 Front of Richmond Art Center, in Richmond, California | |
 | |
| Established | 1936 |
|---|---|
| Location | 2540 Barrett Avenue, Richmond, California, U.S. |
| Coordinates | 37°56′09″N122°20′52″W / 37.9358°N 122.3477°W Coordinates: 37°56′09″N122°20′52″W / 37.9358°N 122.3477°W |
| Type | 501(c)(3) Arts Center |
| Executive director | José R. Rivera |
| Public transit access | Richmond Bart Station |
| Website | https://richmondartcenter.org/ |
Richmond Art Center is a nonprofit arts organization based in Richmond, California, founded in 1936. [1]
In 1936, Richmond-resident Hazel Salmi began teaching classes under the Emergency Education Program (EEP) of the Works Progress Administration (WPA). [2] In 1938, the City of Richmond granted Salmi an old Health Department building to use for classes and exhibitions. [2] Early classes included outdoor sketching, block printing, flower arrangement, color, woodcarving, and leather tooling. [2]
In the 1940s, Salmi and other artists petitioned the City of Richmond to include a permanent art center as part of the new downtown Civic Center development. With funds from a bond measure that specifically funded the art center, the civic center construction plans were the first in the nation to include a community art center. Richmond's Civic Center was designed by architect Timothy Pflueger. [3] The complex, which encompasses City Hall, Hall of Justice, Auditorium, Richmond Art Center, and Public Library, was completed in 1951. The low, linear forms reflect the mid-century modern style of the late 1940s and 1950s. [4]
Richmond Art Center's new facility opened in 1951. [5] Hazel Salmi was director at Richmond Art Center until 1960. [6]
Artist Tom Marioni, sometimes under the pseudonym Allan Fish, served as the Curator of Richmond Art Center from 1968 until 1971. [7] [8] Richmond Art Center became a focal point for West Coast Conceptualism during his time. [8] Notable exhibitions Marioni organized included Paul Kos’ first solo exhibition Participationkinetics (1969). [9] Under Marioni's curatorship, Terry Fox created one of their seminal works, Levitation (1971). [8] In 1971 Marioni was fired by the Head of Parks following a controversial performance by one of Judy Chicago's students that was part of the exhibition California Girls (1971).
For many years Richmond Art Center operated as a division of the City of Richmond's Parks and Recreation Department. In 1950 Richmond Art Center became an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit. [10]
The Executive Director of Richmond Art Center is José R. Rivera. [11] [12]
Richmond Art Center's facility is a u-shaped building wrapping around a courtyard garden and public outdoor space. The building has four galleries, including a 2,200 square foot main gallery, as well as six studio and multipurpose spaces. [11] In the courtyard of the building, many sculptures by artist John Roeder (1877-–1964) were installed after his death in 1964.
Richmond Art Center provides arts classes for adults, teens, youth and families. On-site classes and workshops are taught in the center's dedicated spaces for ceramics, weaving, metalwork, printing, painting and youth arts. Richmond Art Center also partners with non-profit organizations, community groups and West Contra Costa Unified School District to provide intensive art education programs off-site. [13]
In 2020, COVID-19 shelter-in-place orders temporarily closed Richmond Art Center's facility to the public and the organization launched online arts instruction. [12]
Below is a list of notable exhibitions at Richmond Art Center.
| Year | Title | Artist(s) | Curator | Notes/Citations |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1955 | Emiko Nakano, Clayton Pinkerton | a two person show. [19] | ||
| 1962 | Retrospective Exhibition | Jasper Johns | solo exhibition. [20] [ better source needed ] | |
| 1963 | Theodore Odza | solo exhibition [21] [22] | ||
| 1968 | Richard Diebenkorn Drawings | Richard Diebenkorn | solo exhibition. [23] | |
| 1969 | Invisible Painting and Sculpture | Larry Bell, Jerry Ballaine, Bruce Conner, Albert Fisher, Lloyd Hamrol, Wally Hedrick, Warner Jepson, Harry Lum, George Neubert, Harold Paris, Michelangelo Pistoletto, David R. Smith, William T. Wiley | Tom Marioni | [24] |
| 1969 | PARTICIPATIONKINETICS! | Paul Kos | Tom Marioni | Kos blocked the entrance with an 1100 pound block of ice and called it "Richmond Glacier'. He sprinkled the ice with salt to encourage irregular melting. Kos created other kinetic sculptures. [9] |
| 1971 | California Girls | Rita Yokoi, Karen Kimura, Ann Shapiro, Judy Chicago, Judy Raffael, Janet Webb, Andrea Brown, Pat Tavenner, Kathy Goodell, Nancy Haigh, Gae Landrum, Marsha Fox, Cheryl Zurilgen, Judy Linhares, Gi Gi Van der Noot, Terri Keyser | Tom Marioni | Judy Chicago was teaching a course at Fresno State University and had an exhibition and collaboration with her students. They held a fake beauty pageant and each woman represented a city with her sash and performed. [25] [26] According to Marioni, he was fired from his job as curator after this event because of one of the performances was controversial. [7] |
| 1987 | Sargent Johnson | commemorating the 100th year of Sargent Johnson's birth. [27] | ||
| 1996 | Showing Up: Maximum-Contrast African-American Quilts | Elzorah Abram, Mable Battle, Irene Bankhead, Laverne Brackens, Mattie Burnley, Charles Cater, Anna Ruth Crofit, Marye Danner, Louisa Fite, Willia Ette Graham, Georgia Green, Aunt Jewel Harts, Kitty Jones, Madeline Mason, Minnie Lee Metcalf, Fannie Mae Moore, Bessie Moore, Anny Bell Simon, Maple Swift, Lucy Sims, Ora L. Thompson, Rosie Lee Tompkins, [28] Gussie Wells, Arbie Williams | Eli Leon | [29] |
| 2010 | Roses & Thorns: The Legacy of Richmond's Historic Japanese Nurseries | Artists contributing images of the building and surviving flowers included Matthew Matsuoka, Ellen Gailing, Fletcher Oakes and Ken Osborn | Donna Graves | Exhibition explored the former Japanese-American-owned greenhouses next to the Cutting Boulevard exit of Interstate 80. The show, which celebrated the 75th anniversary of the center, featured 55 contemporary photographs shot at location and offered a glimpse at the rich history of the Japanese-Americans of Richmond. [30] |
| 2012 | Wanxin Zhang, A Ten Year Survey, 1999 - 2009 | Wanxin Zhang | John Held Jr. and Peter Held | Exhibition featured 16 of Zhang's "six-foot plus clay figures in an austere setting, transforming the gallery space into a living tomb of warriors posed in battle, not for the vanity of political leaders, but for the enrichment of world citizens." [31] |
| 2014 | Closely Considered: Diebenkorn in Berkeley | Richard Diebenkorn | Exhibition featured paintings of Diebenkorn and drawings by Bay Area friends including David Park, Elmer Bischoff, Frank Lobdell, Nathan Oliveria, James Weeks and Joan Brown. [32] | |
| 2015 | Mildred Howard | solo exhibition. [33] | ||
| 2016 | 80th Anniversary Exhibitions: David Park: Personal Perspectives and The Human Spirits | David Park solo, and Elmer Bischoff, Joan Brown, Enrique Chagoya, Kota Ezawa, Viola Frey, Richard Misrach, Lava Thomas, among others. | Jan Wurm | The Center celebrated its 80th anniversary in 2016 with two companion exhibitions, “David Park: Personal Perspectives,” [34] [35] featuring 35 works by Park in his final decades from the 1930s through the 1960s, and “The Human Spirits,” in which works by many artists influenced by the center were displayed. [36] |
| 2018 | Califas: Art of the US-Mexico Borderlands | AGENCY (Ersela Kripa & Stephen Mueller), Chester Arnold, Jesus Barraza, Enrique Chagoya, CRO studio (Adriana Cuellar & Marcel Sánchez), Ana Teresa Fernández, Nathan Friedman, Guillermo Galindo, Rebeca García-González, Andrea Carrillo Iglesias, Amalia Mesa-Bains, Richard Misrach, Alejandro Luperca Morales, Julio César Morales, Postcommodity, Rael San Fratello (Ronald Rael & Virginia San Fratello), Fernando Reyes, Favianna Rodriguez, Stephanie Syjuco, David Taylor, Judi Werthein, Rio Yañez. | Michael Dear, Ronald Rael | Califas: Art of the US-Mexico Borderlands explores representations of the US-Mexico ‘borderlands’ in contemporary art, with a special emphasis on the Bay Area. [37] |
| 2019 | Here is the Sea | Stephen Bruce, Christy Chan, Tanja Geis, Marie-Luise Klotz, Richard Lang and Judith Selby Lang, Love the Bulb Performers, Katie Revilla, Joseph "Jos" Sances, Dimitra Skandali | One of the noted pieces of this exhibit was “Or, The Whale” by Jos Sances. Phil Linhares, former RAC Board member and former chief curator at the Oakland Museum of California adjudged the piece “a real tour de force, an impressive work by any measure, worth a trip to Richmond!” [39] [40] [41] | |
| 2020 | Art of the African Diaspora | Orin Carpenter, Kelvin Curry, Gene Dominique, Anna Edwards, Raymond L. Haywood, Dulama LeGrande, Justice Renaissance, WilParish, Ron Moultrie Saunders, Akili Simba, Michelle Tompkins, amongst others. | Co-founded by the late Jan Hart-Schuyers and the late Rae Louise Hayward, The Art of Living Black/Art of the African Diaspora is the longest running event of its kind in the Bay Area to feature artists of African descent. In 2020 works by over 150 artists of African descent were featured. [42] [43] | |
| 2020 | Over and Under | Pilar Agüero-Esparza, Ric Ambrose, Tamera Avery, Megan Broughton, Tyrell Collins, Roya Ebtehaj, Sheila Ghidini, Annette Goodfriend, Xandra Ibarra, Lisa Jetonne, Henrik Kam, Maureen Langenbach, Ifra Mahmood, Katie McCann, Sarah Player Morrison, Susan Zimmerman | Kevin B. Chen | “This exhibition is informed by the interchange of ideas and material, the crisscrossing of bodies and objects, and the weaving of histories and personal narratives. Over 200 artists submitted artwork for consideration; 16 were ultimately selected whose work resonated with these ideas.” [44] |
Terry Alan Fox was an American Conceptual artist known for his work in performance art, video, and sound. He was of the first generation conceptual artists and he was a central participant in the West Coast performance art, video and Conceptual Art movements of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Fox was active in San Francisco and in Europe, living in Europe in the latter portion of his life.
Taraneh Hemami is an Iranian-born American visual artist, curator, and arts educator based in San Francisco. Her works explore the complex cultural politics of exile through personal and collective, multidisciplinary projects often through site specific installation art or participatory engagement projects.
Henry Pierre Villierme was an American Californian painter associated with abstract expressionism and the Bay Area Figurative Movement. Villierme was considered one of the "Second Generation" members of the Bay Area Figurative Movement. Villierme first rose to prominence with a series of successful exhibitions in the late 1950s. From the 1960s to the 1980s Villierme continued to paint and sculpt in his studio, and in the late 1980s returned to public exhibitions.
Paul Joseph Kos is an American conceptual artist and educator, he is one of the founders of the Bay Area Conceptual Art movement in California. Kos incorporates video, sound and interactivity into his sculptural installations. Currently Kos lives and works in San Francisco.
Mildred Howard is an African-American artist known primarily for her sculptural installation and mixed-media assemblages. Her work has been shown at galleries in Boston, Los Angeles and New York, internationally at venues in Berlin, Cairo, London, Paris, and Venice, and at institutions including the Oakland Museum of California, the de Young Museum, SFMOMA, the San Jose Museum of Art, and the Museum of the African Diaspora. Howard's work is held in the permanent collections of numerous institutions, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Oakland Museum of California, and the Ulrich Museum of Art.
Tom Marioni is an American artist and educator, known for his conceptual artwork. Marioni was active in the emergence of Conceptual Art movement in the 1960s. He founded the Museum of Conceptual Art (MOCA) in San Francisco from 1970 until 1984.
Weston Teruya is an Oakland-based visual artist and arts administrator. Teruya's paper sculptures, installations, and drawings reconfigure symbols forming unexpected meanings that tamper with social/political realities, speculating on issues of power, control, visibility, protection and, by contrast, privilege. With Michele Carlson and Nathan Watson, he is a member of the Related Tactics artists' collective and often exhibits under that name.
Carlos Villa was a Filipino-American visual artist, curator and faculty member in the Painting Department at the San Francisco Art Institute. His work often explored the meaning of cultural diversity and sought to expand awareness of multicultural issues in the arts.
Robert Boardman Howard (1896–1983), was a prominent American artist active in Northern California in the first half of the twentieth century. He is also known as Robert Howard, Robert B. Howard and Bob Howard. Howard was celebrated for his graphic art, watercolors, oils, and murals, as well as his Art Deco bas-reliefs and his Modernist sculptures and mobiles.
Adele Stimmel Chase was an American artist who worked in ceramics, metal sculpture and painting.
Shaghayegh Cyrous is an Iranian-born American artist and curator based in San Francisco. Her interactive time-based investigations, participatory projects, and video installations have been said to "create a poetic space for human connections."
Indira Allegra is a multidisciplinary American artist and writer based in Oakland, California.
Invisible Man and the Masque of Blackness was an art installation by Zak Ové that has been installed in several major cities. It features 40 identical statues, each weighing approximately 300 lbs.
M. Louise Stanley is an American painter known for irreverent figurative work that combines myth and allegory, satire, autobiography, and social commentary. Writers such as curator Renny Pritikin situate her early-1970s work at the forefront of the "small, but potent" Bad Painting movement, so named for its "disregard for the niceties of conventional figurative painting." Stanley's paintings frequently focus on romantic fantasies and conflicts, social manners and taboos, gender politics, and lampoons of classical myths, portrayed through stylized figures, expressive color, frenetic compositions and slapstick humor. Art historians such as Whitney Chadwick place Stanley within a Bay Area narrative tradition that blended eclectic sources and personal styles in revolt against mid-century modernism; her work includes a feminist critique of contemporary life and art springing from personal experience and her early membership in the Women's Movement. Stanley has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship and grants from the Pollock-Krasner Foundation, Adolph and Esther Gottlieb Foundation, and National Endowment for the Arts. Her work has been shown at institutions including PS1, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), The New Museum and Long Beach Museum of Art, and belongs to public collections including SFMOMA, San Jose Museum of Art, Oakland Museum, and de Saisset Museum. Stanley lives and works in Emeryville, California.
Jacques Schnier (1898–1988) was a Romanian-born American artist, sculptor, author, educator, and engineer. He was a sculpture professor at the University of California, Berkeley from 1936 to 1966.
Chanell Stone is an American photographer. She is Black and known for her "Natura Negra" series. Stone lives and works in Oakland, California.
John Joseph "Jos" Sances is an American artist, activist, writer, and community organizer, known for his printmaking, and tile murals/public art. He is the founder and director of Alliance Graphics. Sances is based in Berkeley, California.
Bruce McGaw is a Bay Area Figurative Movement artist and professor emeritus of the San Francisco Art Institute. He was born in Berkeley, California in 1935 and studied at the California College of the Arts with Richard Diebenkorn and others in the 1950's.
Theodore "Ted" Odza (1915–1998) was an American artist, curator, and educator, known for his sculptures and abstract paintings. He taught art classes at University of California, Berkeley, and later served as the chair of the art department of Laney College. Additionally he curated multiple national touring art exhibitions of Central European artists.
Vera A. Allison (1902–1993) also known as Vera Gaethke, was an American Modernist jeweler, and abstract painter. She was a co-founder of the Metal Arts Guild of San Francisco, a non-profit, arts educational organization. Allison had lived in San Francisco, Berkeley, and Mill Valley in California; and in San Cristobal, New Mexico.
I got a job at the Richmond Art Center in 1968. And that broadened my horizons. Saw the art world differently and everything. And then I created a fictitious name, Allan Fish, so that I could have a way to be a curator and be an artist at the same time. And I chose Allan because of my old art teacher Allon Schoener.
PARTICIPATION KINETICS! Paul Kos at the Richmond Art Center, Richmond. July 10- Aug. 10.