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My Ruling Planet.
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The Age of Cement. Cement and oil, by Rocky Rische-Baird. |
Painter/sculptor Rocky Rische-Baird displays work created from cement and motor oil in an exhibit entitled “My Ruling Planet. Sculptures, paintings/drawings by Rocky Rische-Baird” at Esteban Sabar Gallery from May 3rd to May 31st, 2007. An artist’s reception takes place on Thursday, May 3rd from 6 to 9pm.
As meaning emerges from medium, could there be a more contemporary, relevant medium than cement and motor oil? In a society literally built and fueled by these substances, a word slowly dying at the hands of pollution and war from side-effects of our addiction to the Earth’s most dangerous substance – oil; a world covered and smothered by the cement that is paving this planet, these materials, full of such loaded and layered meaning and metaphor, define our times, define our physical and mental environments – and, perhaps, are a new definition of “us.”
Rocky Rische-Baird uses these defining mediums to create sculpture and paintings/drawings that will be on exhibit in his show, “My Ruling Planet,” opening at the Esteban Sabar Gallery in Oakland, on May 3rd.
From Mars, the god of war, sculpted from cement and motor oil, to a life-size figurative sculpture titled, “The Age of Cement,” to abstract creations inspired by sidewalks, to small mixed-media pieces with the figures painted with motor oil, Rische-Baird explores questions of environment, perception, and the seemingly instinctual human drive to attempt to inject permanence into our temporal existence.
San Francisco Chronicle Review:
SLICK SCULPTURES 'My Ruling Planet' - Artist covers concrete works in motor oil to make a political statement
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Through May 31, 2007.
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Filipino painters explore cultural irony in an exhibit entitled “TRAIDOR!” at Esteban Sabar Gallery from May 3rd to May 31st, 2007. An artists’ reception takes place on Thursday, May 3rd from 6 to 9pm.
TRAIDOR!, an exhibition by four Filipino painters, England Hidalgo, Marcius Noceda, Carlo Ricafort and Mel Vera Cruz, that explores the irony of the struggle to present artwork about a history of exploitation while immersed in a commodified world. Lian Ladia, the curator, explains, “Traidor is a tagalog word for traitor, and this exhibition explores the irony in the exploration of the relationship of art and commodity.”
The exhibition gets beneath the surfaces to discover material processes that would betray the seductive world of objects, similar to Theodore Adorno’s concept of negative dialectics, a solution to a mindless consumption dominated by society.
The four Filipino artists work in the Bay Area and focus on postmodern and political art. Their most recent show was at Somarts in San Francisco called Overmapped with significant artists like Carlos Villa and Robert Guitterez. The progressive group has been invited to exhibit their works at the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Manila in 2009.
East Bay Express Article:
Restless Natives - Four Filipino artists and their identity crises.
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Through May 31, 2007.
Artists on exhibition at the Esteban Sabar Gallery include Julie Alvarado, Sue Averell, Bethany Ayres, Rocky Baird, Nancy Ballard, Trish Booth, Mario Chiodo, Guy Colwell, Scott Courtenay-Smith, Patricia Gillespie, Liz Amini-Holmes, Mark Holmes, Scott Hove, Albert Hwang, Wendell Jones, Feng Jin, Ben Johnston, Zack Jones, John Kinstler, Douglas Light, Donna Mendes, Marty McCorkle, Marvin McMillian, Kenney Mencher, Carol Paquet, Tim Phelan, Erik Rogers & Dana Porteos, Fernando Reyes, Diego Rios, Bernadette Sale, Kevin Slagle, and Daniel Wooddell.
See examples of each artist's work.
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