Art Scenes

Until May 17th the aptly named "Markings" exhibition will be shown in the Sacramento State University Library. Koo Kyung Sook's work is asserting, vivid, and alive. Looking into one of the pieces is like peering down a microscope to see the swirling organism below.  This effect is no accident, although the marks themselves are completely random. As Sook claimed in her artist statement: I do not have any particular images in mind when I start my work. Instead, I make hundreds of improvised marks...I then follow my intuition in the process of constructing, discovering, and reconstructing the selected marks to join them together to create figurative images. Her creative process, which in this body of works begins back in 2004, is extensive and laborious. It began through a fascination with collaboration, in art, the body, and life. A focus on what makes up a human body, a person. In the shows earlier pieces, we see figures abstracted into marks: small, r

The Power of Memory and Home Artist Alexandra Lown  Tucked away in the R.W. Witt Gallery of Sacramento State University was a collection of works that demonstrated a certain kind of strength not often thought of in contemporary art--that of love and home. Artist Alexandra Lown has combined comfort and wonder in her lucid artworks. Faces and Refractions, 2018. Oil paint and oil pastel on canvas. $2000 Above is a depiction of Lown's childhood home, where she still lives in Sacramento. The sculpture-like modeling, the attention to detail, give a sense of reality to the welcoming scene. Yet closer attention shows the dream-like elements of the piece: clouds float across the scene, flowers grow through the walls, and the furniture ebbs in and out of solidity. This scene is a memory, affected by its remember: the artist.   Lown: " This is how my kitchen looked when I was little before we did anything to it when this was the table he picked up at a ga

                             What do you think of the relationship between the pop culture of today and the art culture of the past? Do you see lines blurring? What other examples can you name of popular artists embracing the fine art world? Is this appreciation or satire? Let me know in the comments