April 21 - May 19, 2018
Curator’s Statement Metamorphosis Through metamorphosis life forms and objects go through transformation of form, structure, or substance as if by magic or witchcraft. Metamorphosis features five women sculptors who work primarily in large format: Marguerite Elliot, Crystal Kamoroff, Jann Nunn, Ann Rowles and Sondra Schwetman. Through the use of heat and fire, and by knitting, arranging, layering and welding, these artists transform metal, fiber, old clothes, wood and clay into sculptures that are astonishing in their size, heft and beauty. Metamorphosis also includes mid-size and smaller works by these artists that compliment and contrast with the larger works on display. Curator: Priscilla Otani co-founder of Arc Gallery & Studios, along with Matthew Frederick, Stephen C. Wagner and Michael Yochum
Catalog designed by Michael Yochum Arc Gallery Š 2018
Featured Artists
Marguerite Elliot Crystal Kamoroff Jann Nunn Ann Rowles Sondra Schwetman
OPENING RECEPTION Saturday, April 21st, 7-9 PM CLOSING RECEPTION & ARTIST TALK Saturday, May 19th, 12-3 PM
Marguerite Elliot
Growing up on a small farm in rural Virginia, I spent many hours walking along stream banks, communing with nature. I was fascinated with the farm machinery and loved watching my Dad make things. The art I create today has a direct connection to my years growing up in the country. I feel a deep affinity with nature and the natural cycle of life. Concerned with the current environmental destruction, loss of species, and irrevocable environmental changes taking place all over the world, my work functions as both a reliquary and a shrine, to what is lost or soon may be lost. My steel sculptures speak to the transitory and fragile nature of life. Elements of nature- seedpods, leaves, and rocks are bound or suspended by thin wire, or encased in steel. Are they being protected, or are they imprisoned? Can you touch them or does the wire keep you out? There is an implied feeling of fragility and vulnerability. My attraction to working with steel is one of alchemy. Intense heat (3200 degrees) is required to melt the steel. All kinds of power tools are needed to complete the process, as well as carefully applied chemical patinas. Over the years, I have become a tool nut. Painters collect brushes and paint. I collect power tools and patinas. Although the intense heat of my welding torch transforms the steel, melting and bending it, even steel is transitory, eventually rusting away to nothing.
website: http://www.margueriteelliot.com email: marguerite.elliot@gmail.com
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS FROM 1985-PRESENT
Committed to Print, Museum of Modern Art, New York City, NY Books Without Bounds, Irvine Fine Arts Center, Irvine, CA Ronald Feldman Gallery, New York City, NY Armand Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA Doin’ It In Public: Feminism and Art at the Women’s Building, Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, CA Group Show, Newport Harbor Art Museum, Newport Beach, CA Street Harvest, New Langton Arts, San Francisco, CA (solo) Street Harvest in Los Angeles, Art Dock, Los Angeles, CA (solo) End of the Rainbow, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA The Art of the Women’s Building, Artemisia Gallery, Chicago, IL Secular Attitudes, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA The Fate of the Earth, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, CA Small Work, Artworks Downtown, San Rafael, CA Marin Museum of Contemporary Art, Novato, CA ka-POW!, Pacific Pinball Museum, Alameda, CA
GRANTS, COMMISSIONS, COLLECTIONS
Museum of Modern Art, Permanent Collection, New York City, New York Public Commission: Gijon Foundation, Dallas, Texas Private Commissions: Gene Adcock, Los Angeles, CA Private Commission: Robert Kagan, Avon, CT Private Commission: Christine and Bill Bone, Beverly Hills, CA National Endowment for the Arts Grant
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS McCarthy, David, “American Artists against War, 1935-2010”, University of California Press, 2015 p. 117 Elliot, Marguerite and Karras, Maria, “The Woman’s Building & Feminist Art Education, 1973-1991”, published with the Getty Initiative and Otis College of Art and Design, 2011 Wilson, William, “Off The Street”, Los Angeles Times, May 13, 1985 Muchnic, Suzanne, “Attitudes: Art Shading Into Politics”, Los Angeles Times, March 14, 1985 Paul, James, “The Center of Strange in San Francisco”, Washington Post, June 24, 1984 Lippard, Lucy, “How Cool Is The Freeze?”, Village Voice, June 15, 1982 PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS AND EXPERIENCE
Women’s Caucus for Art, Northern California Chapter, Membership Chair ArtTable, Northern California Chapter, Communications Chair Di Rosa, Napa, CA Docent Elliot Art Productions, Owner Ultimate Art Travel, Owner Aperture f/64 Gallery, Director
Rift steel, natural objects 84” x 20” x 10” Marguerite Elliot
Leaves steel, magnoilia leaves 84” x 12” x 8”
Anima Mundi steel, seedpods 84” x 20” x 10”
Dust to Dust steel, seedpods 35” x 20” x 2.5”
Marguerite Elliot
Hanging Pods cast bronze seedpods, steel, wire 13” x 12” x 4”
Two Pods Entwined cast bronze seedpods, steel, wire 13” x 17” x 4”
Two Pods steel, mixed media, wire 13” x 12” x 6” Marguerite Elliot
River steel, natural objects 17” x 60” x 2.5”
Marguerite Elliot
Crystal Kamoroff
I am motivated by reinvention and transformation of a physical and spiritual nature. My artwork is a record documenting the act of connecting. In my process I create visual relationships and links that construct a desirable whole from interdependent parts. These connections simultaneously defy and employ logic in playful ways. I utilize sensual forms and hybrids of the organic/mechanical, natural/artificial and of the internal/ external within my work to limn the tensions between polar relationships. I strive to highlight the incongruity between the automatic peripheral systems and those of direct conscious desire. It is about the soft underbelly, the simple innards and complex mechanisms that propel an organism forward to fulfill a natural history. I use non-traditional materials in combination with formally accepted materials and methods that yields a beneficial cross-pollination within my work. The collection, relocation and transformation of matter are an attempt to honor the intrinsic potential in everything. It is about the dismantling, dissection, cannibalization, and re-connection of objects and materials that function like the expulsion of seeds bursting from an organism to create something entirely new. My intention is to visually represent the mind at work; to render uninterrupted flow; a myriad of impressions; multifarious thoughts and feelings; without regard to narrative sequence; and to place value on experience over deductive reasoning. I imagine a dreamy world beyond rational systems that provides a common denominator for the most variable, irrational and fantastic anomalies.
website: http://www.crystalkamoroff.com email: CrystalKamoroff@gmail.com
EDUCATION 2011 2008
MFA, Ceramics, Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, OH BFA, Spatial Art, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2004 2002
Mud Pie & The Obsessive Curiosity, Willits Art Center, Willits, CA, Curated: Gary Martin Ceramics In Focus, Davis Arts Center, Tsao Gallery, Davis, CA, Juried by Nathan Lynch California Clay Competition, The Artery Gallery, Davis, CA, Juried by Diana Fong Rare Earth: National Ceramics Exhibition, Cabrillo Gallery, Aptos, CA, Juried by Kirk Delman Re:Purposed, Third Street Art Gallery, San Francisco , CA, Curated: Danielle Satinover Salon Show, SomArts Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA MAAP, Mission Art & Performance series, Precita Eyes Gallery, San Francisco, CA Inked, Paolo Mejia Galley, Oakland, CA Different Light, 111 Minna Gallery, San Francisco, CA Message The Maker, Gallery G, San Francisco, CA OddVille, American Steel Studios Gallery, Oakland, CA Art House; Studio G Presents H, Gallery G, San Francisco, CA AlterEco, Santa Cruz Institute of Contemporary Art, Santa Cruz CA, Juried by Ann Hazels Dissilience, Workspace Limited, San Francisco, CA Curated by Su Pang Little Epic Encounters: Failed Experiments in Alchemy & Restraint, MFA Exhibition, Dorothy Uber Bryan Gallery, Bowling Green, OH Moneybags, Mad Art Gallery, St. Louis, MO, Curated by Lisa Kim and Stan Chrishom Simpson Sculpture Park, Bowling Green, OH, Juried by Chris Gajewicz Midwinter Dream, Autobody Fine Art Gallery, Alameda CA, Curated by Jaqueline Cooper BGSU Ceramics, Ann Miller Gallery, Wittenberg University OH, Curated by Scott Dooley Contemporary Sculpture 2009, The Art Center, Grand Junction, CO Juried by Michael Meyers The Shape of Desire, The Art Ark, San Jose, CA, Two person show with Jacqueline Cooper, Curated by Valerie Rapps Cognitive Dissonance, The John Pickelle Gallery, San Jose, CA Telos, BFA Show, Herbert Sanders Gallery, San Jose CA Form & Function, Santa Cruz Mountain Art Center, Ben Lomond, CA Ars Longa Vita Brevis, Cabrillo Gallery, Aptos, CA Juried by Rose Sellery &Tobin Keller
AWARDS & RESIDENCIES 2017 2011 2009 2008 2007 2006
The Alpha Award for Best of Show, California Clay Competition, The Artery Artist in Residence, Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, Newcastle, ME Sean Manning Research Scholarship, Bowling Green State University Artist in Residence, San Jose State University A. B. Guslander Scholarship Violet Speddy Scholarship Helen Dooley Scholarship, San Jose State University Wiggsey Silvertsen Scholarship, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA Dooly Spatial Arts Scholarship, San Jose State University 2002 Don Moss Memorial Endowed Ceramic Scholarship, Cabrillo
Hitch, Harness & Yoke ceramic, steel, wood, found object 72” x 13” x 13” Crystal Kamoroff
Warm Plunge ceramic, steel 84” x 11” x 11”
Hook & Bait ceramic, cast aluminum, cast bronze 72” x 7” x 7”
A Sunday on La Grande Black Box Stack ceramic, wood 144” x 18” x 9” Crystal Kamoroff
Bean ceramic 39” x 9” x 18” Crystal Kamoroff
Nightwood ceramic 33” x 9” x 6”
Yema ceramic 32” x 24” x 11”
Crystal Kamoroff
Jann Nunn
Conjoining Idea and Aesthetic My content driven artwork primarily takes the form of sculpture, large-scale sculptural installations, and works on paper engendering both conceptual and poetic sensibilities. Copious research and gut instinct- a marriage of head and heart- inform the decisions in each of my site-related, site-specific, situationresponsive projects. Not unlike words in a poem, material selection along with scale and presentation become greater than the sum of their often-unrelated parts. Every aspect and implication of material usage is carefully considered and specifically relates to the work’s content and context. I use a variety of materials including welded steel and stainless steel, cast bronze, glass, lead, fiberglass, paper and wood. I’ve held a life-long penchant for repurposed materials. Frequently disparate materials are employed in a single work to accentuate duality, tension or evoke multifarious interpretations. I leave no stone unturned in my quest to symbolically convey personal, political or spiritual manifestations with authenticity and relevance. The driving force behind my work resides in conjoining idea and aesthetic. Often described as a draw-you-in kind of beautiful, my art embodies a strong physical presence with carefully considered and often laborious craft, yet the ideas remain paramount. I have exhibited my work, lectured and held residencies nationally and internationally since 1987. I have a BFA degree from University of Alaska Anchorage, attended Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and earned an MFA from San Francisco Art Institute. I am currently a Professor of Sculpture at Sonoma State University.
website: http://jann-nunn.com email: jann.nunn@sonoma.edu
EDUCATION 1992 1991 1988
San Francisco Art Institute, MFA Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture University of Alaska Anchorage, BFA
ACADEMIC APPOINTMENT 1999 -
Professor of Sculpture, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, CA
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS, SCREENINGS AND PERFORMANCES 2018 Jann Nunn Large-Scale Sculpture in the Garden, Luther Burbank Center for the Arts, Santa Rosa, CA Room for Thought, Space 151, Levy Art + Architecture, San Francisco, CA (curator, Jack Fischer) 2017 Judgment Day, ABC No Rio in Exile at Bullet Space, New York, NY Marking Space, Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA (curator, Jan Wurm) Material Matters, Seager Gray Gallery, Mill Valley, CA Personals: Small Objects, Skowhegan, New York, NY 2016-18 Geometric Reflections, Paradise Ridge Winery, Santa Rosa, CA (curator, Kate Eilertsen) 2016 NextNewPaper, San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, San Jose, CA 2015-16 Disruption, Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton, NJ (curator, Tom Moran) 2015 Cadence and Rhythm, Mercury 20 Gallery, Oakland, CA (solo) 2014 Breathing Space: New Sculptural Installations, Mercury 20 Gallery, Oakland, CA (solo) 2013 Jann Nunn Sculpture and Works on Paper, Hammerfriar Gallery, Healdsburg, CA (solo) Arc of the Atlas, Mercury 20 Gallery, Oakland, CA (solo) 2012-14 The Spirit of the Man, Voigt Family Sculpture Foundation, Paradise Ridge Winery, Santa Rosa, CA (curator, Debra Lehane) 2012 PROJECT: Jann Nunn, Pro Arts, Oakland, CA (solo) The Elements of Style, Bullet Space, New York, NY 2010 The Ides of March, ABC No Rio, New York, NY (also, 1998,2000,2002,2006) 2009 Erna and Arthur Salm Holocaust & Genocide Memorial Grove, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, CA (solo) The Seduction of Duchamp: Bay Area Artists’ Response,Slaughterhouse Gallery, Healdsburg, CA (Hanna Regev, curator; traveled to Art Museum of Los Gatos, CA and ArtZone 461, San Francisco, CA in 2010) 2007 Border, Temporary Public Sculpture. Shelly Willis, curator. Sonoma Community Center, Sonoma, CA (solo) 2006 Recent Acquisitions, Michael Schwager, curator, di Rosa Preserve, Napa, CA 2001 As She Seems, Space 743, San Francisco, CA (solo) Ban/Ban, Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA 2001 Burning Man Festival, commissioned installation, Black Rock Arts Foundation. Black Rock City, NV 2000 Korean Sculpture-Worldwide Sculpture, Moran Museum of Art, Gyunggi-do, Korea 1999 Ban/Ban, Korean Culture and Art Center Foundation, Seoul, Korea RESIDENCES 1997 1996 1993-96 1989 1987
Atelier Höherweg, e.V. Düsseldorf, Germany Villa Montalvo, Saratoga, CA Headlands Center for the Arts, Affiliate Artist, Sausalito, CA Prema Arts Centre, Uley, Gloucestershire, England Tout Quarry Sculpture Park, Portland, Dorset, England Chesil Gallery. Portland, Dorset, England
Don’t Stop Chianti steel, cork, pigment 9’ x 4.5’ x 4’ (variable) Jann Nunn
Merlot steel, cork, pigment 7’ x 4.5’ x 4’ (variable)
Twisted Sisters bronze 9” x 4” x 3” (each)
Hands bronze, limestone 11” x 4” x 6”
Hands is an unlikely pair of conjoined bronze hands of two women- a sculptor and a pastry chef- who use their hands for their livelihoods and creative endeavors. The limestone comes from Taut Quarry Sculpture Park in Portland, England where I created a large stone carving in 1986.
Jann Nunn
Snatches bronze dimensions variable (each piece approximately 2” x 3” x 1”)
Touch bronze (unique casting) on mirror 4” x 2.5” diameter
Touch was made by holding molten microcrystalline wax in my palm until it hardened. Each work in the series is a unique casting, meaning that each is individual and not an edition. My intention is to induce a physical connection with everyone who touches the work. It is an indirect way to put my hand in yours. Over time, oils from the hands of those who touch the bronze will establish a distinct patina.
Jann Nunn
Charred wood, bronze. stainless steel 81” x 7” x 11”
Jann Nunn
Ann Rowles
My work investigates the human body as it intersects with culture, history, and psyche. I work in a variety of media according to the dictates of the idea and the situation. In 2004, my mother, who was living independently in North Carolina, had a very slight fall which caused major repercussions in our lives. For nine years — as an only child and a “good daughter” — I spent many hours caring for her. I could no longer count on hours at my studio free to make a mess. Looking for a new way of working, I turned to something old! The craft of crochet which I learned from my great-grandmother seemed perfect. Crochet was a portable media I could carry with me to doctors’ appointments and hospital bedsides. The work begins with a single stitch, repeated over and over in multiple variations, much like cellular development. This meditative process tied together my unraveling life and created a tangible relic of my attempts to control the uncontrollable as well as a record of the passage of time spent with my mother. At first these sculptures dealt with the physical and psychological manifestations of my mother’s illness. Her health conditions became a topic for my work. As I worked I became more curious about the abstract, formal and spatial possibilities of the technique. I tried various yarns, twines, wires, and other fiber-like materials, adding sewn elements to create multiple layers. Although references to the body and disease remained, their representation diminished in importance.
website: http://www.annrowles.com email: annrowles@gmail.com
EDUCATION 1990 1969
M.F.A. in Sculpture, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill B.A. in Studio Art, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS 2013 2009 2003 1994 1993 1993 1992 1990
Riffs & Contortions, the X Change Gallery, the Arts Exchange, Atlanta, GA Soft Works, JCLRC Gallery, Georgia Perimeter College, Clarkston, GA Cut to Size, Chelsea Gallery, Western Carolina University, Cullowhee, NC Closet Installation: Memory & Fantasy, Artspace, Raleigh, NC University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Cone Galleries, Brevard College, Brevard, NC, X. Threads, Spirit Square Center for the Arts, Charlotte, NC Meredith College, Weems Gallery, Raleigh, NC, Hyperplasia, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Hanes Art Center, Chapel Hill, NC
SELECTED RECENT EXHIBITIONS 2017 She Persisted, Soho20 Gallery, New York, NY. 2016 MSA Select, Gallery 72, Atlanta, GA Decatur Fine Arts Exhibition, Dalton Gallery, Agnes Scott College (Bronze Medal) Art from my Perspective, Georgia State University, Clarkston, GA Mark, Lyndon House Art Center, Athens GA, 2015 MSA Professional Exhibition, Ernest G. Welch School of Art & Design, Atlanta, GA Center/Gallery: Feminist Legacy/Feminist Future, The Carrack, Durham, NC MSA Select, Association for Visual Arts, Chattanooga, TN 2014 Exquisite Exhibit, Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta, GA Women’s Work, Sellars Gallery, Brenau University, Gainesville, GA Hungry Eyes, SOHO20 Chelsea Gallery, New York, NY Body Conscious, Hambidge Center for the Arts, Rabun Gap, GA Equal: Modern Family, Tipton Gallery, East Tennessee State Univ., Johnson City, TN Equilibrium, WomanMade Gallery, Chicago, IL, 2012 Woman + Body, Kepco Plaza Museum, Seoul & MediaCube 338, Gwangju, South Korea,, 2010 Art on the Beltline (with Sixfold Collective), Atlanta BeltLine, Inc., Atlanta, GA COLLECTIONS William King Regional Art Center, Abingdon, VA North Carolina Center for the Advancement of Teaching, Cullowee, NC Private Collections: Georgia, California, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, Virginia GALLERY AFFILIATION SOHO20 Gallery, 56 Bogart Street, Brooklyn NY 11206
http://soho20gallery.com/
Transitional Object mixed fibers, vinyl tubing & wire 62” x 24” x 20” Ann Rowles
Albatross Resurgent mixed fibers, wire, vinyl tubing, metallic embroidery thread 40” x 30” x 20” (dimensions vary by installation)
Ann Rowles
Dreads mixed fibers, vinyl tubing & wire 20” x 24” x 12”
Pouch mixed fibers, vinyl tubing & wire 24” x 24” x 12”
Ann Rowles
Porosity crocheted cotton thread, wire, found doilies 24” x 14” x 12”
Cradle crocheted cotton thread, wire, found doilies 10” x 12” x 8”
Ann Rowles
Sondra Schwetman
Symbolic languages are used to communicate and explain aspects of the physical world, as well as the internal world we each inhabit. Myths, fables and fairy tales explain culturally accepted ideals about these worlds by presenting the unexplainable, unknown or other through archetypes understood on visual, verbal and pre-verb levels, This body of work uses these levels of understanding to address the ambiguous space between reality and fiction where the female form and therefore female often dwell. The works in this series concentrate on psychological, religious, cultural and social issues that women deal with everyday such as: reproduction and reproductive rights, discovery, knowledge, success, creativity, class systems, colonization, compliance and silence.
website: http://www.sondra-schwetman.com email: sondraschwetmanart@gmail.com
EDUCATION 1995 1986
MFA, Sculpture and Metalsmithing, The University of Houston, Houston, TX. BFA, Art - Visual Communications, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX.
RECENT EXHIBITIONS Art Speaks: Lend Your Voice, Santa Monica Art Studios, Santa Monica, CA Metamorphosis, Arc Gallery, San Francisco, CA Underbelly, H Gallery, Ventura, CA Vision: An Artist’s Perspective, Kaleid Gallery, San Jose, CA Voices: An Artist’s Perspective, National Association of Women Artists, New York, NY (in conjunction with Karen Gutfreund; Art and UniteWomen.org) Contemporary Women Artists XVII Reimagining Femmage, The Foundry Art Center, St. Louis MO Through the Eyes of the Mother in two parts: An Album for my Mother and Awakening Goddess, Baekryun Gallery, Seogu, Qwangju, South Korea Piante Gallery, Eureka, CA Korean Cultural Center, Chicago, IL Stories We Tell, Phoenix Gallery, Chelsea, NY Paducah Arts Alliance NEA Exhibition, Yeiser Art Center, Paducah, KY Summer National Juried Exhibition, Marin Museum of Contemporary Art, Novato, CA (juror: George Rivera) Collector’s Choice, Sylvia White Gallery, Ventura, CA. Yellow, A.I.R. Studio, Paducah, KY Pink, A.I.R. Gallery, Paducah, KY Southern Vortices, Curtis Center Gallery, Murray State University, Murray, KY Body, Figure, Nude, Lexington Art League, Lexington, KY (juror: Anna Brzyski) National Juried Exhibition, The Arts & Culture Alliance, Knoxville, TN (juror: Neely Hyde) Contemporary Women Artists XV – Art as Activism, Foundry Art Centre, St. Louis, MO (juror Yolanda Lopez) Illuminance, Mythology and Weird Little Fetishes, Morris Graves Museum of Art, Eureka, CA (solo) Art of Fiber, Workhouse Arts Center, Lorton, VA (curator: Amy Lust) As They See It: Works by Contemporary Women Artists, Sacramento State University Library Gallery, Sacramento, CA.
2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011
Small Treasons mixed media (Forton MG, steel, pigment) 72” x 72” x 36” Sondra Schwetman
Outskirts of War silk organza variable dimensions Sondra Schwetman
Cleave bronze 9” x 9” x 9”
Three Pears: Cleft bronze 3” x 6” x 3” each
http://arc-sf.com http://arcfinearts-sf.com 1246 Folsom St. San Francisco, CA
arcgallerysf@gmail.com 415-298-7969