Artist Spotlight: Ellen Starr's "Natural Selections"

Ellen Starr, La Mesa Fig Trees, Water soluble oil on canvas, 21.5 x 25.5"

Ellen Starr is drawn to nature as a subject for various reasons. She finds it spiritually refreshing while simultaneously emotionally and intellectually stimulating. Her newest exhibition, Natural Selections, finds Starr sharing her love of the organic with the viewer, engrossing us in natural habitats and lush ecosystems.

Ellen Starr, Mngrove Heron, Water soluble oil on canvas, 19.5 x 19.5"

Nature’s endless variety stimulates the artist. “I love the challenge of organizing its visual complexity. The splash of sunlight on a leaf, the crisscross of stems and branches, the silhouettes of purple shadows -these are all elements that I can manipulate and interpret with the help of canvas and water soluble oil paint,” says Starr.

Ellen Starr, Fiji Hiking View, Water soluble oil on canvas, 19.5 x 25"

Natural Selections balances various elements of composition - line, shape, dark, light, texture, color - in order to create an equilibrium that satisfies the artist’s aesthetic sense. Starr enjoys finding logic in disorder, seeing beauty in the intricate, and to make confusion understandable. “I care deeply about many subjects and it is the desire to communicate my personal perceptions that moves me to produce art.”

Ellen Starr, Bel Air Beach Club, Water soluble oil on canvas, 19.5 x 25.5"

Ellen's work will be on exhibition until Saturday, February 18.
Join Ellen, Boris Litvinov, and Joan Horsfall Young at an Artist Panel Discussion Saturday, February 11, 3pm.

Artist Spotlight: Joan Horsfall Young's "On Water"

Joan Horsfall Young, L504 Sunset Over the Water, Oil on linen, 12 x 12"

In her latest exhibition at TAG Gallery, Joan Horsfall Young explores the earth’s most sacred natural resource: water. Our precious commodity is becoming increasingly scarce. Have we taken it for granted? Are we being punished for not paying homage to it? 

Joan Horsfall Young, G162 Making Waves, Oil on linen, 20 x 16"

In On Water, Young synthesizes these ideas with quotes from ancient and contemporary writers and transmutes them into paintings that document the beauty and utility of our delicate resource. Social gatherings on the still waterfront, the power of the ocean’s mighty waves, and the tenderness of a romantic moment reflected on a shimmering lake are all documented in Young’s canvases as testament to the might and versatility of water.

Joan Horsfall Young, L486 Tide Pools, Oil on linen, 8 x 10"

Suppose a tide came only once every fifty years. What a flurry of excitement there would be. Imagine the scramble to pay the price of admission to witness such an event. 

Joan Horsfall Young, Bathers On the Beach, Oil on linen, 24 x 30"

Water is good; it benefits all things

So let us give nature a chance…

She knows her business better then we do.

The exhibition runs through February 18.

Meet Joan at the Artist's Reception, Saturday January 28, 5-8pm

or at the Artist Panel, Saturday February 11, 3pm

Current Exhibition: Joan Horsfall Young, Ellen Starr and Boris Litvinov

Tuesday Jan 24 - Saturday Feb 18, 2017

Reception:
Sat., Jan 28, 5-8 pm

Artist Panel
Sat., Feb 11, 3 pm

Boris Litvinov - Meditations In Stone

Boris Litvinow, Femme Triste, Translucent Utah orange alabaster mounted on African zebrawood, 8 x 5 x 5'

Ellen Starr - Natural Selections

Ellen Starr, Vasquez Rocks, Water soluble oil on canvas, 21 x 31"

Joan Horsfall Young - On Water

Joan Horsfall Young, L500 Cloud Reflections, Oil on linen, 12 x 12"

Artist Spotlight: Tom Wheeler's Light Lab 2017 - Route 395

Tom Wheeler, Red Fence Alabama Hills, Archival pigment on cotton fiber, 26 x 36"

Light Lab 2017 - Route 395 is Tom Wheeler’s foray into location-focused series work for the first time, while continuing to refine his now familiar and unique style of long-exposure painted-light photography. This magnificent highway is one of the most scenic stretches of road in California and seems an inevitable fit for Wheeler’s pension for grand, sweeping landscapes and dramatic backdrops for his long-exposure nighttime work. He has specialized in painted-light photography for decades now, and demonstrates a mastery of the craft in his most recent show. 

Tom Wheeler, Abstract #2 Along Dolomite Road, Archival pigment on cotton fiber, 36 x 26"

Wheeler’s previous body of work, Light Lab 2016, showcased experimental techniques in a small series of lighted box imagery in the California desert. Light Lab 2017 - Route 395 is a continuation of this work, which generally entails the use of hand-held light tools and translucent experimental props, often using a minimalist style of a brightly lit subject among a vast landscape. Wheeler does not create images in post-production or with Photoshop, but instead opts for lugging all the necessary tools and equipment out into the wilderness to wholly create his stunning imagery at the time of exposure. 

Tom Wheeler, Cube #7, Archival pigment on cotton fiber, 26 x 36"

In Light Lab 2017 - Route 395, Wheeler has once again created cutting-edge imagery as he continues to break across new boundaries in the night-photography genre. He spent a week traveling without a schedule, scouting locations by day and shooting images at night, sometimes until 4am, living out of his car, his tent, and the campy little motels along the way. 

Tom Wheeler, Fully Lit, Archival pigment on cotton fiber, 26 x 36"

Route 395 offered Wheeler the ultimate in outdoor studio settings: from vast meadows buttressing the tallest peaks in the continental U.S, to the ancient bristlecone pines 9000 feet up in those mountains. He explored hundreds of miles of back-roads, discovering abandoned 19th century mining encampments and various locations that offered dramatic sections of the famous aqueduct to Los Angeles. 

Tom Wheeler, ATV Party, USA, Jawbone Canyon, Archival pigment on cotton fiber, 36 x 26"

This exhibition of awe-inducing work is truly a cross-section of the life and scenery of this magical and desolate part of the state. With images spanning only a few sections of this vast road stretching north and south through most of the state, Wheeler assures us that this is merely “Part 1” of Route 395.

Light Lab 2017 - Route 395 is on exhibit until January 21.

Artist Spotlight: Karen Woodward Sarrow's Blue Earth

Karen Woodward Sarrow, Mountainous, Acrylic and ink on linen, 48 x 84"

TAG Gallery is proud to present Blue Earth by artist Karen Woodward Sarrow. This showing includes paintings inspired by the Keep it in the Ground environmental movement asking for a transition to renewable energy, and a significant reduction of fossil fuels and pollutants. 

Sarrow begins her paintings by drawing black lines to capture natural movement, the expressive contours of life and human design, as well as a conscious recognition to grief embedded in our world. She then completes the paintings with flat colors.

Karen Woodward Sarrow, Blue Earth, Acrylic and ink on canvas, 40 x 40"

An environmental activist, Sarrow roots her paintings in the impact of humanity’s carbon footprint on the globe, with images ranging from topics of socio-economic inequality to environmental racism. To this end, Blue Earth is, at its core, an exhibition on the art of observation, with the artist finding solace and inspiration in her ability to educate and communicate through her craft. Science and art both facilitate dialogue by way of surveillance, with this exhibition acting as an intersection for both disciplines. 

Karen Woodward Sarrow, Blue Butterflies, Acrylic and ink on canvas, 48 x 24"

Sarrow has been formally influenced by the work of muralist painters and modernist Max Beckman, using English pop artist Patrick Caulfield’s work to inform her ongoing experimentation with color placement and spatial relationships. Her canvases are filled with images of a healthy blue earth but also sickly blue animals, using color to portray idealism as well as a sense of wrongness and mourning. 

Karen Woodward Sarrow, Keep It In the Ground, Acrylic and ink on board, 40 x 16"

Blue Earth is a show designed to inspire love and action for clean water and air by way of translating the sometimes-intangible concepts and magnitude of environmental safety and translating its message via visual language. Sarrow invites you to feel, to question, to engage, and lastly, to act.

Blue Earth is on exhibit until January 21.

Current Exhibition: Karen Woodward Sarrow, Tom Wheeler, New Member Showcase

Tuesday, January 3 – Saturday January 21, 2017

Opening Reception: Saturday, January 7, 5 – 8pm

Artist Panel Discussion: Saturday, January 14, 3pm


Karen Woodward Sarrow – Blue Earth

Karen Woodward Sarrow, Big Blue, Acrylic and ink on canvas 36 x 72"

Tom Wheeler – Light Lab 2017: Route 395

Tom Wheeler, El Cerro Gordo, Archival pigment on cotton fiber, 20 x 30"