Esoteric Survey

Lecture Series & Documentary Screening Join the Museum of Ventura County on Saturday, January 25, 2020 from 2—4:00PM for an afternoon about modernist design, fine arts and crafts, and the creative individuals who made a lasting impact in design history. First, Guest Curators Eric Huff, Jordan Downs and Steve Aldana will participate in an insightful conversation with the Museum’s Chief Curator Anna Bermudez about their collaboration on the California Cool: Mid-century Modernism on the Central Coast exhibit. Following the discussion, Laura Ackerman-Shaw will share recollections about her parents’ personal and professional lives that intertwined during their 64-year marriage. Through their combined complementary talents and temperaments, the Ackermans forged a prolific partnership that produced a wide range of timeless designs including ceramics, mosaics, tapestries, woodcarvings, and hardware, an unusual cross-disciplinary approach for designer-craftsmen. Rounding out th...

I finally made it to see Soft Schindler at MAK Center for Art and Architecture at the Schindler Kings Road House. Suspended rope sculpture installation by Tanya Aguiña (left), Bryony Roberts Studio (right) and text in the clerestory windows is by Design, Bitches.  Glazed ceramic torsos by Alice Lang Anna Puigjaner—MAIO The LTR looks perfect there. Jorge Otero-Pailos "Soft Schindler uses the concept of softness to encourage a politics of re-evaluation: If this space/sculpture/material isn’t what was first assumed, what other assumptions need challenging?" More  here .

Architectural Pottery and Vista Furniture Company Wayne Chapman and a ceramic animal The Chapman came with someone's beach scores.

Happy New Year. I've been slacking off. I haven't been shopping much and didn't take any holiday trips. So how about some cruise ship architecture with a great streamline modern house in Point Loma that nobody seems to know much about. If you know the architect, reach out. 

As seen in Craft Horizons, the bottle won first prize at the 1958 Young Americans exhibition.  The exhibition was put on by the American Craftsmen's Council and Museum of Contemporary Crafts. If you're keeping score, Val Cushing won second prize and an honorable mention for John Mason, with third prize.  Van Keppel-Green table, planter and Dansk

Maurice Grossman in the desert.

Changing and Unchanging Things: Noguchi and Hasegawa in Postwar Japan at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco  The exhibition explores the work and friendship of artists Isamu Noguchi (1904–1988) and Saburo Hasegawa (1906–1957).  U.S.-born sculptor and designer Isamu Noguchi (1904–1988) and Japanese painter, theorist and teacher Saburo Hasegawa (1906–1957) both reacted to the catastrophic effects of the war by questioning how art could balance tradition and modernity, Japanese culture and foreign influences, past and present. They were both committed to modernist practices, such as the removal of the inessential, truth to materials and a utopian belief of the power of art to improve society, but felt that modernism needed a new direction, one that could be provided by a deep exploration of Japanese art and design. Together, they visited historic gardens, palaces and temples around Kyoto to immerse themselves in traditional Japanese culture.  Image: H...