Laguna College of Art + Design Permanent Collection Exhibition on display at the LCAD Gallery through January 21
By MARRIE STONE
Laguna’s permanent art collections seem to be getting more attention these days. Maybe because our institutions are growing old enough that their storied histories warrant celebration. Perhaps we’re in a reflective and nostalgic time in our culture. The Festival of Arts, now in its 92nd year, recently completed the largest showing of its permanent collection at the John Wayne Airport. The Laguna Art Museum, founded in 1918, often showcases selections from its collection. This month, for the first time, the Laguna College of Art + Design (LCAD) unveiled its own exhibition. Roughly one-third of its collection – or 34 pieces – are now on display at the LCAD Gallery on Ocean Avenue through January 21, 2024.
While LCAD was founded in 1961, they’ve been collecting student and alumni pieces since the 1970s. The current exhibition includes work from 2000 through 2023.
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Photo by Eric Stoner
Gallery Manager Bryan Heggie with Board Member Suzanne Chonette in front of Aidan Baker-Hall’s “Climbing the Cathedral” (2016)
Permanent collections act as both a historical record and a way of studying stylistic, sociological and technological changes over time. Especially for a college like LCAD, where computer gaming and design play such significant roles, compressed time periods yield drastically different work.
“This collection began as an idea almost 20 years ago…with the goal of having the best artworks [to inspire] future art students [and serve] as an example for what they could become,” said LCAD President Steven Brittan at the exhibition opening last Thursday. Always at the forefront of creativity, the College used a percentage of their profits from vending machine sales to help finance the collection.
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Photo by Eric Stoner
President Steven Brittan addresses the opening of the LCAD Inaugural Permanent Collection at the Gallery on Ocean Avenue
I spoke with several artists whose work is on display about the backstories behind the pieces, their inspirations and how they view their work today.
Timothy Robert Smith: Study Upside Downtown Laguna Beach (LCAD mural), 2013
If you live in Laguna, you’re likely familiar with Timothy Robert Smith (whether you know it or not). Smith’s public murals appear on the LCAD campus, the LBHS campus and, most recently, on the side of Broadway by Amar Santana on Glenneyre. His pieces play with perspective, taking a worm’s eye view of the world from the bottom up.
Smith began his Upside Downtown series a decade ago with a gritty take on downtown Los Angeles (where pigeons are more prominent than Laguna’s seagulls). That piece showed at a solo show at the Copro Gallery in Bergamot Station in Santa Monica. It set the stage for Smith’s later work.
One day in 2017, while working as an adjunct professor at LCAD, Smith approached then-President Jonathan Burke in the parking lot. Doesn’t this old mural need to be replaced, he asked, pointing to the Laguna Canyon wall. Burke agreed. Smith set to work. He’d created a smaller study called Upside Downtown Laguna Beach in 2013. But the painting was a little too risqué for public art. In the study, a woman rides by on a bike wearing a thong bathing suit. Another plays beachball in her bikini. Because the viewer is gazing up from below, that worm’s eye view proved a bit too provocative.
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
Timothy Robert Smith’s “Study Upside Downtown Laguna Beach” (2013)
“I ended up putting a skirt on the bicyclist,” Smith said. “I changed the woman playing volleyball to a guy who’s wearing swim shorts. I made those a little longer too. It’s the same images, just more kid friendly.”
The family-friendly mural can be seen at LCAD’s Suzanne Chonette Senior Studios parking lot, located at 2295 Laguna Canyon Road. The original risqué study is now on display at the LCAD Gallery with the permanent collection.
“Everyone has their own perception of reality,” Smith said. “I try to see the world from everyone’s POV at once and all these visions come together. My goal is to get people to think about what’s actually happening outside of their own limited perspectives and to demonstrate how these pieces fit together to create the bigger picture.”
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Brittany Ryan: Canyon Walkers, 2016
Brittany Ryan has served as the sculpture department coordinator and an LCAD instructor since 2014. She received both her BFA and MFA from LCAD. Locals will recognize her larger-than-life bronze sculptures at the main entrance of LCAD’s campus. Canyon Walkers – comprised of three human figures and a dog – was installed in 2018. Prior to that, Ryan created maquettes (scale models) of the four pieces. She had them bronzed and offered them for sale. LCAD acquired the pieces for its permanent collection.
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Photo by Eric Stoner
Brittany Ryan’s “Canyon Walkers” (2016)
Ryan strives to make her pieces feel both culturally relevant while also timeless, striking a balance between the modern and the classical.
“These four figurative monumental-scale bronze sculptures…are representative of the people one might see making their way through the culturally unique Laguna Canyon,” Ryan wrote. “These figures are specific, not idealized, not without identity.”
Ryan imbues her sculptures with stories, hoping to connect with the viewer and inspire them to care about the Canyon Walkers’ journey and what motivates them.
Ryan was recently commissioned to create an Afghanistan War Memorial at the Laguna Hills City Hall Plaza. Laguna Hills adopted Camp Pendleton’s 3rd Battalion/5th Marines in 2010. Ryan’s memorial, to be installed in the coming years, will commemorate their engagement in Afghanistan in 2010.
Elizabeth McGhee: Nausicaa, 2009
In Greek mythology, Nausicaa means “the burner of ships.” She appears in Book 6 of Homer’s Odyssey when Odysseus is shipwrecked on the coast of Scheria. Nausicaa and her handmaidens are washing clothes on the shore when Odysseus emerges naked from the forest. Embarrassed by his nudity, Nausicaa hands him some clothes and guides him into town.
Laguna-based artist Elizabeth McGhee began this series in 2012 with a plan to paint 80 modern women based on various Greek myths. All her models are volunteers. McGhee met the Nausicaa model at the Festival of Arts. The woman asked to pose for a painting. Using her own pillowcase for the cloth prop, McGhee took dozens of photos. “One photo isn’t enough to capture someone,” she said.
Nausicaa represents number 16 or 17 in the series. McGhee is now in the high 40s, well over halfway.
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
Elizabeth McGhee with her painting, “Nausicaa” (2009)
When you visit the exhibition, note the placement of this painting. It hangs to the left of Pegah Samaie’s To Love and Obey (2019), which features a wholly naked Iranian woman, her face encased in lace, a commentary on the Iranian culture’s treatment of women. The juxtaposition of the two makes for a bit of humor in the curation of the show.
Harrison Halaska: Sculpture Shed, 2018
Harrison Halaska painted Sculpture Shed over a single weekend. Drawn to the heads looking back at him, Halaska wanted to capture the process of observing and being observed. “It created a pretty charged, intimate atmosphere,” Halaska said. “I hope that transferred to the painting and the viewer can feel [it also]. I felt both alone and in the presence of a person/people while working in that shed. The painting is the artifact of being alone and trying to describe that feeling.”
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
Harrison Halaska’s “Sculpture Shed” (2018)
For Halaska, being part of LCAD’s permanent collection feels like an opportunity to celebrate the strong work being done at the college. “As a student, you’re motivated by your own interests and curiosities,” he said. “But you’re also just trying to keep up with all of the good work being made around you.”
The exhibition is also a chance to look back on work created years ago with a fresh eye and new insights. “It wasn’t one thing that inspired me to make that painting,” Halaska said. “The truth is, at the time, I had no idea why I was interested in that scene. It’s only now, five years later upon reflection, that I have any thoughts about motivations. Maybe it was always as obvious as: humans are attracted to other humans (the clay heads), and I was happy and comfortable to be alone in that small shed.”
Kenny Harris: Interpreting, 2017
Kenny Harris has been a full-time professor at LCAD since 2018 and has taught as an adjunct since 2006. He created Interpreting while in his final year of MFA studies at the college.
“Interpreting is a painting of a person signing the word ‘interpreting’ in ASL,” Harris said. “The sitter was a sign language interpreter for a deaf student in class at LCAD. I thought it would be visually interesting to depict a person in the act of visually communicating a word, painting and sign language both being types of visual communication.”
“The second painting, Sign of the Rose, is a double image of her signing ‘rose.’ I tried to show the movement of the sign. I used plexiglass so I could achieve the transparency of the moving hand.”
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Courtesy of Kenny Harris
Kenny Harris’s “Interpretation” and “Sign of the Rose” (2017)
“Each artist represented here as part of the permanent collection has a fascinating life story,” Brittan said at the opening reception. “I couldn’t possibly do justice to all the artists in the permanent collection, so I encourage you to enjoy their work hanging in the gallery and get to know them better.”
LCAD Inaugural Permanent Collection will be on display at the LCAD Gallery, located at 374 Ocean Ave., through January 21, 2024. Gallery hours are Wednesday through Sunday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m., closed Mondays and Tuesdays. Admission is always free. For more information, visit their website by clicking here.