Catalog for the CCA Exhibit "25: Celebrating 25 Years of the Barclay Simpson Award", 2012
In honor of the Sculpture program’s 80th Anniversary, the Libraries/CCA/C Archives presents the exhibit History Lessons: Sculpture at CCA/C, revealing sculpture’s central place in CCA’s history. From the 1913 image of Life Modeling students creating crucifixion pieces for the Competition for an Altar Crucifix, to the 2016 image of future grads installing the spatio-temporal works of The Immediate Archive, these images of student and faculty makers, their workshops, and the works of art they created give us a glimpse of sculpture through the decades and of the continued passionate pursuit of sculpture practices at CCA. “Like I hope all of the stories told in this little ‘history lesson’ might suggest, sculpture is and always has been, quite literally, something to rally around. So next time you are “casting about for an occupation,” consider building a life in and on and around it.”
MFA Exhibition, spring 1984. Untitled sculpture by Randall Dixon. MFA 1984. CCAC Gallery at 5251 Broawday with a view of the arch gate at the Broadway entrance to the Oakland campus. Photograph by Sharon Golden.
Works by Masters of Fine Arts Candidate Nicole Aponte,were displayed along the concrete wall in the Simpson Library; shedding light on the role that research has in the life of an artist.
Wherein we celebrate Constitution Day, aka the supreme law of the United States, with video clips from Alexander Hamilton and Schoolhouse Rock! Alexander Hamilton, a wildly popular, hip-hop musical about the founding father, written by Lin-Manuel Miranda, recently visited the White House; this clip of that performance includes a great introduction by President Obama! Schoolhouse Rock!, an ABC-TV educational series broadcast from 1973-1985, includes over forty infectious songs on subject matter ranging from grammar to economics & of course, the Constitution.
Increasingly popular, some artists and book publishers are making “bootleg” versions of photo books and editions that have become rare (and thus hard to find or very expensive). Often these bootleg versions are made on a copy machine, with different paper than the original or perhaps even a different edit and binding. Assignment: Make a bootleg version of a book from Meyer Library that you think honors the original but is more in the style of an homage. Meaning: take inspiration from the original but make a version that you think is worthy of a re-issue and that takes some imaginative liberties with the original. While this may go beyond a strict “bootleg,” it should definitely go beyond a mere facsimile of the original. The CCA Libraries will acquire the bootlegs on view into the artist books collection.
Lange explores notions of comfort, safety, identity and home through textiles. For this exhibition, four large-scale fabric sculptures are suspended from the Simpson Library wall alongside an artist intervention with the Science Library. Shelters operate as wearables and have been utilized in performances by Lange in previous iterations of the work, one such performance will be hosted during the opening reception.
The CCA Libraries Exhibition Program presents a digital exhibition by Erik Scollon’s undergraduate course, Craft as Social Justice. Exhibiting students include Maha Almadhi, Kelsey Bowen, Faye Dennis, Laila Espinoza, Maya Gulassa, Christine Juon, Angela Seon, Rosa Novak, Tracy Ren, Tenzin Tsomo, and Mai Utsumiya. For their final project, the students of Craft as Social Justice created an online exhibition of objects that focus on the intersection of craft practices and a social justice issue of their choosing. The collected exhibitions seek to make visible the connections between skilled making and materiality to the lived experiences of the makers and users. The curators sought to tie the issues and the makers to the current political moment. Viewers are invited to view the student projects on display in the digital space of exhibition by powering on the iPad display and following the links and videos embedded on the Craft as Social Justice homepage. Digital exhibitions on view include Break the …