Contemporary Asian American Abstraction by paulthiebaudgallery

Notes On West Meeting East

When I was in college working toward my degree in art history, I was required to take only one “nonwestern” course, which could be anything as long as it was about a culture outside of the standard western canon. Fulfilling this requirement was a challenge as not many courses were available, perhaps one in every three semesters, and the lack of choice meant you took what was available. Another curiosity of my education was that the only discussion of art from the San Francisco Bay Area took place in a four-unit class on modern art covering the period from 1945-1980. Considering that I was attending a university located in the ethnically diverse Bay Area, it is surprising that there was not a broader offering of courses covering other cultures, let alone a single course devoted to the art of the region, or at minimum about California art. In the modern art class, of the few Bay Area artists talked about, the only Asian American artists that I recall being discussed were Ruth Asawa (1926-2013) and Carlos Villa (1936-2013), both of whom made important impacts on the arts and in arts education.

Famous for her hanging sculptures made of woven wire in the form of delicate arabesques, Ruth Asawa attended Black Mountain College from 1946-49, where she studied under Joseph and Anni Albers, and R. Buckminster Fuller. During a trip to Mexico with her sister in the summer of 1947, Asawa learned how to crochet baskets made of wire from the villagers living in Toluca, where the Asawa sisters were teaching children art and health. Returning to Black Mountain that fall, Asawa made the first of her now internationally famous wire sculptures and never looked back.

Carlos Villa Studied art at the California School of Fine Arts (later known as the San Francisco Art Institute) and at Mills College in Oakland, CA. After moving to New York City in the early 1960s, and working there in a minimalist mode of art making, Villa returned to San Francisco in 1969 in search of a different way of creating his art. He found it, in part, through his friend Thomas Seligman, who had been hired to create the Africa, Oceanic, and the Americas department at the De Young Museum. Seligman let Villa explore the collection firsthand and pointed him to key publications about cultures he had not studied in school. The first works to emerge from his intense research and explorations were his celebrated painted canvas capes that are adorned with feathers and other objects. His career proceeded from there and had many aesthetic evolutions in the following decades.

Besides their works, the other key component of Asawa’s and Villa’s lives, and professional careers, was arts education. Upon her appointment to the San Francisco Arts Commission in 1968, Asawa began lobbying for arts programs that would teach young and ordinary San Franciscans. Her success eventually led to the founding of the San Francisco School of the Arts, a public high school centered on the arts that was later renamed in her honor, and many other programs in city schools. Villa began teaching at the San Francisco Art Institute in 1969 and continued there until his death in 2013. In 1976, Villa curated one of the first multi-disciplinary and multi-ethnic exhibitions in the country at SFAI entitled Other Sources: An American Essay, which was conceived as an alternative celebration of the United States Bicentennial. Subsequent to the exhibition, Villa began creating one of the earliest, if not the first, multi-cultural curriculum and pedagogy for teaching art histories outside of and concurrent to the canon of white modern and contemporary artists in America. Villa developed this at SFAI through a series of symposia held over several years, and he also taught classes at the school centered on this curriculum.

The impact of these two artists on the generations working today cannot be underestimated. Both artists modeled strategies of sourcing aspects of European/American modernism, combining them with materials and techniques used by native cultures, and filtering them through the artistic sensibilities of their own heritages to arrive at their works. Through the efforts they made in arts education and

teaching, they both imparted this methodology of working through their own example and direct instruction to generations of artists in the Bay Area and beyond. It is no surprise that the artists included in Contemporary Asian American Abstraction have followed this strategy in service of their own works.

Contemporary Asian American Abstraction celebrates younger generations of artist working in California today whose works and careers are made possible, in part, because of the efforts of both Asawa and Villa to elevate and attain greater recognition for the work of Asian American, Pacific Islander, and other non-white artists within the Bay Area and the United States. Having mounted an exhibition of paintings earlier this year from the estate of Arthur Okamura (1932-2009), an important Japanese American painter and educator who worked in abstraction and other styles, it should be noted that Asawa’s and Villa’s efforts have also brought renewed attention to artists of theirs and older generations who are deserving of greater recognition in the canon of art. Given the rapidly changing demographics in this country and in the Bay Area, the blending of sources and heritages by these artists in service of creating a new synthesis is something that we should all take an active interest in and consider in the broader culture.

I first encountered Sono Osato’s paintings while a student at Sonoma State University, when I applied for and became a curatorial intern at what is now the di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art in Napa, CA. The heavily encrusted surfaces of her canvases – made of tar, beeswax, oil paint, remnants of typewriters, and other materials – enthralled me. I had not seen such thickly painted works – they could be up to three inches in depth – except in the works of Joan Brown and Jay DeFeo, and even then, they bore no resemblance to Osato’s pieces beyond thickness. Osato Studied art at Arizona State University and earned her MFA from the California College of Arts and Crafts (now California College of the Arts), where Arthur Okamura was one of her thesis advisors. She was also an early affiliate artist at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Sausalito, CA, where thick paint and other materials began to accumulate on the surface of her canvases. During my research about the paintings in the di Rosa collection, I would later learn of Osato’s intense interest in the histories of both language and technology, and how they both fed directly into the creation of her paintings.

In the history of civilizations that we have come to know, one of the oldest cultures is Sumer, which was located between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers in the southern part of what is now modern-day Iraq from 5500 – 1800 BCE. It was there that the origins of written language and many early technologies took place. This knowledge has informed Osato’s work from the beginning, as can be seen in her naming her paintings using titles like Umma and Diluvia, which derive from the ancient languages of that region.

Another aspect of her work that fascinated me was her liberal use of gears, sprockets, and other remnants of mechanical typewriters and adding machines. The parts themselves were intact, but fully divorced from their original purpose and put forward to stand on their own. This transformation of context made me view them in a different way, as abstract objects with agency of their own, and as a visual language Osato was employing in the service of abstraction. It made me think of the conceptual artist David Ireland (1930-2009), who held a belief in the “truth of materials” as a central tenant in the creation of his own work. Imagine my surprise much later when I learned that Osato and Ireland were close friends while he was alive.

As time has proceeded, Osato’s paintings have also evolved in appearance, though they continued to

germinate from the same central premise. The heavy impasto lessened over the course of her Silent Language series, and revealed the machine parts completely in the Babylon series (of which Umma is a part). Recently in the Diluvia series, the gears and other parts have dematerialized into silhouetted shapes, often larger than life size, floating across the painted surfaces of wooden panels. The sensation of floating is intentional by Osato, an erosion of the last of the topographies in her earlier works. This washing away of physical presence echoes the transformation of many technologies from the physical realm of mechanics into the digital world of electrons. Now, at the dawn of Artificial Intelligence Age, humanity itself is feeling the land wash away beneath its feet in much the same way, unmoored by the technologies it has created for itself.

One spring day earlier this year at the gallery, Mary Ijichi’s Assemblages arrived in their frames ready to be hung in the exhibition. As they leaned against the wall on top of the print cabinet, I watched as the changing position of the sun altered my perception of the works in the most subtle way as the hours passed. While I had known about and experienced this phenomenon in her work before their arrival, having exhibited them at a previous gallery I worked for, it never ceases to amaze me how sensitive her assemblages are to changes in light.

Inspired by, among others, Agnes Martin (1912-2004), the towering figure of twentieth century minimalist paintings structured around grids, Ijichi’s works also use a grid as their compositional foundation, but to different ends. Here the grid acts as a dimensional object as much as a structural guide, informing the colored pencil rubbing on the frosted mylar surface and giving it visual depth in a realm different from Martin’s. The works of Yayoi Kusama have also proven a source to draw on for Ijichi. Kusama’s repetitive mark making, sometimes done on a minute scale, has informed Ijichi, who works obsessively at the same level. Too, Kusama’s use of light in her infinity rooms to illuminate expanses of perception, echoes Ijichi’s manipulation of color to achieve a similar effect.

Mary jichi’s journey to the creation of her Assemblage series was one of process and discovery. Her initial creative impulse was to make rubbing drawings that captured the textures of different surfaces, their irregular forms disrupting the pencil as it moved across the sheet. Wanting greater control of patterning, Ijichi then moved to sourcing materials, such as beads, plastic architectural grills, and other manufactured surfaces for taking rubbings of. As these objects informed her drawing process, she became intrigued by seeing them through the frosted mylar and how they informed the rubbings she was making. The Assemblages emerged from the layering of these materials – museum board, architectural grid, beads, mylar, and the drawing on its surface. Not satisfied with the intrinsic colors of these materials, Ijichi began painting the inside sides of the grids and the museum board backers to increase the range of hues in the works. In doing so, she added the ineffable of phenomenology into each piece, something almost impossible to describe but rather to experience.

I became aware of Grace Munakata’s paintings at a point in time I cannot exactly define. Was it while she was still showing with the late dealer Ruth Braunstein at Braunstein/Quay Gallery? Or was it at an art fair after she had moved to Paul Thiebaud Gallery, years before I joined its staff? I may never be certain, but what I do recall was being intrigued by what I saw and also unsure of all that I was looking at. This reaction of curiosity/uncertainty might unnerve some people and cause them to shrink away.

I find it a good sign in a work of art; a lean in moment to see if I can resolve what I am seeing in my mind. Even after learning more, if I am still wrestling it is generally a good sign. In Munakata’s case, her paintings have never resolved themselves, which is a mark of their strength.

Grace Munakata went to UC Davis in the 1980s for both her undergraduate and graduate degrees in art, studying under Wayne Thiebaud, Mike Henderson, and others while there. The evolution of her paintings from then to 2011, when she painted Propellers, was a gradual one that came to involve collaging imagery onto passages of abstract brushstrokes. Munakata comes from an artistic family. Her father regularly practiced making Japanese brush paintings, sumi-e, and her mother as a seamstress sewing and mending clothes. While growing up around these activities greatly informed Munakata’s acrylic paintings, their inspiration also stems from other sources.

In pre-industrial Japanese culture, there was a long tradition among the peasant farming classes in rural areas of practicing ‘Boro’ or the mending and patching of clothes as they were damaged while working in the fields. In some cases, the same garment would be worn by multiple generations of family members, imbuing the stitching and layered fabrics with the life story of a family. The Boro tradition is also synonymous with ‘Mottainai’, a belief where it is considered a shame to waste something and great appreciation is given to the continued use of old item, despite damage from use. Today, internationally recognized fashion designers Rei Kawakubo and Junya Watanabe have elevated Boro into the realm of high fashion through Kawakubo’s label Comme des Garçons, in much the same way Munakata has infused its principles into her lush paintings.

The more recognizable imagery in Propellers – the bird, the badger, the lilies in the upper left corner –are simultaneously reflections of Munakata’s memories of childhood fables with magical creatures, and her deep love of the natural world and her concern about the impact of human activity on other species being able to survive. In 2023 alone, eight bird species in Hawai‘i were declared extinct despite the best efforts of conservationists and the establishment of multiple areas of habitat protection. Their loss is one step closer to the Silent Spring foretold by Rachel Carsen in 1962. Weaving these and other sources together in paint, Munakata’s compositions contain not only a diaristic element in them, but also embody the complex experience of navigating the multiple tensions, beliefs, and desires that define everyday life in 21st century America.

“Keep Looking, and when you think you’re done, look some more…”, or so the saying by the late American curator Peter Selz (1919-2019) goes. It is one of the few dictums in the world of art that transcends circumstance and applies equally to everyone. In that vein, I found myself one evening in the spring of 2022 at the opening of a group exhibition focused on graphite drawings by nineteen artists from the Bay Area. I had heard about the exhibition because an artist I was following at the time was included in the show. As I surveyed the offerings, I came across two drawings by an artist then unknown to me, Joshua Moreno. I was immediately captivated by both the clear aesthetic vision I was seeing, and the intensely detailed graphite marks comprising each composition. I must have looked at them intently for fifteen minutes or more as the clatter of the opening went on around me. It would be another year and a half before I met Moreno at another opening and got to know him through a series of studio visits. My appreciation for him as an artist and his work has continued to grow since then.

Moreno was still a student earning his MFA from Stanford University when I first saw his work. Even before graduating, he had established several series and created a number of conceptual projects spanning drawing, video, painting, sculpture, and site-specific installation. This corpus of work

stems from Moreno’s interest in the overlapping relationships between the natural and human-made environments. In particular, he focuses on the elemental phenomena surrounding us unnoticed in our everyday lives. Moreno’s series of Circles Squared Swipe Drawings, grew evolutionarily out of two previous series – Circled Circles Swipe Drawings (2012) and Contained Topography Drawings (2013). All three series display Moreno’s obsessive use of countless tiny, hand-drawn graphite circles to form his compositions. Reflecting differences in pressure, lead weight, and the amount of time in each working session, Moreno’s accumulations of marks coalesce into irregular bands of tonality. Read together across the composition, the bands meld into amorphic topographies mimicking geologic strata. To these Moreno applies an eraser to swipe away part of the image, disrupting our sense if illusion with the phenomena of disillusion.

Within several belief systems originating in Asia, the void surrounding an object is just as important as the form of the object itself. They also teach that change is constant and living within change is how to move through life. Moreno’s Circles Squared Swipe drawings embody those principles all at once.

In the history of western aesthetics, Moreno’s works might be likened to the achievements of such artists as Sol LeWitt (1928-2007), or perhaps to Roman Opalka (1931-2011), both of who employed dense repetitive mark making within the guidelines established by rigorous conceptual frameworks. What sets Moreno apart from both is his active use of erasure as a tool in service of creating void space within the form, making the balance of these opposing forces a key element in these works.

Just after New Year’s this year, I reconnected with Sandeep Mukherjee for the first time in almost twenty years during a visit to his studio in Compton, CA. We had first met in the spring of 2005 at Sonoma State University when the campus art gallery held an exhibition of emerging artists from Los Angeles. His work was one of the stars of the show – an eight by twenty-five foot mural made of five pieces of scored and pleated dura-lene painted with radiating bands of vibrant acrylic ink. Mukherjee travelled up to give an artist’s lecture to the students in the department and we met afterward. In those early pieces, the dura-lene was like a skin to him, a translucent barrier through which light illuminated a sumptuous color palette. The circular rings of acrylic hues emanate from a single point on each of the five sheets, imparting a cosmological feel to the panels. Standing before it, I felt I was being transported to another place, somewhere between the edge of the western world and cultural sphere of Mukherjee’s native subcontinent.

Born and raised in Pune, India, Sandeep Mukherjee did not initially follow the path of art. His first degrees were in Industrial Engineering, which he earned from Manipal Institute of Technology in Mangalore, and UC Berkeley in the 1980s. For a number of years, he worked as an engineer for different companies before leaving it behind to get a BFA from Otis College of Art and Design in 1996 and an MFA from UCLA in 1999. However, the impact of his first career can still be very much felt in the paintings, drawings, sculptures, and installations he makes today.

The three pieces by Mukherjee in the exhibition – Horizons Bend 1, Eroded Field 1, and Horizons Bend 2 (all 2023) – were each initially begun over a decade ago. The organic marks alluding to blades of grass or other natural flora were lain down at that time, but they were eventually set aside as unresolved works. After a period of hibernation, Mukherjee pulled them out in 2023 as a way of beginning a new series of paintings. Over the initial markings, he added layers of speckled acrylic inks in the form of overlapping geometric shapes. During the artist talk at the exhibition opening, Mukherjee said he had experimented with spraying the acrylic with different substances to see what effects might

happen through their chemical interaction. Having settled on his primary reagent, Mukherjee masked off areas to work in and discover. A key tension in all of his work is a balance of precise control and serendipitous discovery. In the flecked areas of layered color he has captured alchemical magic in suspended animation.

The use of geometric forms by artists in either the East or West is nothing new, however over the last decade there has been a resurgence of their use by artists such as Eamon Ore-Giron, and others, as a strategy for exploring trans-national exchanges through compositions that resonate across cultural contexts. Mukherjee’s paintings and sculptures exist in dialogue with these artists and ideas in their articulation of aesthetic strategies that honor his personal heritage and his present culture, while also transcending both of them.

Among the artworks in the exhibition, Ekta Aggarwal’s sewn paintings were introduced to me by Sandeep Mukherjee after our studio visit in January of this year. Her works were one of several possibilities Mukherjee had offered as suggestions for inclusion in the exhibition, but were the only choice once I reviewed her website. Looking at the images of her paintings, I could see an artist relatively young in their career exploring materials and how to transform them into different types of compositions. The clarity and care with which she was doing this drew me in on a formal level, but it was the social aspect hidden behind the works that added greater dimension to each piece.

Born in Delhi, India, and having earned an MA from Chelsea College of Arts in London in 2013 and an MFA from California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, CA, in 2018, Aggarwal’s paintings and works on paper grew as much out of the resurgence of textile and craft work in the United States as they did from the social needs of low-income women in India. Shortly after earning her MA in London, Aggarwal returned to India and began a social program where low-income women were employed to make earth friendly bags out of sewn Khadi cloth as a way to give them some financial independence. A byproduct of this program was lots of fabric scraps that piled up on the floor. Aggarwal collected these pieces of selvage and has used them as the source material for her paintings since then. Each of her paintings is unique, even though some fabrics may appear in more than one work. The scrap pieces are sewn together into strips and larger blocks, which are then combined to make the final composition. This pieced top is then sewn to a solid fabric backer of Khadi cloth to give it greater stability when being stretched for hanging. The resulting works take the form of irregular checkerboard grids whose colors pulsate with rhythm in the viewers eye and recall the tradition of crazy quilts in the United States. However, these works do not meet the criteria of quilts, as they have no batting as filler.

Khadi cloth itself has an important history within India and its struggle for independence from Great Britain. As a colonial possession in the 19th century, India produced vast quantities of raw cotton, but it had no textile industry to either spin yarn or weave it into cloth. The raw materials were shipped to England and the finished cloth was re-imported back to India at inflated prices. In response to this, the Swadeshi, or self-sufficiency, movement was founded in 1905 in Calcutta. Its goals were to boycott foreign goods and to promote local production, and it went on to play a major role in the Indian independence movement. Khadi, a hand-spun and woven cotton cloth, was developed as part of this response and was given its name by Mahatma Ghandi himself because of the coarseness of the early cloths. Its widespread adoption across India led to growth out of the economic stagnation the country had experienced. Aggarwal’s use of Khadi to promote the financial independence of women in India continues in this century old tradition of using cloth as a means to promote economic freedom.

It messes with you. It convinces you that what you think isn’t all. And it challenges you to understand something that is different, that a person can be just as good in a different sense…

- Sam Gilliam1

At the time of Jackson Pollock’s break through drip paintings, there was a desire by many to ascribe meaning and understanding to them, though Pollock resisted this. Over a decade later, in an interview between writer Bruce Glaser, and artists Frank Stella and Donald Judd, Stella actively stated “What you see is what you see”2 in an attempt to negate any interpretation of his work beyond simply that. Since that time, historians have viewed the works of these three artists and their contemporaries within larger historical contexts to impart meaning to their creation. In doing so, they have proven the impossibility of the quest Stella, Judd, and the others went on; the meaning of a work of art, at minimum, cannot be divorced from the larger cultural moment of its creation. There is no neutral space of conception or execution. The use of abstraction as a strategy to create not only beauty, but convey meaning, by the six artists in this exhibition is case and point.

While no longer considered a challenge to the definition of art as it was when Pollock’s drips debuted at Betty Parsons Gallery in January 1948, abstraction’s ability to challenge cannot be discounted. It demands investigation at every encounter. It is difficult to decipher in any literal sense. It operates within our minds at a primal level below rationality and logic. We recognize within it something beyond the ability of language to convey – pure emotional resonance. In the hands of these six artists, abstraction has been taken to new horizons and infused with complicated, layered meanings just as relevant as those of Pollock, Judd, and Stella, but in a different sense.

Greg Flood July 2024

1 Lund, Christian. Video interview with Sam Gilliam in his Washington D.C. studio in October 2018. Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Art, 2020.

2 Bruce Glasser; Lucy Lippard, editor. “Questions to Stella and Judd,” Art News, September 1966.

opposite: Grace Munakata, Propellers (detail)

Ekta Aggarwal, Metamorphosis, 2018, hand cut Khadi scrap fabric on Khadi, 48 x 48 inches opposite: Metamorphosis (detail)

Ekta Aggarwal, Everything Moves, 2018, hand cut Khadi scrap fabric on Khadi, 24 x 24 inches opposite: Everything Moves (detail)

Ekta Aggarwal, Close to the Self, 2024, hand cut Khadi scrap fabric on Khadi, 42 x 42 inches opposite: Close to the Self (detail)

Mary Ijichi, Assemblage #22, 2023, colored pencil, mylar, plastic, beads, acrylic, artist’s tape, and museum board, 24 x 24 inches opposite: Assemblage #22 (detail)

Mary Ijichi, Assemblage #25, 2023, colored pencil, mylar, plastic, beads, acrylic, artist’s tape, and museum board, 24 x 24 inches opposite: Assemblage #25 (detail)

Mary Ijichi, Assemblage #15, 2022, colored pencil, mylar, plastic, beads, acrylic, artist’s tape, and museum board, 12 x 12 inches opposite: Assemblage #15 (detail)

Mary Ijichi, Assemblage #23, 2023, colored pencil, mylar, plastic, beads, acrylic, artist’s tape, and museum board, 12 x 12 inches opposite: Assemblage #23 (detail)

Grace Munakata, Propellers, 2011, acrylic and mixed media on gatorboard, 48 1/8 x 34 1/2 inches opposite: Propellers (detail)

Sono Osato, Diluvia Study #18, 2022, graphite pencil on paper, 24 x 19 inches opposite: Diluvia Study #18 (detail)

Sono Osato, Diluvia 4, 2023, tinted rabbit-skin glue ground and oil on panel, 48 x 48 inches opposite: Diluvia 4 (detail)

Sono Osato, Umma, 2009, tinted rabbit-skin glue ground and oil on panel with found objects, 14 x 36 inches (triptych)

Joshua Moreno, CirclesSquaredSwipe 2/4, 3/4, 2020, graphite and pencil on paper, 22 x 29 3/4 inches opposite: CirclesSquaredSwipe 2/4, 3/4 (detail)

Joshua Moreno, CirclesSquaredSwipe 2/4, 2020, graphite and pencil on paper, 22 x 29 3/4 inches opposite: CirclesSquaredSwipe 2/4 (detail)

Sandeep Mukherjee, Horizons Bend 1, 2023, acrylic and alcohol on dura-lene, 18 x 18 inches opposite: Horizons Bend 1 (detail)

Sandeep Mukherjee, Eroded Field 1, 2023, acrylic and alcohol on dura-lene, 18 x 18 inches opposite: Eroded Field 1 (detail)

Sandeep Mukherjee, Horizons Bend 2, 2023, acrylic and alcohol on dura-lene, 18 x 18 inches opposite: Horizons Bend 2 (detail)

Education

2016-2018

MFA, Art, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2012-2013 MA, Fine Art, Chelsea College of Arts, University of the Arts London, London

2011 Summer Study Abroad-Contemporary Fine Art Practice, Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, London, UK

Summer Program-100 Design Projects, Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, London, UK

2010-2011 Certificate in Art Appreciation, National Museum Institute of History of Art, Conservation and Museology, Delhi, India

1998-1999

Diploma in Interior Design, Exterior Interiors, Delhi, India

1995-1998 BA (Honours) Economics, Hindu College, University of Delhi, Delhi, India

Professional Experience

2024 Instructor, Winter session, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2023 Part Time Faculty, California State University Northridge, Northridge, CA

2019-2020

Instructor, Winter session, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Adjunct Faculty, Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar, Doha

2018 Lead Instructor, Together Workshop: Experimental Painting, The Union for Contemporary Art, Omaha, NE

Teaching Assistant, Painting+Design, California State Summer School for the Arts, Valencia, CA

Teaching Assistant to Thomas Lawson, Lost River/Missing Lake, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Teaching Assistant to Thomas Lawson, Dust and Water Workshop in collaboration with SOMA, Mexico City

2017

Teaching Assistant to Jeannene Przyblyski and Thomas Lawson, What Makes it Art, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2016 Student Tutor, Student Affairs, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Selected Awards and Residencies

2024 Pollock Krasner Foundation Grant

2023 Finalist, The Hopper Prize

2022 Artist in Residence, Joseph and Anni Albers Foundation Residency, Bethany, CT

2019-2020 Artist in Residence, Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar, Doha

2018 Student Project Grant, Student Affairs, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Student Travel Grant, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Diversity Grant, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Artist in Residence, Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Omaha, NE

2017 Dean’s Project Award, School of Art, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Student Union Grant, Student Union, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA Workshop, Hochschule Fur Bildende Kunste, Hamburg, Germany

Student Travel Grant, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Provost’s Merit Scholarship 2017/18, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Hybrid Incubator for Visionary Entrepreneurs (HIVE), California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Student Project Grant, Student Affairs, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Research and Practice Fellowship, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2016 Dean’s Grant, School of Art, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Provost’s Merit Scholarship 2016/17, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2014 Shortlisted for New Contemporaries, London, UK

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2024 Stitches of Care, Emma Gray HQ, Santa Monica, CA

2022 Time Travel, Emma Gray HQ, Santa Monica, CA

2020 At Home, Five Car Garage, Santa Monica, CA

2019 6 PM, Monte Vista Projects, Los Angeles, CA

2018 Slowing Down, Mint Gallery, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2017 Space for Mistakes, L Shape Gallery, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2015 Fragments, Galerie Romain Rolland, Delhi

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024 Contemporary Asian American Abstraction, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2023 The Feminist Art Program (1970-1975): Cycles of Collectivity, REDCAT, Los Angeles, CA

Open Show, Monte Vista Projects, Los Angeles, CA

2022 Garden, Ladies’ Room, Los Angeles, CA (online)

Flat File 2022, Ortega y Gasset Projects, Brooklyn, NY

2021 Garden, Ladies’ Room, Los Angeles, CA (online)

2020 Translating the patterned light, Maiden LA, Los Angeles, CA (online)

2018 Through-Line: Drawing & Weaving by 18 Artists, Steve Turner Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Faculty Group Exhibition, CSSSA, D301, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Exit 57 B, The Bel Air Restaurant, Los Angeles, CA

Rattlesnake Bells in the Desert, The Box Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Lost River/Missing Lake, Lime Gallery, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Unstretched/Unframed, Semperdepot, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Vienna, Austria

Drawing Experiments, L Shape Gallery, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Code Art Fair, Steve Turner Gallery, Copenhagen, Denmark

2017 MFA Group Show, D300, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA President’s Inaugural Exhibition, Main Gallery, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Painting Class, Main Gallery, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Chiquita Canyon Landfill Found Art Scholarship, Main Gallery, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2016 Avium/Hortus, D300 & D301, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

Need a Show for this Title, D300 & D301, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA

2014 Concrete Island, Made in Arts London, Affordable Art Fair, Hampstead Curatorial Projects

2013 Process in Exile, Made in Arts London, London

MA Final Show, Chelsea College of Art, London

Chelsea Cafe Project, Chelsea Space, London

In Two Parts, MA Interim Show, Chelsea College of Art, London

Chelsea Salon Series, South London Gallery, London

2005 5th Northern Region Art Competition, Camlin Art Foundation, Lalit Kala Akademi, Delhi, India

2004 Delhi State Art Exhibition, All India Fine Arts and Crafts Society, Delhi

2003 3rd Northern Region Art Competition, Camlin Art Foundation, Lalit Kala Akademi, Delhi, India

Artist Talks

2022 Flat File Friday, Ortega y Gasset Projects, Brooklyn, NY (online)

Artist Talks (cont.)

2018 Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, Omaha, NE

Curatorial Projects

2023 Artist/Curator, Curatorial Team, The Feminist Art Program (1970-1975): Cycles of Collectivity, REDCAT, Los Angeles, CA

2018 Co-curated with Kathy Carbone, “Feminist Conversations: Reaching Back, Looking Forward”, Curating the Institute Archives Project, Special Collections and Institute Archives Reading Room, California Institute of the Arts Library, Valencia, CA

Collaboration

2015 Collaborated with artist Shweta Bhattad for her performance Faith, “Sharing Our Stories”: Global South Social Movements, COP21, Paris

Publications and Reviews

2024 Van Proyen, Mark. “Contemporary Asian American Abstraction @ Paul Thiebaud”, Squarecylinder.com, June 26, 2024.

Meet Ekta Aggarwal - Artist, Shoutout LA.

Wagley, Catherine. “CalArts and the Rediscovery of the Feminist Art Program”, CARLA.

Sarbanes, Janet. “The Joys of Feminist Archiving: Two Southern California Shows”, East of Borneo. Reizman, Renée. “When Feminism Ruled CalArts”, Hyperallergic.com. 2023 “Ekta Aggarwal on pushing boundaries, the meditative aspect of embroidering and creating patterns, and working in a wide range of materials and mediums”, Hopper Prize.

2022 Dambrot, Shana Nys. “Ekta Aggarwal: Time Travel”, Art and Cake. “Artforum Must See: Ekta Aggarwal: Time Travel”, Artforum Benzel, Scott. “Time Machines-On the work of Ekta Aggarwal”, Medium.com.

2020 Denny, Elizabeth. “Curated Selections”, Dovetail Magazine, Issue 02. Carbone, Kathy. “Dear Sister Artist: Activating Feminist Art Letters and Ephemera in the Archive”.

2019 Carbone, Kathy. “Feminist Conversations: Reaching Back, Looking Forward, interview between Ekta Aggarwal and Kathy Carbone”, Network Library Project, viralnet.net

2015 Kohli, Sonal. Zigzag

Selected Collections

City of Hope Orange County, Irvine, CA

Private Collections in India, the United Kingdom, and the United States

MARY IJICHI

Education

B.S., University of California, San Francisco, CA

A.B., University of California, Berkeley, CA

Selected Residencies

2001 The MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH

1998 Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT

1996 Ragdale Foundation, Lake Forest, IL

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2021 Mary ijichi: Assemblages, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA (exhibition catalog)

2017 Frottage: The Changing Surface, Artspace Edition Shimizu, Shizuoka, Japan

2014 George Billis Gallery, New York, NY

2011 Homage to Yayoi Kusama, George Billis Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2008 (Text)ure, George Billis Gallery, New York, NY

2005 Extrusions, Takada Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024 Contemporary Asian American Abstraction, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2021 California Girls 2, Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA

21 Expressions, National Academy of Arts, Culture and Heritage, (ASWARA), Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and ArtFort, Chandigarh, India

2020 The deYoung Open, Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, CA

A Global Pandemic: What It Means for Me, Gallery Yuyama, Niigata-ken, Japan

2019 New Encounters 2019, artspace Edition Shimizu, Shizuoka City, Japan

SIA (Society of Independent Artists), Live Worms Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2018 Way Bay 2, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, CA

Way Bay, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, CA

2017 Half Hundred Swing Show: Homage to Joseph Cornell 2017, Ao Gallery, Kobe, Japan

2016 Mail Art, Karuizawa New Art Museum, Nagano, Japan

2015 AU International Contemporary Art Exhibition, Museo Hermann Nitsch, Fondazione Morra, Naples, Italy

A Celebration of Mail Art, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

2014 5X5 An Invitational, Westmont Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, CA

Focus Latin America: Art is Our Last Hope, Phoenix Art Museum, AZ

Ex Postal Facto, San Francisco Center for the Book, San Francisco, CA

Ever Gold 5 Year Anniversary Show, Ever Gold Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2013 Arkansas 45th Collectors Exhibition, Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AR

2012 Smalls, Davis & Cline Gallery, Ashland, OR

2011 5X5: An Invitational, Westmont Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, CA

Three-person Show, Andrea Schwartz Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2010 Bohemia Gallery, Ashland, OR

2009 Andrea Schwartz Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Illegiblusion, Sabina Lee Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2007 What is a Line?, Yale University Gallery, New Haven, CT

Los Angeles Asian & Tribal Arts Show, Santa Monica, CA

2004 Issho/Together: Japanese American/Japanese National Artists In America 1941–present, Meridian Gallery, San Francisco, CA

AAWAA Group Exhibition, d.p. Fong Galleries, San Jose, CA

Light, Surface and Translucence, Davis & Cline Gallery, Ashland, OR

2003 Fine Lines: Drawings from the Collection of Wynn Kramarsky, Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, Santa Barbara, CA

In the Making: Contemporary Drawings from a Private Collection, University Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA

2001 Traces, Palo Alto Art Center, Palo Alto, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

(cont.)

1999 They Hold up Half the Sky - Redefining the American Art Landscape, South of Market Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA

1998 Jan Cicero Gallery, Chicago, IL

1996 Jan Cicero Gallery; Chicago, IL

1995 Vantage Point - Abstraction, Jan Cicero Gallery, Chicago, IL

Biennial print and Draw Competition and Exhibition, Triton Museum of Art, Santa Clara, CA

Women of Color in Art, Carver Cultural Center, San Antonio, TX

1994 Yellow Forest, SOMArts Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1993 Ebert Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Time Echoes, C.N. Gorman Gallery, University of California, Davis, CA

1992 Gathering, Lite Rail Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Different Voices, University of California Santa Barbara-Women’s Center, Santa Barbara, CA

Sixth Parkside National Small Print Exhibition, University of Wisconsin – Parkside, Kenosha, WI

BACA Annual Juried National Exhibition, Part II: Works on Paper, Berkeley, CA

1991 Art Works Gallery, Fair Oaks, CA

Community Arts Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1990 Fort Mason Foundation Exhibition, San Francisco, CA

1989 Worden Gallery, San Francisco, CA (two-person show)

Fort Mason Foundation Exhibition, San Francisco, CA

Publications and Reviews

2024 Van Proyen, Mark. “Contemporary Asian American Abstraction @ Paul Thiebaud”, Squarecylinder.com, June 26, 2024.

2022 Roth, David M. “Outbound”, Squarecylinder.com, October 2, 2022.

2021 Proyen, Mark Van. “Mary Ijichi @ Brian Gross”, Squarecylinder.com, November 21, 2021.

2018 Desmarais, Charles. “Way Bay at UC Berkeley Strays Way off Path”, San Francisco Chronicle, January 27, 2018.

2017 “Mail Art”, catalog, Karuizawa New Museum, Karuizawa, Japan 2017.

2014 Malone, Peter. “Clusterfunk; Six Solo Shows in Two Galleries”, Art Critical, November 2014. “Mail/Art/Book”, San Francisco Center for the Book, 2014.

2012 Held Jr., John. “Studio Visit with Mary Ijichi”, SFAQ Online, December 10, 2012.

2009 “Pulse”, Art Ltd., May/June 2009.

2008 “560 Broadway: A New York Drawing Collection at Work, 1991-2006”, Yale University Press, New Haven and London 2008

2007 “What is a Line?”, Drawings from the Collection, Yale University Art Gallery, 2007.

2005 Baker, Kenneth. “Creativity Comes Slipping Through the Cracks”, San Francisco Chronicle, September 10, 2005.

2004 Koppman, Debra. “Previews”, Artweek, March 2004 Vol 35 Issue 2.

2003 Russell, Gloria. “Gallery Show Features Bold Expression”, Sunday Republican, April 20, 2003. Siersma, Betsy. “In the Making: Contemporary Drawings from a Private Collection”, The Fine Arts Center, University of Massachusetts Center of Art, 2003. Duncan, Michael. “Fine Lines from the collection of Wynn Kramarsky”, Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, 2003.

2002 Santiago, Chiori. “Mary Ijichi: Transcendent Text”, Nikkei Heritage, National Japanese American Historical Society, Vol IX, Number 1, Winter 2002.

2001 Reiley, Laura. “Vestiges of the Unconscious”, Palo Alto Weekly, May 18, 2001.

Selected Collections

Archives of American Art (John Held papers), Smithsonian Institute, Washington D.C. Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, CA

Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX

Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, CA

(Sol) LeWitt Collection

University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA

Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT

JOSHUA MORENO

Born 1988 in Watsonville, CA

Education

2022 MFA, Studio Art, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA

2011 BFA, Studio Art, University of California, San Diego, CA

Professional Experience

2022 Instructor, Drawing, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA

2020 Co-founded, “all of us” art collective

Selected Residencies

2023 Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris France

Headlands Centre for the Arts, Sausalito, CA

2022 Headlands Centre for the Arts, Sausalito, CA

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2023 The Nature of Things Here, Headlands Centre for the Arts, Sausalito, CA

Composition G, East Palo Alto, CA

2022 Shifting Heights, Upper Market Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Things I’ve Seen Since We’ve Been Together Apart, Bleeker Hall, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA

Impressions Lasting, Bleeker Hall, Stanford University, Palo Alto, CA

2021 Everything is Temporary, ICE Gallery, Logan Heights, CA

2018 Swoop In Out Back, Space4Art, San Diego, CA

Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board, Helmuth Projects, San Diego, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024 Contemporary Asian American Abstraction, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2023 Eco Echoes, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, CA

Shifting Trajectories, Cite Internationale Des Arts, Paris, Fr

Pictures of You, The Lab, San Francisco, CA

All the Troubles, Upper Market Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Pyramid Scheme, Bass Reiner, San Francisco, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions (cont.)

2022 Memory Traces, La Jolla Historical Society, San Diego, CA

Inflorescence Scaffold, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, CA

Ultraviolent, Patricia Sweetow Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Let Them Eat Cake, University Gallery, Stanford, CA

2021 Lava Cake, University Gallery, Stanford, CA

Constructive Eviction, 2 Swinson Gallery, Oakland, CA

In These Uncertain Times, The Museum of Art and History, Santa Cruz, CA

2020 Another Day OK, all of us, online exhibition, www.allofusprojects.com

Layer Cake, Coulter Gallery, Stanford, CA

2019 Takeaways, Pajaro Valley Art Gallery, Watsonville, CA

2018 High Key: Color in Southern California, San Diego Art Institute, San Diego, CA

Marine Layer, Helmuth Projects, San Diego, CA

Distant Light, Quint Projects, San Diego, CA

2017 Diverge/Convene, San Diego Art Institute, San Diego, CA

2016 The Frequency of Something Happening, Space4Art, San Diego, CA

Publications and Reviews

2024 Van Proyen, Mark. “Contemporary Asian American Abstraction @ Paul Thiebaud”, Squarecylinder.com, June 26, 2024.

SANDEEP MUKHERJEE

Born 1964 in Pune, India

Education

1999 MFA, University of California, Los Angeles, CA

1996 BFA, Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, CA

1988 MS, Industrial Engineering and Operations Research, University of California, Berkeley, CA

1986 BS, Industrial Engineering, Manipal Institute of Technology, Mangalore, India

Professional Experience

2006-2022 Professor of Art, Pomona College, Claremont, CA

Selected Grants, Awards, and Fellowships

2017 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship, NY Berlin Fellowship, 2017, Villa Aurora & Thomas Mann House e.V.

2015-16 City of Los Angeles (COLA) Fellowship, Department of Cultural Affairs, Los Angeles, CA

2014 Nominated for the 2015 Fellows of Contemporary Art Fellowship (FOCA), Los Angeles, CA

2012 Faculty Research Grant, Pomona College, Claremont, CA

2010 Faculty Research Grant, Pomona College, Claremont, CA

2009 California Community Foundation Award, Mid-career Artist Fellowship, CA

2008 Faculty Research Grant, Pomona College, Claremont, CA

2007 Faculty Research Grant, Pomona College, Claremont, CA

2006 Nominated for the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award, NY

Selected Solo and Two-Person Exhibitions

2023

Approaching Limits, Project 88, Mumbai, India

Spectral Theatre, with Rohini Devashar, Project 88, Mumbai, two-person show

2017 Molting the Fractured, 68 Projects, Berlin, Germany

Mutual Reentanglement 2, VOLTA, New York

2016 The Sky Remains, Dhaka Art Summit, Dhaka, Bangladesh

2015 Mutual Entanglements, Chimento Contemporary, Los Angeles, CA

2014 Traces and Tears, Project 88, Mumbai, India

2012 Sandeep Mukherjee: New Work, Brennan & Griffin, New York City, NY

2011 Sandeep Mukherjee: New Work, Project 88, Mumbai, India

2010 Sandeep Mukherjee: New Work, Brennan & Griffin, New York City, NY

2009

2008

Sandeep Mukherjee, Second Street Gallery, Charlottesville, VA

Sandeep Mukherjee, Sister, Cottage Home, Los Angeles, CA

Spell: Sandeep Mukherjee, Broad Center, Pitzer College, Claremont, CA

Sandeep Mukherjee, Nature Morte Gallery, New Delhi, India

2005 Sandeep Mukherjee, Sister, Los Angeles, CA

2004 Project 21: Sandeep Mukherjee, Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, CA

2002 Sandeep Mukherjee, Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2000 Redolence, Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024 Berlin On My Mind, 68 Projects, Berlin, Germany

Contemporary Asian American Abstraction, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco

Genesis: On Beginning, Parny Lalont, London

Time Being, curated by Khang Nguyen, Wonzimer, Los Angeles

2023 It’s About Time, curated by April Greiman and Stacie B. London, Brand Library & Art Center, Glendale, CA

Common Ground, curated by Vida Heydari, Vida Heydari Contemporary, Pune, India

Spectral Theatre, with Rohini Devashar, Project 88, Mumbai

2022 Swept Away: Love Letters to a Surrogate(s), Guild Hall, East Hampton, NY

Tracing Echoes, Project 88, Mumbai, India

2021 Not an Imitation, curated by Rohini Devashar and Pallavi Paul, Project 88, Mumbai Artists and Poems, Los Angeles, CA

2020 JACOB’S WEST: poem from home, curated by Rema Ghuloum, Online exhibition

2019 Centennial: 100 Years of Otis College Alumni, Ben Maltz Gallery, Otis College, Los Angeles, CA

STORIES: Selections from the Permanent Collection, Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, CA

2018 Some of Our Favorite Things, Ben Maltz Gallery, Otis College, Los Angeles, CA

On Whiteness, The Kitchen & The Racial Imaginary Institute, New York, NY

2017 Elemental/Marking Time, Sturt Haaga Gallery, Descanso Gardens, Los Angeles, CA

SUPPER CLUB, Galerie Kornfeld, Berlin, Germany

2016 8688, curated by Diana Campbell Betancourt, Project 88, Mumbai, India

Phantasmagoria/Reentanglement, with Stas Orlovski, Glendale College Art Gallery, Glendale, CA

C.O.L.A. 2016 Fellowship Exhibition, Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

2015 The Objectless State, Chan Gallery, Pomona College, Claremont, CA

Earth Bound, Project 88, Mumbai, India,

2014 Pictures of Everything, curated by Dion Johnson, University of La Verne, CA

A Machine Project Field Guide to the Gamble House, Machine Project, Pasadena, CA

2013 In Direct Light, curated by Timothy Nolan, Woodbury University, Los Angeles, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions (cont.)

2013 No Less a Drawing, curated by Prajna Desai, Project 88, Mumbai, India

My Echo My Shadow, Gavlak, Palm Beach, FL

2012 Emerald City, Thomas Solomon Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Local Color, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA

Facing West/ Looking East, Oceanside Museum of Art, Oceanside, CA

Lineamenta, Beacon Arts Building, Los Angeles, CA

Meticulosity, Ben Maltz Gallery, Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, CA

Drawn, Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Artists’ Tower of Protest, organized by LA><ART and the Getty Research Institute, West Hollywood, CA

2011 Selections from the Hammer Contemporary Collection, UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA

Goldmine, University Art Museum, California State University, Long Beach, CA

The Archaic Revival, Las Cienegas Projects , Los Angeles, CA

2010 Form and Phenomenon, Project 88, Mumbai, India

In Side Out, Susan Inglett Gallery, New York, NY

Commonwealth, curated by Young Chung, PØST, Los Angeles, CA

Malleable Memory, Aicon Gallery, New York, NY

Last Show, Kathryn Brennan Gallery @ Cottage Home, Los Angeles, CA

Panaroma: Los Angeles, ARCOmadrid, Madrid, Spain

FAX, curated by The Drawing Center and Independent Curators International, Torrance Art Museum, Torrance, CA

2009

Oz: New Offerings from Angel City, Regional Museum of Guadalajara, Mexico

In Bed Together, curated by Jane Glassman, Royal/T, Los Angeles, CA

Nothingness and Being, curated by Shamim Momin, Fundacion Jumex, Mexico City, Mexico

Lovable Like Orphan Kitties and Bastard Children, Green Gallery, Milwaukee, WI

Prescriptions, ACME gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Los Angeles: Aspects of the Archaic Revival, Galerie Haus Schneider, Karlsruhe, Germany

Dialogue in Art: South Asian American Art Festival, Santa Monica, CA

2008

Portrayal Betrayal, Long Beach City College, Long Beach, CA

Faculty Exhibition, Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, CA

Ambivalent figuration; people, Samson Projects, Boston, MA

A New Cosmopolitanism: Preeminence of place in contemporary art, Visual Arts Center, California State University, Fullerton, CA

2007

Humor Us, Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Barnsdall Art Park, Los Angeles, CA

Painting’s Edge, Riverside Art Museum, Riverside, CA

Rogue Wave, LA Louver Gallery, Venice, CA

Darling, take Fountain, Kalfayan Gallery, Athens, Greece

2006 DRAW•ING (dro’ing) n., BravinLee programs, New York, NY

Symmetry, The MAK Center at the Schindler House, West Hollywood, CA

Otis Alumni Exhibition, Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, Barnsdall Art Park, Los Angeles, CA

The Senses, Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, CA

Pieces of Angels: Contemporary Art from Los Angeles, University Art Gallery, Sonoma State University, Sonoma, CA

Drawing and Drawn, Cerritos College Art Gallery, Norwalk, CA

2005

Adjunct, University of Southern California, Helen Lindhurst Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Works on Paper, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY

Erotic Night Mother’s Day, UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA

2004 SPF: Self-Portraits, Angles Gallery, Santa Monica

2003

To the Point, State Gallery, Vancouver, Canada

Warped Space, California College of the Arts, Wattis Institute of Contemporary Arts, San Francisco, CA

Go Figure! Manifestations of the Human Form in Contemporary Art, Turchin Center for the Visual Arts, Boone, NC

2003 Raid the Icebox, Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Conversations, curated by Connie Butler, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA

The Real Me, Occidental College Galleries, Los Angeles, CA

International Paper, UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA

2002 LA Post-Cool, curated by Michael Duncan, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA

The Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, CA

Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC

Drive By, Reynolds Gallery, Richmond, VA

2001 Boomerang, Exit Art, New York, NY

Hard-Boiled Wonderland, curated by Julie Joyce, Harriet and Charles Luckman Fine Arts Gallery, California State University, Los Angeles, CA

The Importance of Being Earnest, curated by Michael Duncan, Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA

2000 Philosophy in the Bedroom, curated by Anne Walsh, OR Gallery, Vancouver, Canada

1998 The F Word, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA.

Still and Otherwise, Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

Publications and Reviews

2024 Van Proyen, Mark. “Contemporary Asian American Abstraction @ Paul Thiebaud”, Squarecylinder.com, June 26, 2024.

Davis, Genie. “Exploring the Spiritual Realm at Wonzimer”, Diversions LA, February 9, 2024, illus.

2023 Bhuyan, Avantika. “Artist Sandeep Mukherjee plays with movement in his experimental laboratory”, Mint Lounge, June 18, 2023, illus.

“Go gallery hopping at these 10 art shows in Mumbai”, Architect and Interiors India, June 5, 2023, illus.

Maddox, Georgina. “Highlights from Art Night Thursday”, MASH India, May 25, 2023, illus.

Doshi, Devanshi. “Attend this unique art exhibition in Mumbai that goes against the concept of boundless creativity”, Mid-Day Mumbai, May 12, 2023, illus.

“Must See Exhibitions”, Artforum.com, January 12, - February 25, 2023, illus.

Kothari, Urvi. “A Curated Guide to Mumbai Gallery Weekened”, Femina, India, January 2023, illus.

2022 Passi, Shalini. “Visual Vistas from India Artworld at Frieze London 2022”, MASH India, illus.

2020 Dambrot, Shana Nys. “Arts at Home”, LA Weekly, May 13 - May 17, 2022.

2019 Riefe, Jordan. “Class of the Century”, LA Weekly, October 31- November 7, 2019, illus.

Mukherji, Soumya. “How India Melted the Frieze (with Warmth and Wonder) –Indian Artiists at Frieze, London, UK”, MASH India, October 2019, illus.

2018 Yates, Anna Ruth. “5 Best NYC Exhibitions of 2018”, Exhibition Review, APTLY, illus. Paige, Landesberg. “To Watch and Be Watched”, THE SEEN, Issue 07, September 2018, illus. Jagpal, Jagdip. “An insider’s guide to the best of Frieze London 2018”, Vogue, India, illus. Judith, Bradlwarter. “Nine Artist I discovered at Frieze art fair”, Atelier Judith, October 11, 2018, illus.

Claudia, Rankine. “Bleached racists and lynching trees: the show that’s targeting white supremacy”, The Guardian, August 10, 2018.

2017 Genie, Davis. “ELEMENTAL/Marking Time, Descanso Gardens Sturt Haaga Gallery”, ART AND CAKE, November 30, 2017, illus.

Künstler in Berlin, Artists Interview, DEEDS, ART@BERLIN, September - November 2017. McCaslin-Brown, Claire. “World Premiere in Berlin Art Week”, McCaslin Art Advisory, September 29, 2017, illus.

Haja, Nilofar. “Sandeep Mukherjee receives the prestigious 2017 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship”, Architectural Digest, India, May 10, 2017, illus. Greenberger, Alex. “Guggenheim Foundation Announces 2017 Fellows”, ARTNEWS, April 7, 2017.

Publications and Reviews (cont.)

2017 Enhom, M. “May/June 2017 - In the News”, art ltd., May 1, 2017, illus.

Artforum News. “Guggenheim Foundation Announces 2017 Fellows”, Artforum, April 7, 2017.

Kapil, Garima. “Three Indian-Americans selected as Guggenheim Fellows for 2017”, Connected to India, April 11, 2017, illus.

Khasnis, Giridhar. “Ambivalent Hues”, Deccan Herald, December 30, 2017.

Dutt, Ela. “Three Indian-Americans, One Pakistani-origin artist win prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship”, News India, April 12, 2017, illus.

Albanese, Giovanni. “Newly-names American Guggenheim Fellows ‘Honored’ by Prestigious Recognition”, India West, April 11, 2017, illus.

Cascone, Sarah. “Catch These Breakout Stars at the VOLTA Fair”, artnet news, March 2, 2017, illus. Riley II, Charles A. “CRITIC’S VIEW: Five Booths Not to Miss at VOLTA NY This Year”, Hamptons Arthub, March 2, 2017, illus.

2016 Desai, Phalguni. “Geographic soulmates”, The Hindu, December 23, 2016, illus.

Pillai, Pooja. “Hello from the Other Side”, Indian Express, December 22, 2016, illus.

Savlani, Sonam. “From LA to Bombay”, LeMill, November 23, 2016, illus.

C.O.L.A. Fellowship Exhibition, “Sandeep Mukherjee : Performing Site”, Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery, catalog essay by Claudia Rankine, illus.

Ann, Binlot. “The Dhaka Art Summt gives Bangladesh a Global Spotlight”, Forbes Magazine, February 22, 2016, illus.

Dhaka Art Summit Guide 2016, “Sandeep Mukherjee”, Shilpakala Academy, Dhaka, catalog essay by Diana Campbell Betancourt, illus.

2015 Knight, Christopher. “Entangled in abstractions”, Los Angeles Times, October 21, 2015, sec.E, p.3, illus.

Bell, David. “Mutual Entanglements”, Notes on Looking: Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, October 28, 2015.

Rankine, Claudia. “Claudia Rankine Writes to Thomas Jefferson”, The Washington Post, August 28, 2015.

Gottschalk, Molly. “Art-World Insiders Select Frieze’s Must-See Works”, Artsy.net, October 14, 2015, illus.

Loks, James. “Looking for the Future at Frieze London”, ArtSlant, October 16, 2015, illus.

Motto, Okawa. “Sandeep Mukherjee Just Is”, artilikela.com, September 28, 2015, illus. 2014 Wagely, Catherine. “Machine Project and Gamble House Continue the Trend of Artists Taking over Historic Homes”, LA Weekly, September 24, 2014, illus.

Miranda A., Caroline. “Machine Project’s Gamble House”, Los Angeles Times, September 19, 2014, illus.

Juiano, Michael. “Critics Pick”, Timeout Los Angeles, September 18, 2014, illus.

Harris Gallery, University of La Verne, “Pictures of Everything”, essay by G. James Daichendt, illus. Padiyar, Aditi. “Traces and Tears”, Domus Magazine, August, 2014, illus.

Gupta, Neha. “Vibrations and Rythms”, Verve Magazine, March 15, 2014, illus.

Julie, Sam. “Traces and Tears in brooms and rollers”, The Asian Age, March 2, 2014.

Lohani, Hansika. “Traces and Tears”, Platform Magazine, March 2014, illus.

Shah, Ashiesh. “Sandeep Mukherjee at Project 88”, DNA, March 16, 2014, illus.

Desai, Phalguni. “Erase and Layer”, Mumbai Mirror, March 11, 2014.

2012 Schuster, Robert. “Sandeep Mukherjee: New Work”, Best in Show, The Village Voice, November 7-13, 2012.

Knight, Christopher. “Young hits home in Emerald City”, Los Angeles Times, December 14, 2012, sec.D, p.20.

Ollman, Leah. “Meticulosity‘ aims to reconnect the conceptual, visual “, Exhibition Review, Los Angeles Times, April 29, 2012, sec.E, p.6.

Grattan, Nikki. “Sandeep Mukherjee, In the Make: Studio Visits with Artists and Designers”, inthemake.net

2012 Sareen, Hemant. “Sandeep Mukherjee”, Take On Art, Volume 2, Issue 7, February, 2012, p. 135, 136, illus.

Shaw, Michael. “Sandeep Mukherjee”, The Conversation: An Artist Podcast, theconversationartistpodcast.podomatic.com

2011 Punj, Rajesh. “Indian Contemporary Art Global Activity”, Asian Art, November, 2011, p. 24, 25. Doshi, Riddhi. “A Dance of Colors”, Hindustan Times, Mumbai, September 4, 2011, illus. Dsouza, Bertie. “Flying Solo”, Business India, September 4, 2011, p. 134, 135, illus.

Arslan, Zaira. “Physical Expression”, Indian Express, Mumbai, September 4, 2011, illus.

Kilachand, Nayantara. “Art of the Day: Writing on the Wall”, Mumbai Boss, August 24, 2011, illus. Nagree, Zeenat. “Spiral Fever”, Time Out Mumbai, August 19 – September 1, 2011, Vol. 7. issue 26, p.64, illus.

University Art Museum, California State University, Long Beach, “GOLDMINE: Works from the Collection of Sirje and Michael Gold”, essays by Christopher Scoates, Christopher Miles and George Melrod. Illus.

2010 Citron, Beth. “Critic’s Picks”, Artforum.com, September 2010, illus.

Nagree, Zeenat. “Critic’s Choice: Form and Phenomenon”, Time Out Mumbai, December 10–23, 2010, Vol. 7. issue 8, p.77, 82.

California Community Foundation, Fellowship for Visual Artists. Essay by Irene Tsatsos, illus.

2009 Rattemeyer, Christian. The Judith Rothschild Foundation Contemporary Drawings Collection: Catalogue Raisonne, MOMA, New York.

Parsons, Laura. “Cosmic abstraction: Mukherjee spins the wheel”, Exhibition Review, The Hook, Charlottesville, November 30, 2009.

Thiele, Carmela. “Satyr im Hamsterrad”, Exhibition Review, Badische Neueste Nachrichten, June 1, 2009.

Duncan, Michael. “Sandeep Mukherjee at Cottage Home and Sister”, Exhibition Review, Art in America, January 2009, p.119, illus.

2008 Miles, Christopher. “Best in Show 2008”, LA Weekly, December 19-25, 2008, Vol. 31/No. 5, p.50.

Shaw, Michael. “Sandeep Mukherjee”, THE Magazine, Los Angeles, Exhibition Review, August 2008, p. 48, illus.

Pomonis, Mary Anna. “Sandeep Mukherjee”, artUS, Exhibition Review, Summer 2008, issue number 23. p. 16. Illus.

Davis, Kathryn M. “Los Angeles: Capital of Contemporary Art?”, THE Magazine, Santa Fe, July 2008, p.48, 49.

Taft, Catherine. “Critic’s Picks”, Artforum.com, June 2008, illus.

Miles, Christopher. “Sandeep Mukherjee at Sister and Cottage Home.” LA Weekly, May 23-29, 2008, Vol. 30/No. 27, p.49, illus.

Knight, Christopher. “Traces of nature on a grand scale”, Los Angeles Times, May 16, 2008, sec. E, p.21. illus.

Taft, Catherine. “Round-Up of the Best Shows in LA”, Saatchart.com, May 2008, illus.

Myers, Holly. “Mountain and Valley: The paradoxes of Sandeep Mukherjee”, LA Weekly, April 4-10, 2008, Vol. 30/No. 20, p. 58, illus.

Cal State Fullerton, Fullerton, CA. “A New Cosmopolitanism”, January 20 – February 22, 2008, essay by Charles Gaines, illus.

Michno, Christopher. “Luminosity and a Sense of Jazz”, Exhibition Review, Inland Empire Weekly, March 6-12, 2008, Vol. 2/No. 48, p. 13.

Nichols Gallery, Broad Center, Pitzer College, Claremont, CA, “Spell: Sandeep Mukherjee”, February 2 – March 22, 2008, essay by Max King Cap, illus.

2007 Knight, Christopher. “45 Painters under 45: Painting Gets a Broader Brush”, Los Angeles Times, December 2, 2007, sec. F, p. 1,10,11, illus.

Kalfayan Gallery, Athens, Greece. “Darling Take Fountain”, May 31 – September 29, 2007, essay by Konstantin Kakanias, illus.

Dambrot, Shana Nys. “Rogue Wave 07: 12 Artists from Los Angeles”, Art Review, Exhibition Review, September 2007, p. 126.

Publications and Reviews (cont.)

2007 Melrod, George. “Rogue Wave 07: 12 Artists from Los Angeles”, Exhibition Review, Art Ltd. September 2007, p.16.

Koroxenidis, A. “Depicting Life in Los Angeles”, Kathimerini, Exhibition Review, 10 July. Jacobs, James. “Emerging Artists: Strange Forces”, Art & Antiques, June 2007, p. 90, illus. Scarborough, James. “Sandeep Mukherjee, Rogue Wave ’07: 12 Los Angeles Artists”, What the Butler Saw, Exhibition Review, August 19, 2007.

Ollman, Leah. Exhibition review, Los Angeles Times, July 6, 2007, sec. E, p. 22.

2006 Wood, Eve. “Symmetry”, Exhibition review, Art Papers, July/August 2006, p. 63, illus.

Buckley, Annie. “Symmetry: Investigating X”, Exhibition Review, Artweek, June 2006, p.12, illus. Miles, Christopher. “Sandeep Mukherjee”, Exhibition Review, Artforum International, January, 2006, p. 229, illus.

Geer, Suvan. “Sandeep Mukherjee at Sister”, Exhibition Review, Artweek, February 2006, illus.

Shaked, Nizan. “Sandeep Mukherjee: New Work”, Exhibition Review, X-Tra Vol. 8, No. 4, p. 36-37, illus.

Dambrot, Shana Nys. “Made in Los Angeles”, Tema Celeste, January/February 2006, p. 57, 60.

Chang, Cindy. “Seeing the Mirrored Images”, Los Angeles Times, February 16, 2006, sec. E, p. 16.

Boone, Lisa. “Art in Balance”, Los Angeles Times, January 19, 2006, sec. F, p. 5. Illus.

Frank, Peter. “Symmetry”, LA Weekly, May 5-11, 2006, Vol. 28/No. 24, p. 56.

2005 Knight, Christopher. “A Mural of Color, Line and Light”, Los Angeles Times, Exhibition Review, November 25, 2005, sec E, p. 38.

Donohue, Marlena. “Continuing and Recommended”, Exhibition Review, Art Scene, December 2005, p.20.

Kraus, Chris; Tumlir, Jan; McFadden, Jane. “LA Artland: Contemporary Art from Los Angeles”, Black Dog Publishing Ltd., London, p.163, illus.

Duncan, Michael. “State of the Art ‘05”, LA Weekly, October 28 – November 3, 2005, Vol. 27/No. 49, p. 52, illus.

2004 Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, CA. “Project 21: Sandeep Mukherjee”, January 20 – February 22, 2004, essay by Christopher Miles, illus.

Donohue, Marlena. “Continuing and Recommended”, Exhibition Review, Art Scene, February 2004, p. 21.

2003 Rugoff, Ralph. “Warped Space”, San Francisco: CCA Wattis Institute, illus. p. 7.

Carson, Juli. “Review 04: Sandeep Mukherjee”, X-Tra. Vol. 5, No. 3, p. 26-28, illus.

Jeno, Heather. “The Young and the Restless: Conversations at MOCA”, desirelosangeles.com

UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles. International Paper. January 26 – April 27, 2003, essay by Claudine Isé, illus.

Knight, Christopher. “Drawing, not toeing, the line”, Exhibition Review, Los Angeles Times, February 7, 2003, sec. E30.

Worman, Alex. “L.A. Confidential”, artnet.com, February 2003.

2002 Knight, Christopher. “In the Tiniest Gestures, Delicacy on an Epic Scale”, Exhibition Review, Los Angeles Times, October 4, 2002, sec. F, p. 24.

2001 Miles, Christopher. “Los Angeles, Critic’s Picks”, Artforum.com, June 2002.

Knight, Christopher. “Alices Visit Alternate Realities in ‘Hard-Boiled Wonderland’”, Exhibition Review, June 15, 2001, sec. F, p. 26.

Harriet and Charles Luckman Fine Arts Complex, California State University, Los Angeles, “Hard-Boiled Wonderland”, May 24 – July 7, 2001, essay by Julie Joyce, illus.

Greenstein, M.A. “To Go Naked is the Best Disguise”, Art India 6, Quarter 1, p. 18, illus.

Duncan, Michael. “Sandeep Mukherjee at Margo Leavin Gallery”, Exhibition Review, Art in America, March 2001, p. 140-141, illus.

2000 Cooper, Jacqueline. “Sandeep Mukherjee”, Exhibition Review, New Art Examiner, December/January 2000, p. 50, illus.

2000 Feldman, James. “Sandeep Mukherjee”, Exhibition Review, Art issues 65, November/December 2000, p. 50, illus.

Duncan, Michael. “L.A. Confidential”, Exhibition Review, Artnet.com, October 2000. Pagel, David. “Thrilling Images of Nature Throw Caution in the Wind”, Exhibition Review, Los Angeles Times, September 22, 2000, sec. F, p. 18.

Perdices, J. Alvaro. “Sandeep Mukherjee Redolence”, Alo.com. September 2000. “Sandeep Mukherjee at Margo Leavin Gallery”, eyestorm.com. September 2000.

1999 Duncan, Michael. “L.A. Portraiture: Post Cool”, Art in America, October 1999, p.131.

Public Projects

2020-23 Art in Architecture: James M. Ashley and Thomas W.L Ashley US Courthouse Annex Project, Toledo, OH

2020-21 Sofi Stadium, YouTube Theater, Permanent Installation, Los Angeles, CA

2020 Facebook, Artist in Residence Program, Permanent Installation, Facebook Headquarters, Los Angeles, CA

Selected Collections

Cleveland Clinic Collection, Cleveland, OH

Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, CA

Jumex Collection, Mexico City, Mexico

Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, New Delhi, India

Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA

Microsoft Collection, Redmond, WA

Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA

The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY

Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, KS

Orange County Museum of Art, Newport Beach, CA

Peter Norton Collection, Santa Monica, CA

Pitzer College Art Collection, Claremont, CA

Pomona College Museum of Art, Claremont, CA

Portland Art Museum, Portland, OR

The Progressive Art Collection, OH

San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA

Santa Barbara Museum of Art, Santa Barbara, CA

Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC

GRACE MUNAKATA

Born 1957 in Monterey, CA

Education

1985 MFA, Studio Art, University of California, Davis, CA

1984 Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Skowhegan, ME

1980 BA, Studio Art, University of California, Davis, CA

Professional Experience

1988-2021

Professor of Painting & Drawing, California State University East Bay, Hayward, CA

Selected Awards and Residencies

2022 Morris Graves Foundation, Loleta, CA

2020 Sitka Centre for Art and Ecology, Cascade Head, OR

2019 Monson Artist Residency, Monson, ME

2018 Skaftfell Artist Residency, Center for Visual Arts, Seydisfjordur, Iceland

2017 Lucid Art Residency, Lucid Art Foundation, Inverness, CA

2015 Sabbatical leave award CSU East Bay

2009 Sabbatical leave award CSU East Bay

1998 Sabbatical leave award CSU East Bay

1992 Faculty Development Award CSU Hayward

1985 Graduate Teaching Award, University of California, Davis

1984 Regents Fellowship, University of California, Davis

Andy Warhol Scholarship, Art Department, University of California, Davis

Skowhegan Summer School Scholarship

Humanities Research Grant, University of California, Davis

Travel Grant, Art Dept., University of California, Davis

1983 Graduate Opportunity Fellowship, University of California, Davis

Humanities Research Grant, University of California, Davis

Selected Solo and Two-Person Exhibitions

2023 Grace Munakata: Biology of Flight, Anglim Trimble Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2016 Paintings & Collages, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2014 Paintings, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2013 Paintings, b. sakata garo, Sacramento, CA

2012 Habitation, St. Supéry Vineyards & Winery, Rutherford, CA

2011 It’s Never Too Late to Have a Happy Childhood, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA, two-person show

2009 Recent Works, b. sakata garo, Sacramento, CA.

2008 New Work, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2005 Near at Hand, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2003 A Thousand Layers of Self, James Kaneko Gallery, Sacramento, CA

2002 Paintings & Collages, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA.

2000 Paintings, Gregory Kondos Gallery, Sacramento City College, Sacramento, CA

1999 Shasta College Gallery, Redding, CA, two-person show

Recent Artists: Paintings and Drawings, Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA, two-person show

1997 Recent Work, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1994 New York, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1992 Recent Paintings, Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA

1991 Mixed Media on Paper, Natsoulas-Novelozo Gallery, Davis, CA

1989 Recent Work, Jeremy Stone Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1988 Artists Contemporary Gallery, two-person show, Sacramento, CA

1986 Introductions ‘86, Allrich Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Landscape Drawings, Shackelford & Sears, Davis, CA

1985 MFA Exhibition, Nelson Gallery, UC Davis, CA

Artworks Gallery, Fair Oaks, CA

1984 Davis Art Center, Davis, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024 Contemporary Asian American Abstraction, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2023 An exhibition of women artists, Anglim Trimble Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2022 Dancing with Charlie: Bay Area Art from the Campbell Collection, Sonoma Valley Museum of Art, Sonoma, CA

2021 Wayne Thiebaud Influencer: A New Generation, Manetti Shrem Museum, Davis, CA

Making Their Mark, Anne Loucks Gallery, Glencoe, IL

2019 Three Views, Ann Loucks Gallery, Glencoe, IL

2018 Lucid Art Residency Annual Exhibition, Gallery Route One, Point Reyes Station, CA

Faculty and Staff Exhibition, University Gallery, CSU East Bay, Hayward, CA

2016 Celebrating Ruth, Fouladi Projects, San Francisco, CA

2015

Faculty and Staff Exhibition, University Gallery, CSU East Bay, Hayward, CA

EXPO Chicago, Festival Pavilion, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL

Collage: New Directions, Cherry Center for the Arts, Carmel, CA

artMRKT San Francisco, Festival Pavilion, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA.

2014 Art Silicon Valley/San Francisco, San Mateo County Event Center, San Mateo, CA

EXPO Chicago, Festival Pavilion, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL

artMRKT San Francisco, Festival Pavilion, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA

Art Miami, The Art Miami Pavilion, Wynwood Arts District, Miami, FL

2013 artMRKT San Francisco, Festival Pavilion, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA

Art Miami, International Contemporary and Modern Art Fair, Miami, FL

EXPO Chicago, Festival Pavilion, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL

Palm Springs Fine Art Fair, Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA

LA Art Show, Los Angeles Convention Center, Los Angeles, CA

2012 artMRKT San Francisco, Festival Pavilion, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco, CA

Art Miami, The Art Miami Pavilion, Wynwood Arts District, Miami, FL

EXPO Chicago, Festival Pavilion, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL

artMRKT San Francisco, Concourse Exhibition Center, San Francisco, CA

Palm Springs Fine Art Fair, Palm Springs Convention Center, Palm Springs, CA

Transcendental Visions, The Independent, Sand City, CA (exhibition catalog)

2011 Collage, Cherry Center, Carmel, CA

Beyond Tradition: Art Legacies at the Richmond Art Center, Part 2, Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA

Crosscurrents, Togonon Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Faculty Show, University Gallery, CSU East Bay, Hayward, CA

2010 Figures, b. sakata garo, Sacramento, CA

2009 Assemblage + Collage + Construction: A Collective View of Art from Multiple Santa Cruz County Venues, The Museum of Art & History, Santa Cruz, CA

Gallery Group Show, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2008 Contemporary Drawings and Works on Paper, Center for Contemporary Art, Sacramento, CA

2007 Coming Attractions: Gallery Group Show, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2003 The Miniature Show, Graystone Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Branching Out, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Cut, Copy, Paste: The Art of Contemporary Collage, De Saisset Museum, Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, CA

2001 San Francisco International Art Exposition, Ft. Mason, San Francisco, CA

A Private Need: Manual Neri’s art collection, Arts Benicia Gallery, CA

Invitational Exhibition, Richard Nelson Gallery, University of California, Davis, CA

2000

Annual Faculty Exhibition, University Art Gallery, CSU Hayward, CA

Self Portraits, Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Selected Recent Acquisitions, Richard Nelson Gallery, Fine Arts Collection, University of California, Davis, CA

Simply Drawing, Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Artists in Embassies Program (AIEP) Exhibition, Lima Peru (exhibition catalog)

Artists Valentines, Nelson Gallery, University of California, Davis, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions (cont.)

1999 New Space, New Work, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

They hold up half the sky, South of Market Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA

Inaugural Exhibition, Campbell-Thiebaud Gallery, Laguna Beach, CA

Group Exhibition, Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Faculty Exhibition, University Gallery, CSU, Hayward, CA

Off the Wall, Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA

1997 Invitational Valentine Exhibition, Nelson Gallery, University of California, Davis, CA

1994 Spring Exhibition, Joan Roebuck Gallery, Lafayette, CA

Good things come . . ., Braunstein/Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA

SOMAR Gallery, San Francisco, CA

North by Northeast 2, Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA (exhibition catalog)

Landscapes & Still Lifes of the Sacramento Valley School, John Natsoulas Gallery, CA

Off the Wall, Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Artists for Amnesty, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, CA

1993 Contemporary Artists of the California Landscape, John Natsoulas Gallery, Davis, CA

Off the Wall, Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA

1992 East is East, Pence Gallery, Davis, CA

Northern California to Northern Italy, Joan Roebuck Gallery, Lafayette, CA

Looking Out/Looking In, Selections of Bay Area Drawings, Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA (exhibition catalog)

Rodeo, A Studio Community, Bedford Gallery, Regional Center for the Arts, Walnut Creek, CA (exhibition catalog)

1990 Jeremy Stone Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1990 Artists of Contra Costa County, Hearst Art Gallery, St. Mary’s College of CA

1989

Artists for Amnesty, Natsoulas-Novelozo Gallery, Davis, CA

Landscape Visions, California State University, Long Beach, CA

Landscapes 14 California Artists, Natsoulas-Novelozo Gallery, Davis, CA

1988 The Contemporary Romantic Landscape, Jeremy Stone Gallery, San Francisco, CA West Coast Collage, University of Oregon Museum of Art, Eugene, OR West Coast Collage, University of Oregon Museum of Art, Eugene, OR

Artists Contemporary Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Shackelford and Sears, Davis, CA

1986 All California 86, Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach, CA Pence Gallery, Davis, CA

Faculty Show, Sierra College, Winstead Gallery, Rocklin, CA

1985 A Place Apart, Allrich Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Davis at Berkeley, Heller Gallery, University of California, Berkeley, CA Post 84 Show, Davis Art Center, Davis, CA

4th Annual Cowtown, Chann Elliott Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Collage, Winstead Gallery, Sierra College, Rocklin, CA

1984 American Works on Paper, Zaner Gallery, Rochester, NY

1982 Hayward Area Forum for the Arts, Hayward, CA

Northern California Art Association, Sacramento, CA

Five from Davis, White Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Publications and Reviews

2024 Van Proyen, Mark. “Contemporary Asian American Abstraction @ Paul Thiebaud”, Squarecylinder.com, June 26, 2024.

2016 Chun, Kimberly. “Group show to honor gallery owner Ruth Braunstein,” San Francisco Chronicle, January 27, 2016.

2014 Baker, Kenneth. “Munakata’s Abstracts – At 1st Glance”, San Francisco Chronicle, March 8, 2014.

2013 Dalkey, Victoria. “Artist Mixes Abstraction, Pattern, Imagery”, San Francisco Chronicle, June 2013.

2011 Baker, Kenneth. “Simulations, Substances and Humor. Munakata’s Graces”, San Francisco Chronicle, July 2, 2011.

2010 Dalkey, Victoria. “Second Saturday picks: It Figures.”, Sacramento Bee, February 12, 2010.

2009 Roth, David. “Grace Munakata at b. sakata garo”, Squarecylinder.com, April 19, 2009.

Dalkey, Victoria. “A Dogged Search . . . for Home”, Sacramento Bee, April 10, 2009.

2005 Jordan Essoe. “Grace Munakata at Braunstein/Quay Gallery,” Artweek, cover image, May 2005.

2003 Dalkey, Victoria. “Critic’s Pick, James Kaneko Gallery.” Sacramento Bee, Dec. 7, 2003.

2000 Dalkey, Victoria. “Rich Study in Contradictions...”, Sacramento Bee, November 5, 2000. Jenkins, Steven. “2000 Faculty Exhibition”, Artweek, March 2000.

1999 Dalkey, Victoria. Exhibition essay, Shasta College, Redding, CA, 1999.

1994 Gordon, Alan M. “Flatlanders: Sacramento Valley School”, Artweek, February 3, 1994. Allen, Julie. Art Programming Producer, “Expressions,” PBS, KRCB, Rohnert Park, CA, 1994.

1992 Dreher, Warren. Linker, Martin. Fowler, Carol. “Rodeo, A Studio Community”, Bedford Gallery, Regional Center for the Arts, Walnut Creek, 1992. Steel, Nancy. “Strait Reflections”, Diablo Arts Magazine, May 1992.

1991 Moyle, Marilyn. Art Review, Davis Enterprise, March 24, 1991. Fowler, Carol. “Artists’ Enclave”, West County Times, Aug. 4, 1991.

1989 Baker, Kenneth. “Painters Attack Images from Different Angles”, San Francisco Chronicle, Sept. 1, 1989.

Nixon, Bruce. “The Constant Light”, Artweek. July 1, 1989. Chan, Tony. “Another Day in America”, Video.

1987 McColm, Del. Review, Davis Enterprise, Feb. 19, 1987.

Dalkey, Victoria. “Varying Visions”, Sacramento Bee, March 20, 1987.

1986 Dalkey, Victoria. “Meetings by the Bay”, Sacramento Bee, July 6, 1986. Dalkey, Victoria. “Memories Sifted”, Sacramento Bee, Oct. 5, 1986. McColm, Del. “Rare Landscape Exhibits”, Davis Enterprise, Sept. 25, 1986.

1985 Hays, Joanne Burstein. “Visions from Special Places”, Artweek, May 1985. Schlesinger, Ellen. “Basking in Basics: Exhibits of Hard-won Mastery in Davis,” Sacramento Bee, June 1985.

Selected Collections

Linda Aldrich, San Francisco, CA

Bank of America, San Francisco, CA

Estate of Ruth Braunstein, San Francisco, CA

Estate of Jess Collins and Robert Duncan

Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA

Mr. & Mrs. Trevor Foster, St. Helena, CA

Hewlett-Packard Co., Roseville, CA

Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, Winters, CA

Hyatt Regency, San Francisco, CA

Tom Konopiots, Chicago, IL

Lifelong Medical Care, Berkeley CA

Manuel Neri, Benicia, CA

Peggy and Willis Newton, San Francisco, CA

Paul Thiebaud Foundation, San Francisco, CA

Nancy & Paul Pelosi, Washington, D.C.

Joan Roebuck, Lafayette, CA

San Francisco Federal Savings San Francisco, CA

Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, University of California, Davis, CA

Silicon Valley Bank, San Jose, CA

Thom W. Weisel, San Francisco, CA

Jonathon Wells, Chicago IL

SONO OSATO

Born 1960 in Baden Baden, Germany

Education

1986 MFA, California College of Art, Oakland, CA

1983 BFA, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ

Professional Experience

2001 Intermediate Painting, & Foundation 2-D, University of Georgia, Athens

2000 Intermediate Painting, & Foundation 2-D, University of Georgia, Athens

Independent Graduate Studies, California College of Art

1999 Open Seminar, Graduate Studies, California College of Art Through the Body; Paint as Substance, Anderson Ranch

1996 The Circle as Paradigm, Interdisciplinary Graduate Seminar, California College of Art

1995 Interdisciplinary Critique team taught w/ William Farley, California College of Art

1994 Interdisciplinary Graduate Seminar, California College of Art

1993 Graduate Seminar-New Genre, San Francisco Art Institute

1992 Interdisciplinary Sculpture, San Francisco Art Institute

Beginning Drawing, Mills College

1990 Beginning Drawing & Advanced Painting, Kansas City Art Institute

Selected Awards and Residencies

2008 Pollock-Krasner Grant

2000 CHANGE INC.

1999 Pollock-Krasner Grant

1997 Djerassi Foundation Artist in Residency

1995 Contemporary Art Center of Herblay, Artist in Residency, Pontoise, France

1994 ART MATTERS INC.

1989 Pollock-Krasner Grant

1988 Djerrassi Foundation Fellowship in Visual Arts, Ridge Vineyards LOCI, Award Exhibition, “Best of Show” from 1988 Pro Arts Annual Djerassi Foundation Artist in Residency

Selected Speaking

2004 Panelist, The Way Things Are; Tribute to David Ireland, Headlands Center for the Arts, Marin County, CA

2000 UC Berkeley

1999 Video Interview for The Meaning and the Message, Oakland Museum

Anderson Ranch, Colorado

1998 San Jose State University, San Jose, CA.

1996 Interview, Women in the Arts, KALX, Berkeley, CA

Panelist, All Else....Being Equal?, CCA

1994 Sonoma State University

UC Berkeley

1992 Excerpts from Stone Soup, broadcast on Word and Image, KPFA 94FM Public Radio, Berkeley, CA

Stone Soup, producer and hostess of a private reading and performance series

1992 Panelist, Asian American Arts Conference, UC Berkeley

1991 Key Speaker, Pro Arts Open Studios: Collecting Art in the Bay Area, Pro Arts

1990 Kansas City Art Institute

Panelist, Culture Under Fire, Greater Kansas City Coalition Against Censorship, KCAI

1989 Panelist, N. California Sculpture Symposia, The Art of Place, Sonoma State University Woman’s Image Now, Arizona State University

Interview, State of the Arts, KUSP 89 FM Public Radio, Santa Cruz, CA.

Selected Solo Exhibitions

2023 Diluvia, Brian Gross Fine Art on Artsy.com

2022 Silent Language, ICOSA Window Dressing Series, Austin, TX

2017 Submergence, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

2009 Babylon: The Buried Language Series, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

2007 Silent Language, GALLERYtwenty-four, Brooklyn, NY

2006 Revenant, Art in Odd Places (Outdoor Projections), curated by Jeremy Helton, New York, NY

2005 Angels in Dust, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

2003 Echo, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

2002 Paintings/Assemblages, BGFA at One Post Street, San Francisco, CA

2001 New Work, Lowery Gallery, Athens, GA

1999 The Sound of Ku: New Paintings, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

1998 S(O)UND, Natalie & James Thompson Gallery, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA

1994 S(P)OO(O)R, Terrain, San Francisco, CA

1993 Oakland Drawers, Oakland Museum Sculpture Court @ Civic Center, Oakland, CA

1992 New Sculpture by Sono Osato, Terrain Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1991 Utland, San Jose Institute for Contemporary Art, San Jose, CA

Exploded Crate, Laguna Art Museum Satellite @ South Coast Plaza, Costa Mesa, CA

Painting as Sculpture Installation, UC Davis Art Center, Davis, CA

New Work, Terrain Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1989 Innojo Eard Onwaecna, Fuller Gross Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

2024 Contemporary Asian American Abstraction, Paul Thiebaud Gallery, San Francisco, CA

2023 To the Max, di Rosa Center of Contemporary Art, Napa, CA

2022 GESTURE/COLOR/FORM, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

2020 30th Anniversary Exhibition, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

……. Mask Collection, curated by GD Wright, Vault Stone Shop, Austin, TX

2019 Open Space, curated by Leslie Moody-Castro, ICOSA Collective, Austin TX

2014 The Right Amount of Wrong, Curated by Lovina Purple, ISE Foundation, New York, NY

Traces, curated by ARMCHAIR/SHOTGUN, 7 DUNHAM, Brooklyn, NY

2013 A Cage Went in Search of a Bird, curated by Sarah Walko, Radiator Arts, New York, NY

2011 Piece of Mind, curated by FIT MA program, Elga Wimmer Gallery, New York, NY

2008 Beauty’s Burden, curated by David Gibson, Educational Alliance, New York, NY

2007 Honoring CCA at 100: Works by Arneson, De Forest, Fleming, Osato, & Solomon, Brian Gross Fine Art, San Francisco, CA

CCA(C) @ Di Rosa Preserve: Celebration of CCA’s Centennial with Prominent Alumni in the Collection, Napa, CA

Tuttavia Povera, Shore Institute for Contemporary Art, Long Branch, NJ

2006 International Assemblage Art Exhibition, GALLERY twenty-four, Berlin, Germany

Remnants, Lemmons Contemporary, New York, NY

Three Person Show (with Tatiana Parcero & Oscar Muñoz), Gaviria-Lorduy Fine Arts, Brooklyn, NY

Egg Drop Soup, curated by Kat Kriefen, Salon on South Second, Brooklyn, NY

Rumble-20 DUMBO Artists, curated by David Krepfle, Tribes Gallery, New York, NY

Selected Group Exhibitions (cont.)

2006

2000 Time Capsule, Refusalon, San Francisco, CA

1999 Meaning and Message: Contemporary Art from the Museum Collection, The Oakland Museum, Oakland, CA

San Francisco, Los Angeles, Tel Aviv, Refusalon, San Francisco, CA

Requiem: Living Artists Eulogize a Dying Century, Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, Atlanta, GA

1997 The Art Orchestra (A Sculptor’s Ensemble), performed at Florence Gould Theater, San Francisco Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco, CA

1996 Trace, The Dead Space Gallery, Portland, ME

Samplings, Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco, CA

Public Art/Public Space/Public Process, South of Market Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA

Roots in Asia, Richmond Art Center, Richmond, CA

Facing Eden: 100 Years of Landscape Art in the Bay Area, De Young Museum, San Francisco, CA

1994 Wunderkammer, curated by Maria Porges, Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1993 Trash, Southern Exposure Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1991 Ad Majorem Dei Glorium, Grace Cathedral, San Francisco, CA

1990 Ymbspr C Rhymet, The Left Bank Gallery, Kansas City, MO

Wall Sculpture: The Art of Found Objects, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, CA

Oakland Artists ‘90, Oakland Museum, Oakland, CA

Chain Reaction, San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery, San Francisco, CA

1989 Fresh Views, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, CA

Eye Sores, curated by Nayland Blake, New Langton Arts, San Francisco, CA

1988 LOCI, 3 honored artists selected by SFMOMA, curated by Graham Beal, Pro Arts, Oakland, CA

1987 Monumental Women, curated by Jo Babcock & Michael Bell, South of Market Cultural Center, San Francisco, CA

X the Unknown, curated by Michelle Ellis Pracy, at an independent site, San Francisco, CA

Publications and Reviews

2024 Van Proyen, Mark. “Contemporary Asian American Abstraction @ Paul Thiebaud”, Squarecylinder.com, June 26, 2024

2022 Amin, Lakshmi Rivera. “A View from the Easel”, Hyperallergic, November 16, 2022.

2017 Roth, David. “Sono Osato @ Brian Gross Fine Art”, Squarecylinder.com, July 18, 2017. DeWitt Cheng. “Sono Osato @ Brian Gross Fine Arts”, Visual Art Source, July 28, 2017.

2012 Featured Artist, Armchair/Shotgun, Volume 2.

2009 Baker, Kenneth. “Sono Osato-Babylon: the Buried Language Series”, San Francisco Chronicle, April 4, 2009.

Swanhuyser, Hiya. “Danger Beauty Goo”, San Francisco Weekly, March 4-10, 2009. Cerbini, Lorenza. “Creativity at Work”, SpeakUp, Milan, Italy.

2005 Baker, Kenneth. “Sono Osato-Angels in Dust”, San Francisco Chronicle, April 2, 2005.

2003 Baker, Kenneth. “Objects Speak a Private Code in ‘Silent Language’”, San Francisco Chronicle, April 19, 2003.

2002 Baker, Kenneth. Critics Picks, San Francisco Chronicle, June 7, 2002.

2000 Porges, Maria. Review of the Sound of Ku, Artforum, March, 2000.

Bonetti, David. “Charting 35 years of California Art”, San Francisco Examiner, January 6, 2000. “Home is Inside Me”, Stretcher.Org

1999 Baker, Kenneth. “Bearable Weightlessness of Being”, San Francisco Chronicle, December 18, 1999. Sherman, Ann Elliot. “Second Impressions, Meaning and Message in Contemporary Art”, The Museum of California, Fall 1999.

Cullum, Jerry. “What’s on the Surface isn’t the Whole Story”, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, April 16, 1999.

Southern Exposure 25 Year Silver Anniversary Box Set. “di-ROSA Preserve/Art & Nature”, Local Color-ing Book first edition.

1998 Miller, Alicia. “The Secrets of Nature at Paradise Wood Sculpture Grove”, Artweek, July/August 1998

1995 “Facing Eden-100 Years of Landscape Art in the Bay Area”, edited by Steven Nash.

1993 Litfin, Katy. “Profile: Sono Osato”, City Life Magazine, July/August 1993.

Thym, Jolene. “Sculpture Offers Visitors to Peek Inside Oakland’s ‘Drawers”, Oakland Tribune, June 7, 1993.

Hull-Webster, Mary. “A Conversation with Sono Osato”, Artweek, May 20, 1993.

1992 Jan, Alfred. “Sono Osato at Terrain”, New Art Examiner, December 3, 1992.

Cohn, Terri. “The Forgotten and the Familiar”, Artweek, October 22, 1992. Baker, Kenneth. “Scavenged Material Becomes Sculpture”, San Francisco Chronicle, September 15, 1992.

1991 Sherman, Ann Elliott. “Detritus and True”, The Metro, San Jose, November 7, 1991.

Burkhart, Dorothy. “Poetry from Piles of Stuff”, San Jose Mercury News, November 1, 1991. Bonetti, David. “Sono Osato at Terrain Gallery”, Artnews, October 1991. Littlefield, Kinney. “Oakland Artist Explores a Deeper Shade of Black”, The Orange County Register, August 30, 1991.

Curtis, Cathy. “There’s More Than Meets the Eye at Offbeat Laguna Museum Exhibit”, LA Times, August 25, 1991.

Baker, Kenneth. “Osato’s Salvage Show at Terrain”, San Francisco Chronicle, April 4, 1991. Bonetti, David. “Artist with a Cinderella Touch”, San Francisco Examiner, March 29, 1991. “Spirituality and the Avant-Garde”, Five Fingers Review

1990 Baker, Kenneth. Review of Fuller- Gross Exhibition, San Francisco Chronicle, June 13, 1990. Baker, Kenneth. “Installation Explores ‘Art/Non Art’ Question”, San Francisco Chronicle, May 2, 1990.

1988 “A Lot of People Just Don’t Get it”, CRACK 3.

1987 Solnit, Rebecca. “A Sense of Presence”, Artweek, July 25, 1987.

Baker, Kenneth. “Different Kinds of Raw Art”, San Francisco Chronicle, January 17, 1987.

1986 Baker, Kenneth. “Sono Osato at New Art”, San Francisco Chronicle, July 4, 1986.

Selected Collections

Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, OH

Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, San Francisco, CA di Rosa Center for Contemporary Art, Napa, CA Laguna Art Museum, Laguna Beach CA Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, CA Stanford University Law School, Stanford, CA

Cover: Ekta Aggawal, Close to Self (detail), 2024 Rear Cover: Mary Ijichi, Assemblage #22 (detail), 2023

Copyright 2024 Paul Thiebaud Gallery. All Rights Reserved. pgs. 1, 18-23 - Copyright 2024 Ekta Aggarwal. pgs. 26-35, 80 - Copyright 2024 Mary Ijichi. pgs. 6, 48-51 - Copyright 2024 Joshua Moreno. pgs. 52-57 - Copyright 2024 Sandeep Mukherjee. pgs. 36-37 - Copyright 2024 Grace Munakata. pgs. 4, 40-45 - Copyright 2024 Sono Osato.

Design: Greg Flood and Matthew Miller All images, photo: Matthew Miller

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PAUL THIEBAUD GALLERY

Contemporary Asian American Abstraction