|
Friday May 3rd
5-9pm
Stripe MEN 117 Walnut Ave.
Rain Jordan resides and works in the Monterey Bay Area. She holds a BA and an MFA from the California State University system and specializes in textured acrylics and mixed media abstracts. Always innovative, Rain Jordan is the originator of the style displayed here, geometric abstract impressionism.
Rain’s paintings present unique, abstract impressions of nature–seascapes, landscapes, beachscapes, waves, et cetera–or of human life as a part of nature. Perhaps because of her obsession with the importance of home, and/or perhaps because of her work as a Realtor, Rain’s nature-centered paintings often include hints of homelike or other human-made structures as part of her scenes, but in unusual ways, and always focused first on nature.
Rain’s works have been shown in Perth, Australia, in Laguna Beach at LagunaArts, at SC41 in Santa Cruz County, and are in various private collections throughout the world, including New York, California, and Australia.
April 5th from 5-9 pm
107 Walnut Ave.
The paintings on view at Stripe are assembled landscapes.
Originally structured around common birds, this series has expanded to more broadly
reference the local suburban landscape. The eccentric construction of these compositions allows shape, juxtaposition and fragmentation to actively inform every aspect of the images.
Essentially a reverent investigation into what we consider ordinary, these images embrace the mundane, as well as the extreme – the fragile, gorgeous collision of a landscape that exists in accordance with, and in violation of, nature.
The familiar mystery that is the human sense of inhabiting Time is, for me, a central impulse in making Art. The ambiguous narrative of these paintings intentionally alludes to the persuasive presence of memory and how we live (and fail to live) our lives in time.
Born in San Francisco, California, Miriam Hitchcock lives in Santa Cruz where she makes paintings, drawings and videos in her studio. A member of the UCSC Art faculty for many years, Miriam has also taught Art studio courses at the American University in Rome, Cornell University School of Art and Architecture and Stanford University among others. A detailed resume is available on line where you can sample the full range of Miriam’s work. Purchase of artwork and/or studio visits can be arranged by contacting the artist via email.
miriamhitchcock@gmail.com
Website www.miriamhitchcock.com
Catered by the local and delicious Serendipity Spreads!
Friday February 1st
107 Walnut Ave.
5-9pm
Come stock up on all the new Thieves tee, hats, and beanies!
I am a collector…rocks, books, boxes, glass, sand, shells, images. I have always had a compulsive urge to hoard my memories, using objects and images as storage devices. Through photography I am able to visually work through the continued state of transition that my life exists within. Being an only child of divorced parents, my work emerges from a mental state of isolation and a desire to establish some control over my environment. Collecting and photographing have been ways for me to stop time. Capturing a single moment, in the midst of constant change, has been a tool for me to visually and mentally analyze what is happening around me. I make many aesthetic connections in my photographs and I frequently work in diptychs and triptychs. Working with multiple images allows me to tangibly express the aesthetic and formal connections that I make in everyday life. By emphasizing certain colors, textures, and forms, I use one image as a mirror for another, creating new narratives, new meanings, more complicated memories. In my recent work, I have been exploring issues of identity and human connection. Imaging myself and my partner of three years has allowed me to delve deeper into how individual identity is often formed within relationships and explore the ever changing nature of our personal connections to other humans. I have also started incorporating mixed media and sculptural elements into my work in order to investigate my inner obsession with collecting. I am concerned with the meanings that material things hold for people. Because of my own compulsion to acquire objects, exploring the human urge to contain and accumulate material goods fascinates me. What do our objects say about us as people? By working with photography and three-dimensional media I am exploring my personal psychology and identity but I am also digging into the greater psychology of human nature, our relationships with one another and our propensity to try to image, control and take ownership of our world.
For me, the act of painting outdoors provides an escape from the humdrum, a respite from an increasingly pervasive culture of commodification in which we live. In searching out a quiet place, I am seeking a temporary sanctuary, a meditation, a point from which I can follow along and perhaps lose myself among the contours of nature and the play of light, of color and form. I make a few initial brushstrokes and so begins the familiar process of building up a small reflection of the world before me—a thoroughly absorbing task urged on by the gradual and changing passage of light. The time it takes to complete a piece might be a single session of four hours or may be the product of a series of sittings. Sometimes the work is finished in the studio.
Although I do enjoy working on both figurative and non-objective (abstract) paintings and learn a great deal from that process, I find there is something endlessly compelling about the whole project of taking oil painting outdoors and into the fresh air and sunlight. There is risk and unpredictability there along with the hope of discovering something hidden, and the chance to try to express, through your own lens, a sense of being there. My hope is that something of the character of these places—a visual echo tangible yet ephemeral—emerges in these pieces.
Friday November 2nd
5-8 pm
Stripe MEN 117 Walnut Avenue.
Painting on found wood, with each piece having qualities of texture, decay, and grain is always an organic and intuitive process. The experience is much like surfing for me. The pursuit of a beautiful line, in a changing environment, is exhilarating. Add to it the power of color, shape, and texture and I’ll stay at it for hours.
The process of using the reclaimed wood involves hunting for it in the landfill or elsewhere, cleaning repeatedly until the piece can be painted on. The surface quality serves to suggest a landscape. I hope this art evokes the idea of new life and reworking the possible. From the landfill to the wall, this journey is very satisfying.
This latest series involves finding a variety of “vintage woods” and new woods and arranging them to find interesting textural, color, and shape relationships. The painted portions attempt to tie together these found pieces into one theme.
The atmospheric aspect to these landscapes points to the momentary reality they represent. A Buddhist friend who was looking at some of my paintings once told me these paintings remind him of “the natural mind.” This is a state wherein we are aware of the impermanence and passing of all reality, yet able to hang on to those things we want to as if they are permanent. I think that is very related to what is motivating me to make these images. When we see a beautiful scene, it is in flux, it is moving, and it is alive. It is not “a thing.” The life & death of this wood, being exposed to the natural elements gives each piece it’s character, but also suggests the wood as a process, not a thing. I try to find the possibilities and present dead matter anew.
My interest in art extends through my whole life, but didn’t get serious until the birth of my first son 10 years ago. I wanted to be sure as I became a father that I was living the life I really wanted, to be an example of the importance of living by one’s ideals. As teacher for 18 years, of both social studies for 7 years, and art for the last 11 I have tried to live by my ideals before anything else. I have always had to keep experimenting, intellectually and with materials, in order to keep the students (and myself!) moving in a positive direction.
I have lived in Santa Cruz and the larger bay area my whole life.
Friday October 5th
5-9pm
Catered by the always delicious Serendipity Jams!
Lisa Hochstein continues her work in collage with a new series begun in 2011, during a one-month artist’s residency at the Vermont Studio Center.
For over five years, Hochstein has used vintage sheet music covers as source material for her collages. Her work ranges from precise geometric structures to painterly compositions superimposed on a background architecture. The latest work pushes collage further towards gesture and painting, while remaining rooted in the artist’s fascination with color and typography from early-20th-century printed material.
The October show at Stripe coincides with Santa Cruz County’s Open Studios. To see more of Lisa’s work, stop by her studio during North County or Encore weekend (October 13th/14th and 20th/21st), or visit her website at www.lisahochstein.com.
Friday October 5th, 5-8pm
117 Walnut Ave.
Visit the Store | Contact | Admin
