palos Verdes Art Center, glass and jewelry are the sparkling stars of a solo show featuring the jewelry – both wearable and highly fantastical from Ann Olsen Daub in Multifacted, and a mind-altering group of glass artists exhibiting in The Optics of Now: SoCal Glass.

In the group show, the artists create works that defy traditiona expectations of glass art, creating unique and fascinating works from a column of linked glass “paper clip” chains to neon infused fabric daisies. Seashells, sea foam, stained glass, and figurative works all dazzle as do the art deco stylings of Nao Yamamoto.

Among the standouts are otherworldly sculptures featuring crystals and ceramic from Nicole Stahl, and Danielle Brensinger‘s flamedworked glass “Column.” Exhibiting are: Paul Brayton, Danielle Brensinger, Adam Gregory Cohen, Mariah Armstrong Conner, Alexander Dixon, Stephen Dee Edwards, Katherine Gray, Michael Hernandez, Eric Huebsch, John Gilbert Luebtow, Gregory Price, Sara Roller, Nicole Stahl, Amanda McDonald Stern, Ethan Stern, Susan Stinsmuehlen-Amend, Hiromi Takizawa, Kazuki Takizawa, Deshon Tyau, and Nao Yamamoto. 

 

Daub’s work is as whimsical as it is gorgeous. Giant gemstones, disco galls wearing crowns, a ring big enough for an elephant’s wedding, and examples of the artist’s wearble jewelry are all on display. All that glitters is gold here – or silver, mirror, and glass.

Palos Verdes Art Center is located at 5504 Crestridge Rd, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA 90275 Both shows are on view through April 13th.

  • Genie Davis; photos by Genie Davis

What’s in Bloom This Spring at Shoebox Projects

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As Gertrude Stein once said, a rose is a rose…but the flowers in Bloom are far more than that. They are created of oil and watercolor, fabric and photograph, sculptural and quilt,  mixed media and magic.

Curator Kristine Schomaker, in the second 2024 iteration of the return of her in-person Shoebox Projects gallery space, has created a wild and brilliant juried group show, walls radiant with stunning images of rich fecundity and gracious petals.

This is a garden of art, and it is a sweet one. You can almost smell the scents of these blossoms, you can almost touch the rich and silky petals. Dip your dreams into these dewy blossoms and find the fragrance of blissful beauty if you will – or simply admire the amazingly unique, original, and lush interpretations of Bloom.

“If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden.”– Frances Hodgson Burnett

Above, a splendid “Hibiscus” in close up by Caley O’Dwyer bursts with vibrant color.

Annie Seaton’s fabric garden is ablaze in light and embossed with sewn-in jewels, above.

Below, Kira Vollman’s mixed media includes 3D sculptural flowers made from fine metal mesh – copper, brass, and steel – and photography, to shape a delicate floral dreamscape.

From the dazzling swirls and kaleidoscopic wonder of Karen Hochman Brown to the heightened realism of Lauren Mendelsohn Bass, the delicacy of Nurit Avesar’s work, and the rich grace of Dellis Frank’s, there is something growing on these walls to soothe every soul.

The exhibiting artists include:  Shula Arbel, Nurit Avesar, Zadie Baker, Jane Bauman, Holly Boruck, Patricia Branstead, Anne M Bray, Rachel Bunteman, Corinne Cobabe, Adeola Davies-Aiyeloja, S. Emily de Araujo, Estefania Farias, Liz Flynn and Alyssa Arney, Dellis Frank, Carole Goldman, Damien Gossett, Tara Graviss White, Edwin Grundman, Karen Hochman Brown, Alison Hyman, Nicola Katsikis, Amanda Koger, Cristi Lyon, Monica R Marks, Katrina McElroy, Rena McInerney Olk, Martha Meade, Lauren Mendelsohn Bass, Masha Metamorph, Katie Middleton, Kris Moore, Heather Morrow, Marisa Murrow, Melanie Nolen, Caley O’Dwyer, Jennifer Ogden, Julie O’sullivan, Lark Larisa Pilinsky, Melissa Reischman, Katherine Rohrbacher, Terry Romero Paul, Annie Seaton, Shilla Shakoori, Karen Sikie, Phoebe Silva, Mahara Sinclaire, Elizabeth Souza, Nancy Spiller, Barbara Spiller, Carol Steinberg, Emily Sudd, Debbi Swanson Patrick, Kira Vollman, Robin Ward, and Liberty Worth.

As Schomaker says “Whether walking in a garden, planting your own, receiving them from friends or lovers, viewing delicious Renaissance flower paintings or walking through the flower market in DTLA, flowers bring joy and happiness to our internal and external worlds. Flowers are symbols of strength, longevity, grace, balance and abundance. We need more flowers right now.”

There are certainly plenty in Bloom at  Shoebox Projects. Closing is 3-5 pm on February the 25th with gallery hours by appointment on additional days. Shoebox Projects is located in The Brewery Lofts complex in Lincoln Heights.

    • Genie Davis; photos by Genie Davis