Christina Waters

Last weekend’s Plein Air Affaire event at Santa Cruz’ Museum of Art and History attracted thousands of visitors, and made even more thousands of dollars for the downtown arts venue.

The invited artists included some of the Bay Area’s leading outdoor and impressionistic painters, including the legendary Howard Ikemoto, Peter Loftus, Charles Prentiss, Barbara Lawrence, Mike Bailey, and Frank Galuszka. The artwork displayed was striking, beautiful, and of noticeably higher quality that what many have come to expect from plein air shows.

Galuszka, whose day job is professor of art at UCSC, won the “QuickDraw” prize for his atmospheric egg tempera study, Sun and Fog: View over Monterey Bay, (r.) painted on Sunday morning before the public viewing.

If you missed this summer’s Plein Air Affaire, make plans to visit next year at MAH. Alfresco artwork never looked so good. The Museum of Art & History is located at 705 Front Street, Santa Cruz (next door to the new Lulu’s).

San Francisco’s Hackett-Freedman Gallery always offers an eyeful of the best contemporary realism. Opening July 10 is a show of new paintings by Jeffrey Ripple, whose elegant still life studies are the equal to works by the 17th century Spanish masters.

The serene arrangements of flowers and fruit on orientalesque, flat-toned backgrounds show off Ripple’s incredible mastery of realist technique, but they go further than that. The enigmatic studies suggest an ineffable lifeforce behind light, shadow, shape and form - in much that way that Vermeer’s creamy light suggests an unseen, but always-present God. (more…)

The San Francisco Opera’s new production of Das Rheingold — the first of Richard Wagner’s four “Ring” cycle masterworks — is musically mighty, but dramatically thin. Woeful set design — presumably by a last-minute committee of amateurs — caused almost fatal dissonance with an outstanding orchestra, playing music to end the world by for three straight hours.
A decent cast, with the unfortunate exception of Mark Delavan’s wobbly Wotan, did its best to overcome a rickety set of cardboard props, direction by Marx Brothers surrogates, and a set that could only have been some sort of 21st century WPA project. The allegedly innovative digital backdrops made embarrassing references to every PBS science special you’ve ever seen, while the raked stage floor sabotaged grace, causing loud “thumps” and “oomphs” during the changing of the scenes. Actors stumbled, wandered aimlessly, (more…)

If there’s a legal thrill that comes close to great, live opera - I haven’t found it yet. And last Sunday’s opening matinee performance of Ariodante just proved it all over again.

Written seemingly to twist Baroque-era vocal chords into rococo pretzels, Handel’s 275-year-old masterpiece is your basic love, betrayal, revenge, death and happy ending opera seria, loaded with soprano parts written for men and sung by women in 18th century drag. Got that? Think of it this way: Handel was the toast of Europe when Ariodante debuted in 1735. It was created for the male (castrato) soprano superstar Giovanni Carestini — written by a German (Handel) living in London, set in Scotland and sung in Italian. Ben Franklin very likely saw this opera. Twice.

Sunday’s performance was by every benchmark a knock-out, bringing the San Francisco Opera House audience to its feet at least three times during the 3 hours of killer vocal pyrotechnics — imagine all those serious, white-haired opera buffs screaming, cheering and stomping their approval. Delicious. (more…)

01SJ is North America’s newest and largest festival of digital arts featuring transformative and provocative new works from world-renowned artists and performers at the cross-section of contemporary art, technology, and culture.

This year’s blazing Zero One digital extravaganza features UCSC’s Digital Arts & New Media 2008 MFA Exhibition - Bureau of Disruptions — involving the work of 14 tech pioneers.

It opens today — noon to 10pm — at the Comerica Building - 333 W. Santa Clara Street in downtown San Jose.

IRWIN Scholars 2008
MAY 28 - JUNE 14
Opening Reception: Wednesday, May 28 5-7PM; Awards: 6PM

Check out this year’s Irwin Scholarship exhibition at the UCSC Sesnon Gallery in Porter College, featuring twelve of UCSC’s most promising artists working in painting, photography, printmaking, sculpture, installation and electronic media.
This year’s Irwin recipients are: Misha Capecchi, Seth Charles, Julia Fredenburg, Levi Goldman, Andrew Herbig, Serena Mitnik-Miller, (more…)

A roster of heavyweight — or at least wildly colorful and prolific — local artists will gather for your edification on the weekend of June 7-8, 11am-6pm at The Mill Gallery, 131 Front St., in Santa Cruz. It’s called Art for Art, and it benefits the Tannery Arts Center.
Art-lovers can check out bold contemporary artwork in a wide range of media from more than two dozen top practitioners. Choice appetizers and music will also accompany the visual feast, and artists will be donating 20% of all sales to the Tannery Arts Center. Art for Art group exhibition will be on view during June 6th “First Friday” art grazing tour - 5:30-9pm.

If you need more info contact the Art for Art website. See you there!

Susana Arias
Karen Bailey
Fran Battendieri
Hildy Bernstein
Linda Christensen
Pilar Cox
Madeline de Joly
Susan Dorf
Sara Friedlander (she never sleeps)
Don Fritz (neither does he)
Shelby Graham
Jane Gregorius
Stephanie Heit
D. Hooker
r.r. Jones
Robert Larson (more…)

UCSC Open Studio Art Sale!

Brigid McCabe graduated with a degree in Art from UCSC a few years ago, went back east for an MFA, and now lives and works in her Berkeley studio. McCabe’s vibrant paintings of psychological environments, in brilliant hues of orange, yellow and green, will be on exhibit at Togonon Gallery in San Francisco, starting June 5, 2008.

McCabe’s is a fictional world filled with the playful ephemera of everyday life, gleaned from childhood memories and tomorrow’s breakfast. Striking, lively and 100% California in spirit, this work produces adrenaline surges.

Daily Inventory: Paintings by Brigid McCabe. Reception - Thursday, June 5 5:30-8pm. Togonon Gallery - 77 Geary Street, SF (415).398-5572.