Stephen Hepworth, Curator of UCSD’s University Art Gallery and Sue Greenwood, Director of Greenwood Fine Art in Laguna Beach had the daunting task of selecting “46 works of art by 26 artists from over 1100 images submitted by 272 artists”. These raw data points come from the gallery’s handout which is made available to all visitors. Difficult to understand why this bit of information is important; feeling strangely euphoric from a job well done, but also slightly apologetic for the results turned in. 272 artists that “represent” San Diego County’s depth and diversity of artistic talent are not many nor are the 26 deemed “representative.”



Ariel Diaz


This is troubling I believe, since Biennials are supposed to be at the forefront of greatness, highlighting artistic vision with the expectation of discovering a yet unknown talent. The jury in a perfect world, selects the best of the best based on a certain level of criteria and quality of the candidate’s production. In doing so, the juror makes a commitment to the work she believes is an accurate and relevant statement about the exhibit and its artists for the public’s comprehension. A jury should maintain a rigorous selection process, be prestigious, and offer a glimpse into the art world’s future. It is unclear whether the Cannon’s Biennial has achieved this.

“From figurative portraits to brightly hued abstractions, from color photography to delicate wall hangings, from conceptual assemblages to finely hewn furniture, this exhibition is certain to have something to stimulate everyone’s interest, fire their imagination and satisfy their spirit,” so says the gallery’s brochure. In essence, this translates into something for everyone, a panoply of expressions and tastes, satisfyingly unsatisfying, or in truth, a survey of “multidimensionality,” a “variety of themes” with rare occasions of brilliance and panache from a handful of artists.



Michelle Montjoy


Better to label it survey show that does not elucidate any direction of the arts in San Diego. Pleasing to the eye perhaps, but is this enough? Why weren’t the best of the best picked? The answer lies in the quality of the work selected and in the balance and cohesion of its presentation. The public will for the most part and in good faith, refrain from questioning a show’s intent or purpose or an artist’s work, believing of course these types of decisions about quality and merit have already been made. An exhibit’s organizer on the other hand, should not take advantage of the public’s trust or lack of accountability. I am in no way accusing the Cannon Gallery of being dishonest, it is however, easier to put on a good show that will challenge the public’s intelligence and sensibility than opting for universal themes and multidimensionality. If there is no direction to be found then look deeper.



Tara Smith


The point is it’s difficult to tell if we have the best work in front of us, the mix is so varied and diverse, there is no way of making any comparisons between them or similar genres. We are unable to tell if these artists are “experts” in their choice of medium. I would have reduced the number of artists, allowing for an even greater number of works, concentrating on the few who were pushing their craft and the boundaries of their imagination. When there was an attempt to do just that, say for example the paintings by Gerrit Greve - large scale close-up portraits of women’s faces – the “extra” pieces did not give us any further details or insights, rather they relied on very loose and somewhat formulaic brush work, taking up more canvas than our interest. Feeling a little disappointed that Greve’s work in the Movers and Shakers exhibit, albeit similar, was much stronger. It seemed there, he had allowed himself the time, leisure and energy to really look into his subject’s faces. Adding more work can only help if the work is of equal or better quality.

There are other painters in the show of course, as varied as their imagery and curiously out of place in the context of the exhibit, functioning if you will like occasional blips on a radar screen. The successful works were those that weren’t trying to be more than they proclaimed. I felt a certain “plasir” when looking at them, recognizing a certain naiveté and joyous exploration of the materials with no desire by the artist to make it “Art” with a capital A or for that matter, contemporary. Jonathan Wiltshire’s “The City on the Hill,” a futurist and utopian vision of a civilization on a hill is an example of this, or Elizabeth Washburn’s encaustic and oil entitled “Habitat Tree #3” is another – a beautifully executed patchwork of bright colors, texture, layers and creamy surface that depicts a large tree in Autumn. Other works by Duke Windsor of cityscapes and alleys or Al Felman’s “plein air” landscapes, though commonplace, were deftly executed raising them above the din of similar schools of thought. On the other hand, works by Judy Pike “Sisters and the Rift between Them,” the rift represented by the separation of the two panels it is painted on, and Tara Smith’s “Cover Your Neighbor 2,” remain bland and too stylistically contrived.



David Fobes



David Fobes


David Fobes was a refreshing addition to the show however. His “Chromantic” paintings function as paintings until you come closer and discover they have been made using different colors of common household duct tape. Fobes work was also seen this past October in the Simayspace Gallery downtown, one of the few last shows organized in that space before it recently closed. A quick visit to Mister Fobes.com and you’ll discover an artist and a designer of both furniture and architectural projects, who has a witty but clever sense of humor and a love of color that permeates his work. Chromantic is a word Fobes made up meaning – chrome (color) and mantic (ability to see or be prophetic) that are “like the visions elucidated by a clairvoyant, they are not whole, they are missing bits of information, or the information itself may be ambiguous.” This could be read as the brightly multi-colored bands of duct tape that appear in Fobes work of similar length and width, like code bars on a can of soup, which once scanned, gives the price of the product but doesn’t necessairly tell you what that product is made of.

Fobes Chromantic series are often minimal-esque architectural interiors “missing” information like a third wall, a door, or support for the ceiling. They are stark, colorful, a bit hypnotic, playful, and unintentionally poke fun at the Color Field painters of the 70’s with the same rigor and execution of Stella’s Hard-Edge works. The two works on display in the Cannon exhibit are a welcome relief to the stuffiness of the rest of the show, leaving me to wonder what the show might of looked like “installed” in one of Fobes interiors. It seems rather appropriate to ponder this as I imagine myself an avatar in some Second Life online adventure, enjoying the art and the comforts of Fobes home sweet home.



Will Gibson


There is very little photography in this exhibit; I was drawn in particular to Will Gibson’s “The Ore Loader” (Marquette, Michigan) a beautiful B&W photograph of an abandoned ore loader, depositing ore on to ships that would carry the precious cargo across the great lakes. The frankness, simplicity and compositional allure of this photo is in large part, due to Mother Nature’s ability to render most of man’s blemishes beautiful once again, as well as, Gibson’s eye which is much more precise than in his other photos. Landscape is also prevalent in the work of James Soe Nyun and “The Yellowstone Burnscapes,” documentary homage to pioneering photographers like William Henry Jackson and his “great geographical surveys of the American West”. Nyun contemporizes the work by photographing the Yellowstone landscape some twenty years later after the park suffered major firestorm damage in 1988.



James Soe Nyun


Art’s ability and an artist’s desire as Gesa Cowell puts it, “to create images that are able to evoke emotions,” I believe, is the most difficult task to accomplish in any art making process. The unending bombardment of imagery across our television or computer screens, YouTube videos and I Reporters has only made matters worse, concretizing photography’s somewhat undisputed chronicler of all things, people, and events as truth – as reality. That reality, especially today, compressed into .jpegs and sent world wide with a touch of a button, can overwhelm and even undermine the work of Cowell, no matter how “personally symbolic.” Therein lies the difficulty, how does an artist translate emotion onto a pellicle of film and make it convincing, when in Cowell’s case, clichéd images of a toy polar bear, an alarm clock or candlestick, even her Mother’s slippers (according to the title of the piece) are so unconvincing?



Joseph Bennett


The sculptors and installation artists in this exhibit, with few exceptions, did not fare well either. Joseph Bennett’s pieces had the unfortunate experience of being bookends to Shawn Goodell’s untitled cut-out paper submarine, though I’m not sure their placement somewhere else would have made much of a difference. Goodell’s is a delicate and intricate work weaved together by crisscrossing strands exposed by the removal of the paper’s surface, exposing the submarine’s exoskeleton in a spider web motif of positive and negative shapes that make up the whole. Goodell’s work is an anomaly, a specimen in a cabinet of curiosities, strangely out of place yet perfectly in step with contemporary times and art making practices. Bennett’s work, typically assemblages of found objects, their surfaces covered in spraycan white, resemble a beginning drawing class still-life, more than the carefully composed and vastly more compelling constructions he is known for. Placement was also an issue for Kathy Miller’s mixed media installation entitled, “Contemplation”. Stuck in one of the gallery’s corners, it did not help its heavy handed execution of portraying/questioning society’s idea of the female body and the anxiety it can elicit according to Miller. While certainly detrimental and abusive to a majority of women, Miller’s selection of materials to convey this anxiety – a 19th century inspired padded girdle constricted at the waist, flowing robe made up of cloth measuring tapes weighted down by iron rings, and a broken mirror fastened to the wall – does not liberate the viewer’s awareness and manages at best, a stereotypical response from the artist.



Shawn Goodell - click for larger image



Shawn Goodell



Shawn Goodell


In the end, other than Fobes’s duct tape paintings, three artists, Kelly Schnorr, Lee Puffer, and Paul Henry, stand up the best in the context of this show. You can loosely find similarities between all three: women’s roles within the society and family, domesticity, elders, family secrets, home and how it is presented through objects, keepsakes, furniture or a family’s memorabilia - a chipped mug, music box, grandma’s afghan rug etc. What do we hold dear or precious? What do we notice or remember about our past? What or who have we forgotten? Each artist seems to grapple with these issues in their own unique and powerful way.



Kelly Schnorr


Kelly Schnorr presents a piece entitled, “Aunt Pearl, Uncle Frank,” represented by small ceramic houses sitting on shelves one above the other, with a series of flowery coffee cups both store bought and their ceramic copies, hanging on hooks next to the houses. There are black charcoal outlines of these cups on the wall insuring their proper placement and hanging, much like any car mechanic’s tool blackboard – orderliness is next to godliness. However, some cups have been removed or are missing, even on of the houses. But there is more trouble brewing underneath, coming to the surface, fading at times, scrubbed away, tarnished like the cups and houses themselves, faint words appear over and over on their surface – “Dirty” “Ugly” – are these words referring to Aunt Pearl, Uncle Frank or what went on in these houses? We don’t know. Careful observation reveals a metallic screw head protruding from where the house’s chimney should be, a quick turn of the screw sets in motion a hidden music box, as music gently wafts through the gallery, covering up once again a less than idyllic situation. The family that keep secrets together stays together.



Lee Puffer



Lee Puffer


Lee Puffer’s “Trophy Rack” is just as poignant. A woman’s head (the artist’s) made from terra cotta complete with antlers sticking out of her forehead, is presented like a trophy within a gilded thrift store frame that hangs on the wall. Confronting similar issues to those of Miller’s “Contemplation,” Puffer expands these notions into what she calls the “vanishing woman.” Trophies are for the most part prizes, compensation for the taking and domination of an opponent, animal or human spirit. It is vanity at its purest form and stupidity at its basest manifestation. Puffer believes, “some women disappear into motherhood, careers, and marriages… their identity as individuals is subjugated by their roles as mother, wife, and employee.” In other words, they are models to be put on display as examples of accepted behaviour or risk the possibility of extinction and indifference. The power of Puffer’s work and its desire to “honor everyday women and validate their experiences,” effectively circumvents traditional notions of recognition via an inanimate award or effigy, by calling our attention first to what women do as individuals before they are glorified mistakenly, as someone else’s treasure or property.



Paul Henry



Paul Henry



Paul Henry



Paul Henry


Lastly, Paul Henry’s exquisite furniture pieces or parts there of, are refreshingly beautiful, stunning to look at, witty and downright sensual – or what he would shyly call, “leg fetishes”. Indeed they are, but only one leg, a table leg carved from poplar or basswood and then fitted with tiny little drawers not much bigger than a jewel box’s. These are wonderful playful works that recall mythical castles in the sky, tree houses, Frank Gehry-esque architecture and Brancusi’s Endless Columns and Bird in Space sculptures.

The Cannon Art Gallery’s 2009 Juried Biennial, suffering from a somewhat un-inspired selection of works is not helped by the overcrowding of its installation (Henry’s leg sculptures also became bookends for Maria De Castro’s ceramic muses) and too much diversity that dilutes any distinctive movement or trend. It is rather, hegemony of presubscribed aesthetic taste wholly predictable and lacking innovation. A disappointment that does not I’m sure, represent accurately neither what exists in San Diego nor what the city is capable of demonstrating in the art it produces. We can do better.