The David Richard Contemporary Gallery To Show Southern California Paintings From the 1970's

Written by Ethel Cartwright Sunday, 19 June 2011 00:13

Santa Fe.- David Richard Contemporary is pleased to present "Southern California Painting, 1970s: Painting Per Se", the first of four exhibitions the gallery will present over the next two years that will take an in-depth look at various aspects of Southern California painting during the 1970s — a period now being reassessed as an historically important time in California and the rest of the US. In Southern California, the 1970s saw several tendencies emerge from the “Cool School,” including Pop, hard-edge abstraction, “Fetish Finish” craze and the “Light and Space” movement, all continuing from the ‘60s, and a range of artmaking that included hyper-realism, painterly figuration, gestural abstraction, and “material” abstraction.

There was tremendous experimentation with industrial materials and manufacturing processes, and an increasing desire to capture the open expanses and bright light of the California landscape. All these movements were unique to California, only tangentially related to and distinctly different from the Lyrical Abstraction, Minimalism, Pop and Op Art of New York. "Southern California Painting, 1970s: Painting Per Se" will be on view at the gallery from July 1st through July 31st.

This first exhibition, Painting Per Se, on view at David Richard Contemporary for the month of July, will present paintings from 1970s Southern California that mostly utilize traditional supports, such as canvas, linen, panel or paper and pigmented media, including oil, acrylic or watercolor. A few works on alternative supports—acrylic, vinyl—provide a sneak preview into subsequent exhibitions.

Hard-edged, geometric, minimal and Light and Space painting will be represented by the artwork of Charles Arnoldi, Billy Al Bengston, Karl Benjamin, Karen Carson, Judy Chicago, Ron Davis, Tony DeLap, Doug Edge, Helen Lundeberg, Ed Moses, Peter Plagens, and Norman Zammitt. The work of Jerrold Burchman, Marvin Harden and Matsumi Kanemitsu demonstrate the range of not only the gestural and painterly approaches to artmaking, but also painting supports. Figuration was very much a part of the So Cal scene, as represented by the paintings of Hans Burkhardt, Charles Garabedian, Scott Grieger, Maxwell Hendler, Ynez Johnston and Margaret Nielsen. A range of constructions that incorporate novel materials and media that allowed artists to explore painterly issues with a different approach is exemplified in the work of Merion Estes, Craig Kauffman and Tom Wudl, which foreshadows what we refer to as “material abstraction,” also the subject of a subsequent exhibition.

David Richard Contemporary is located in downtown Santa Fe north of the historic plaza. David Richard Contemporary offers a wide range of important contemporary art by established and emerging American and international artists. Although the gallery focuses on abstraction, representational and non-representational art in a variety of media are exhibited. The gallery also presents collaborative curatorial programs highlighting significant works and art historical tendencies in the 1960s through the 1980s. The objective is to create an interactive space for gallery artists, collectors, collaborators and the general art community. Visit the gallery's website at ... http://www.davidrichardcontemporary.com

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