Bergamot Station: Holiday Toy Drive—Bring Art Supplies For Underserved Kids!

Throughout the evening of Friday, December 16, ABC7 & SoCal Firefighters' 19th Annual Spark of Love Toy Drive will be collecting kid-friendly art supplies in conjunction with Bergamot Station's 30 OPEN DOORS art walk. Bring new, unopened art supplies and toy donations to be collected as you enter Bergamot Station from Michigan Ave. More info about the charity here: Spark o f Love

WHEN: Friday, December 16, 2011 / 5-10 pm

VISITOR INFO: Free Admission / Valet Parking Available

WHERE: BERGAMOT STATION
2525 Michigan Ave
Santa Monica, CA 90404
www.bergamotstation.com

Bergamot Station Art Walk "30 Open Doors"

BERGAMOT STATION ANNOUNCES AN EVENING OPEN HOUSE EVENT CELEBRATING SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA’S ORIGINAL ART WALK

INDULGE IN AN EVENING OPEN HOUSE CELEBRATION FEATURING FINE ART, GIFTS, FOOD, SPIRITS, MUSIC AND PERFORMANCE

Santa Monica’s legendary art complex BERGAMOT STATION comes alive with 30 OPEN DOORS, a colorful open house in honor of our remarkable past, present and future as the centerpiece of West Coast art. During 30 Open Doors, guests will view work by acclaimed artists at the Santa Monica Museum of Art and nearly three dozen galleries during our one-night-only extended hours.

Come explore all that Bergamot Station has to offer, including fine jewelry, handmade papers, fine florals, holiday gifts and more!

WHEN: Friday, December 16, 2011 / 5-10 pm

VISITOR INFO: Free Admission / Valet Parking Available

WHERE: BERGAMOT STATION
2525 Michigan Ave
Santa Monica, CA 90404
www.bergamotstation.com

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artists, Richard Gilles and Dale Johnson!

Richard Gilles and Dale Johnson are among the 20 finalists for the Emerging Focus International Photography Competition. They will be premiered at Photo LA which runs from January 12-16, 2012.

Benjamin Lowy Featured on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Congratulations to dnj artist, Benjamin Lowy! To see the episode, please click here.

Len Prince News - Ruby Star Benefit | Fundraiser | Silent Auction

Hope you can make it out "for a rare evening where art, film and music will meet, to support and celebrate break-though feature film, RUBY STAR. All proceeds from this fundraiser and silent auction will benefit this unique film project scheduled for pre-production in 2012."

The featured 1994 cibachrome portrait of Drew Barrymore by Len Prince will be auctioned on the evening with 50% of proceeds being donated to the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation.




Wednesday December 14, 2011 from 6 - 8 PM

The FLAG Art Foundation
The Chelsea Arts Tower
545 W 25th Street, 9th Floor
New York, NY 10001

Works of art generously donated by the following internationally recognized artists:

Eva & Adele
Grimanesa Amoros
Donald Baechler
Tracey Emin
Louise Fishman
Bill Jensen
Lluis Lleo
Jack Pierson
Len Prince
John Sonsini

Dale Johnson Wins Pollux Awards Photographer of the Year Award 2011

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Dale Johnson, for taking the top prize during the Worldwide Photography Gala Pollux Awards 2011. Dale has been invited to exhibit at The Palais de Glace, Buenos Aires, Argentina in January 2012 and will debut a solo show here at dnj Gallery in June of 2012.

Benjamin Lowy's New Book

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Benjamin Lowy, for the recent release of his new book titled, Iraq|Perspectives. The book is now available for purchase in stores and online.

In addition, Benjamin will also be doing a book signing at the ICP Book Store in New York on Friday December 2, 2011 from 6 - 7:30pm.

"Then and Now" Opening Photos

A big thank you to all who made it out for dnj's "Then and Now" exhibition opening! Here is a slide show of images to enjoy from amazing evening.

Dylan Vitone at the Carnegie Museum of Art in "Picturing the City: Downtown Pitsburgh, 2007-2010"

Picturing the City: Downtown Pittsburgh, 2007–2010
September 23, 2011–March 25, 2012
Gallery One (Works on Paper Gallery)

Experience Pittsburgh through the lenses of nine photographers who call the city their home. Inspired by the city’s century-old tradition of documentary photography, The Heinz Endowments asked photographers to record the current renaissance of Downtown, as told through its rivers, parks, buildings, and transportation systems, and brought to life through the celebrations and challenges, faces, and personalities of the people who live and work there. The artists of the Downtown Now Photography Project—Melissa Farlow, Jim Judkis, Richard Kelly, Kenneth Neely, Annie O’Neill, Mark Perrott, Martha Rial, Renee Rosensteel, and Dylan Vitone—focused on changes, large and small, in Pittsburgh today. This exhibition presents 80 works selected by curator of photography Linda Benedict-Jones from the final Project archive of over 400, providing ample evidence that after more than 100 years, photographers continue to marvel over our unique urban landscape.

Picturing the City: Downtown Pittsburgh, 2007–2010 is organized by Linda Benedict-Jones, curator of photography.

Darryl Curran News - LACMA

dnj Gallery artist, Darryl Curran, has an image in LACMA's Hammer Building, Level 3 along with several other prominent artists featured in Angeles, 1960 - 1980, which runs through February 12, 2012. Congratulation Darryl!

This installation of work from the permanent collection represents a chapter in the larger photo history of Los Angeles, focusing on the freewheeling use of process employed by photo-based artists during the 1960s through the 1980s. The installation features work by Robert F. Heinecken, Jerry McMillan, Darryl Curran, and Susan Rankaitis.

In 1960, Heinecken, as the head of the Photography Department at UCLA, became known for promoting a photo practice that was varied and often camera-less. Jerry McMillan utilized the populist photo cube that was a fixture in the 1970s home to create photo-sculpture, and generated photo “drawings"—simple manipulations of paper that result in abstractions. Darryl Curran’s photolithographic prints place the artist’s own photographs alongside mass-produced images or logos, creating a hybrid that focuses on our littered environment. Susan Rankaitis created tonal abstractions made solely from chemicals “painted” in layers onto photo-sensitive paper, transforming the way we perceive photography, a conversation that continues today.

Benjamin Lowy's "Storylines" reviewed in ARTSCENE (Nov.)

dnj's own Ben Lowy's Storylines written as "Continuing and Recommended" exhibitions in the November ARTSCENE





Benjamin Lowy is best known as a photojournalist who has worked for both Corbis and Getty Images. Having covered numerous wars and traveled worldwide covering conflict with his digital camera, he began using toy cameras, such as a Diana or Holga, in 2004 that allowed for an overlapping of images. Originally intended to save film, these overlapping images became the project "Storyline" which, according to Lowy became a panoramic image representing an idea or space that he could not illustrate with his digital cameras. Lowy's images present narratives unfolding over time. The black and white as well as color images are montages of multiple square frames presented in an extended horizontal format. The images from Darfur, Iraq, Afghanistan, rather than capture a decisive moment or image of action, imply a storyline and the sense of simultaneity. The photographs gain a cubistic aura. The topic and location are still specific to the ongoing conflicts worldwide, but Lowy's presentation in these works is humanistic and narrative. For example, in "Afghanistan 02, 2007" Lowry could combine two views of a crowded outdoor scene showing people moving in and out of the frame as the street recedes in two opposite directions, thus creating a powerful compositional component (dnj Gallery, Santa Monica).
Jody Zellen

Tom Stone Featured on "The Good Men Project"

Congratulations to Tom Stone for his recent feature on "The Good Men Project"! If you would like to see some of Tom's images in person, please stop by dnj Gallery at Bergamot Station for a visit.


"It’s in the Eyes"
BY JACK VARNELL

Renowned portrait photographer Tom Stone shoots with a discriminating eye, but it’s the eyes he shoots that remind us of our mission.

A vital part of the Good Men Project is to model the behavior we espouse and discuss here, safe within the confines of our “Project.” It is all smoke and mirrors or bullshit if we don’t. The luxury of coming into contact with the people who share a curiosity about and willingness to openly discuss what it means to be a “good” man is only a part of the picture. We also get to see the integrity and feel the impact that someone who lives by a code, by a set of values and morals worthy of passing along, can have. Tom Stone is one of those people.

As a writer, I long to present the world with a point of view. A focal point that the world presents to me sent through the words. Sometimes words feel so inadequate.

Tom Stone has been creating connections in the communities he visits for years. On the streets with people who never share anything of themselves. Trips are planned in the coming months to Appalachia and Haiti. An acclaimed portrait photographer, he is able to tell the stories you normally might need words or a news photographer to tell if he was less talented.
We present a few representative works from Tom here, and would refer you to his site, Tom Stone Gallery, with the knowledge that a large part of his body of work is available for sale. In most cases the prints are signed, limited and a minimum of fifty percent of the price goes directly to charities he supports. A majority of the rest goes to funding the next project. Consider that as we enter the holidays.

I am including the Artists Statement from Tom’s Website because frankly, I haven’t ever seen a better one and to try and out do it would be dishonest and an insult to the man himself.

As you look at Tom’s work, notice the connection of one human to another; a connection in love, in compassion, and in awareness that the world is beautiful even in its ugliest places. It’s in the eyes.

◊♦◊

Artist Statement:

I photograph people who skirt the edges of things; people whose connection to the broader flow is murky or obscured. Mistaken as more, less or different than they are; they aren’t really seen and don’t really belong. That’s everyone sometimes; but some more often. I try to establish a line for a moment. I hope to connect. And I see the most beautiful and the most heartbreaking things.

To my thinking, the original human trauma is our separation. We are too close not to need each other; and too far to trust each other. We rely on dubious senses and clever devices to interact; but we are alone in our thoughts. Lonely, insecure and uncertain; we pair, we group, we associate. We try to belong and we seek to exclude. We form bonds by geography, religion, economy and otherwise. But it is all precarious. We come together and we drive apart.

And we climb our ladder. We step away from those who don’t belong and help those who do. We are connected rung by rung—though less and less—as we push and pull. But some do not climb; and below, the earth is littered with them. They fit too poorly. They stand apart. They stand without.

And what of them; these ones who don’t belong or who are excluded; who don’t fit or don’t try? Is there nothing they value? Is there nothing of them we value? I count it as a measure of our ignorance, the depth of poverty in the world. It’s a glaring marker to how far we have not come. Yet it has also driven our advance; on less fortunate backs and against less fortunate fate.
But is there really no connection there? Does such fate—whether choice or circumstance—speak nothing of us? Tell me we do more than advance in place; with so many left behind. Or promise me we can do better. Say we can reflect ourselves; us and them. That we can see the ways we overlap and distinguish the ways we grow apart. And pledge that we can learn; to fit all of our misshapes; to reward value beyond charity and beyond the marketplace; to be better to each other; to be better ourselves. And promise me it could be a better world. Or tell me we are at our best.

Tom Stone News

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Tom Stone, for his recent image features in "Rethinking American Poverty" by author Mark R. Rank. The article is extremely thought provoking and is paired perfectly with Tom's moving images of American poverty. Here is a link where you can purchase the full article. Thank you to both parties for shedding light on this issue.

Article Introduction:
It’s a fundamental paradox: in America, the wealthiest country on earth, one also finds the highest rates of poverty in the developed world. Whether we examine children’s rates of poverty, poverty among working age adults, poverty within single parent families, or overall rates of poverty, the story is much the same—the United States has exceedingly high levels of impoverishment.

Tom Stone Photographs Occupy L.A. 2011

dnj Gallery artist, Tom Stone, photographs during the Tom Morello Rally for Occupy L.A.! Check out the great shots here. Thanks to both Tom's for all you do!

dnj Staff

Michael Eastman at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Michael Eastman, for the recent opening of Faded Elegance: Photographs of Havana by Michael Eastman at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art!

The exhibition will run until December 31, 2011 with a family day taking place Sunday, November 6th from Noon – 4 p.m. If you are in the Oklahoma City area be sure to stop by and view some of Michael's beautiful images in person!

Art Review: 'Photography into Sculpture' at Cherry and Martin

The Getty driven PACIFIC STANDARD TIME: ART IN L.A. 1945 – 1980 is off to a great start and the Cherry and Martin Gallery is a fantastic example of what we can expect to see in the coming months with their Photography into Sculpture exhibition featuring dnj Gallery artist Darryl Curran!

Be sure to check out dnj Gallery's "Then and Now" exhibition opening November 19th as part of PACIFIC STANDARD TIME: ART IN L.A. 1945 – 1980.


Robert Heinecken

“Photography Into Sculpture” was a groundbreaking show when it appeared at the Museum of Modern Art in 1970, and it is significant still, in its reprised version at Cherry and Martin. On its first go-round, the show introduced to New York and the other cities on its two-year tour a new, expansive mode of photographic art that originated on the West Coast. This time, as a fine exemplar of the Getty-driven Pacific Standard Time initiative, “Photography Into Sculpture” reintroduces L.A. to a momentous chapter of its own history.

MoMA curator Peter Bunnell organized the 1970 show, spurred by his encounter with the work of Robert Heinecken (then teaching at UCLA) and crystallized by an exploratory visit to Los Angeles. Of the 23 artists in the show, most were from the West Coast and nine came from L.A. Cherry and Martin has rustled up most of the original pieces that Bunnell selected, works that dissolved the photographic image’s age-old marriage to paper, freeing it to swing with plastic, wood, glass, fabric and more.

Bunnell later recounted a revelatory visit to Richard Jackson’s Pasadena studio, where the artist showed him a set of negatives produced by a shutterless, handmade camera. Bunnell asked Jackson if he had printed the images and remembers the artist answering, “Am I supposed to? Must I?” The conventional, causal route from negative to print was no longer a given — in California, at least — but instead simply one option among many.

In Jackson’s “Negative Numbers,” two large film negatives are taped to plexiglass panels and propped up in front of bare light bulbs on a wooden table. In each image, Jackson’s ghostly figure appears behind a row of numbers — his Social Security number and draft number — that he wrote in the air with a flashlight during the exposure. That the government-assigned numbers are darker and more prominent than Jackson’s own faint bodily form gives this record of private performance a subtle political edge.

Other artists in the show infused their work with a Pop sensibility, conceptual twists and visual puns. Michael de Courcy’s cardboard cartons printed with images of birds, the sea and sky reads like a lyrical riposte to Warhol’s Brillo boxes of just a few years earlier. Jerry McMillan’s paper bag fashioned out of a photograph of a wrinkled paper bag delightfully fuses image and object, and is one of many lighthearted tweaks on the referential function of photography.
Some of the works in the show are goofy, dated and clumsy — Lynton Wells’ lifesize stuffed photo-doll, for one — but the takeaway lesson overrides such weaknesses. Such is the folly of a single linear historical narrative: Just when a cohort of artists in the late ’60s were dematerializing art, asserting its importance as idea more than thing, others, gathered in this show, were busy materializing it in new ways. They reveled in photography’s tactile possibilities and shifted the medium’s operative verb from "taking" pictures to "making" them.

By: Leah Ollman

Cherry and Martin
2712 S. La Cienega Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90034
(310) 559-0100

Cynthia Greig News

Several of Cynthia Greig's "Nature Morte" photographs and videos will be included in the upcoming exhibition titled, "Nothing to Say" which opens this Friday at The University of Michigan's Jean Paul Slusser Gallery in Ann Arbor.

Curated by fellow artist Kathleen McShane, the exhibition is concerned with examining nothingness, quiet, less is more, what is there and not there, and nonsense. The title comes from John Cage who commented, "I have nothing to say, and I’m saying it" when referring to his 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence performance. The exhibition suggests that "nothing" can actually evoke "everything," or at least an unexpected fullness (as in Cage’s silence).

September 9 - October 7, 2011
Opening Reception: Friday, September 9, 6-9 pm

Exhibiting artists include:

Lynne Avadenka
Jim Cogswell
Iris Eichenberg
Cynthia Greig
Paul Kotula
Michael Krueger
Melanie Manos
Stephen Prina
Jon Swindler
Cody VanderKaay


Jean Paul Slusser Gallery
The University of Michigan
2000 Bonisteel Blvd.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109

Darryl Curran News

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Darryl Curran, for his inclusion in Photography Into Sculpture taking place at the Cherry and Martin Gallery September 10 - October 22, 2011.
There will be an opening reception Saturday, September 10 from 6-8pm.


Carl Cheng, U.N. of C., 1967, film,
molded plastic, Styrofoam and Plexiglas,
15 x 20.75 x 9 inches

Cherry and Martin will restage curator Peter Bunnell's landmark 1970 exhibition, "Photography into Sculpture", at the gallery as a part of the Getty Museum citywide initiative, Pacific Standard Time.

Photography into Sculpture stands as one of Peter Bunnellʼs great contributions to the history of photography. Described in the original wall text as “the first comprehensive survey of photographically formed images used in a sculptural or fully dimensional manner,” Photography into Sculpture brought together a cross-section of artists from across the United States and Canada. The show encapsulated the radical gestures of late 1960's photographic practice, both inside and outside the photo world. Los Angeles-based artists such as Robert Heinecken, Richard Jackson and Jerry McMillan were brought by Bunnell into a context with such remarkable figures as the Fluxus artist Robert Watts and early Vancouver photo-conceptualists Michael de Courcy and Jack Dale.

The exhibitionʼs legendary tour began at the Museum of Modern Art and continued on to The Krannert Art Museum, The Menil Collection, the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art, the Vancouver Art Gallery, the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, the Phoenix Art Museum, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and, finally, Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles. The full artist list was: Ellen Brooks, Robert Brown, Carl Cheng, Darryl Curran, Jack Dale, Michael de Courcy, Karl Folsom, Andre Haluska, Robert Heinecken, Richard Jackson, Jerry McMillan, Bea Nettles, Ed O'Connell, James Pennuto, Joe Pirone, Douglas Prince, Dale Quarterman, Charles Roitz, Leslie Snyder, Michael Stone, Ted Victoria, Robert Watts, and Lynton Wells.

The majority of the original works from Photography into Sculpture will be on view at Cherry and Martin. Also included in the show will be a number of related artworks by the Photography into Sculpture artists from the same time period. Cherry and Martin has confirmed participation with all of the original artists except Karl Folsom, Ed OʼConnell, Joe Pirone and Leslie Snyder. Any information as to their whereabouts would be deeply appreciated, as the gallery has thus far been unable to locate these four artists. Cherry and Martin will organize a catalog that will include a new interview with Peter Bunnell about Photography into Sculpture; new essays on the exhibition; new photography of the objects; and a selection of original source documents.

Helen K. Garber News

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Helen K. Garber, for wining third place in the FINE ART : COLLAGE PRO category of the 2011 International Photography Awards competition!

To see more images from Helen's amazing Encaustic Noir Series, please stop by the gallery at Bergamot Station for a visit.

LA Times Review - Andrew Uchin

A big congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Andrew Uchin, for his recent review in the Culture Monster section of the LA Times! And thank you to Sharon Mizota as well for writing such a wonderful review!
Andrew's show will be on view a dnj until September 10, 2011 so be sure to stop by the gallery for a visit and see this amazing body of work in person!

As books are increasingly made of pixels instead of paper, it's not surprising that their quaint physical form should become fodder for artists. Andrew Uchin's spare photographs of the covers, spines and other parts of old tomes at dnj Gallery look like little abstractions, but are also paeans to the appealing physicality of books.

Isolated on white grounds, the images sometimes evoke painting. An illustration from a children's book is mottled all over with abrasions, suggesting a very slow, quiet form of action painting. The back of “Voices in Stone” is a plain gray expanse punctuated by a white library checkout card. It looks as if it were carefully placed to resemble a Hans Hoffman painting.

In other cases, the works are small jokes. "Art and Anarchy" is opened to the dedication page, which reads, "To Diane, who refuses to read it." In "The Tyranny of Words" the book is missing entirely, leaving only the dust jacket: words about words about the tyranny of words. At times these ploys are too cute. The cover of "Visual Thinking" has been ripped off, leaving the title page fuzzy behind a translucent white end paper. The corner of a book bearing the running figure of the Modern Library series is creased upward, as if he were turning pages in his haste.

Uchin's images are strongest when they record the personal and often emotional attachments we form with books, charting how intellectual engagement takes physical form. In "Josephine," we see only the page edges of a book lying on its side. Across the edges, someone has written "Josephine" in large letters, and at each end, the words "Black Boy." The edges become a highly personal alternative spine — it's impossible to tell whether the book is titled "Josephine," or whether it is a copy of Richard Wright's "Black Boy" that belonged to someone named Josephine. Regardless, it's poignant evidence of a unique relationship one is unlikely to develop with an iPad.

-- Sharon Mizota

dnj Gallery, Bergamot Station, 2525 Michigan Ave., Santa Monica, (310) 315-3551, through Sept. 3. Closed Sun. and Mon.

"Splash! Liquid Energy Splattered" Reviewed By Ventura County Star

Congratulations to dnj Gallery, artists, Annie Seaton and Bill Sosin, for their inclusion in "Splash!" and the recent review in the Ventura County Star!



Exhibit Standout:
'Splash' Exhibit in Oxnard Explores Fascination With Water

Put artists next to water and their creative juices flow. Inspired by coastal waters, Southern California artists have found plenty of ways to interpret wet. "Splash! liquid energy spattered," an exhibition on display through Aug. 21 at the Carnegie Art Museum in Oxnard, celebrates our fascination with water.

The collection features 60 traditional and nontraditional artworks in diverse media by California artists. Themes represent water's recreational allure, beauty and transparency both realistically and abstractly. The images explore the impact and experience of water, from manufactured pools to natural waterways.

The 22 featured artists are John Budicin, D.J. Hall, Carolyn Hesse-Low, Margie Livingston, Joel Meyerowitz, Brad Miller, Stephen Mirich, Bobbie Moline-Kramer, Maria Luisa Morando, Elizabeth Patterson, Roxie Ray, Blakeney Sanford, Annie Seaton (whose "Big Surf" image is pictured here), Brooke Shaden, Bill Sosin, Rich Stich, Adam Thorman, Daena Title, Roger Weik, Daniel Wheeler, John Wimberley and Peter Zokosky. The collection is on loan from participating artists and fine art galleries throughout California.

The Carnegie Art Museum, 424 South C St., Oxnard, is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and 1-5 p.m. Sundays. A donation of $3 is suggested. For more information, call 385-8157 or visit carnegieam.org.

Michael Eastman "ARTnews" Review - Summer 2011 Issue

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Michael Eastman, for his recent "ARTnews" review on his Plexagraphs series!

Dog Days of Summer Sale - dnj Gallery

Please join dnj Gallery for a weekend art sale taking place August 5th and 6th!

dnj Gallery will offer 10 % off all photo books and gallery miniature edition prints ranging from $40 - $100.

Several Bergamot Station galleries, including the Santa Monica Museum of Art, will also take part in the Dog Days of Summer Sale, so be sure to mark your calendars.

Opening Reception Photos: Out of Con(text) Featuring Andrew Uchin

Thanks to everyone who made it out for Saturday's opening of Out of Con(text)! Here are some great photos to enjoy.

dnj Staff

Elliott Wilcox Featured on LENSCRATCH

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Elliott Wilcox, for his recent feature on LENSCRATCH! In addition, we want to send a big thank you to Aline Smithson for her continued support of dnj Gallery and our artists! Thanks Aline!

dnj Staff

David Trautrimas is Featured in the September Issue of "B&W + Color Magazine"

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, David Trautrimas, for his recent review in "B&W + Color Magazine"!


Spotlight: David Trautrimas
"B&W+Color Magazine," September 2011, p. 134

"I'm not necessarily fascinated by the act of photography in and of itself," says Toronto-based photographer David Trautrimas. "It's the first and usually least complicated step in a long process of assembling an image. I'm much more interested in what happens after the shutter closes. That's when the real fun begins."

For the past eight years Trautrimas has been creating wondrous and unlikely worlds where fantasy collides with an incredible future that might exist in some alternative universe. Think Jules Verne meets Buckminster Fuller. Somewhere between the neural synapses of Trautrimas' mind and the digital relays in his Mac pro computer lies a realm of mythic landscapes with a distinctive retro-futuristic look to them. Viewing his work is like seeing early 1900s magazines with artists' renditions of what the world might look like in 100 years.

Growing up in Toronto, Canada, Trautrimas was addicted to that great old British television show The Secret Life of Machines, hosted by two mad scientist/artists. They would explain the inner workings of modem appliances by taking them apart and doing crazy things, like creating a giant burning pyramid of old television sets.

"There was so much promised that failed to materialize," he laments. "Things like jet-packs and architecture inspired by space travel. This is my way of creating a future that we were denied."

Trautrimas' recently completed series, "Spyfrost," is a sly homage to the various secret govermment projects perpetrated during the Cold War, such as the CIA's mind-control program MKULTRA. He wanted to evoke quasi-military operations with ambivalent ambitions, shrouded in an atmosphere of mystery and intrigue. He hypothesized the origins of iconic modern appliances by reassembling them into top-secret Cold War military outposts. These colossal structures, hybrids of both machinery and architecture, stand as weaponized ancestors to common household objects such as refrigerators, lawnmowers and washing machines. The series elicits the uneasy balance between the era's use of technology to enhance standard of living with its capacity to precipitate global catastrophe.

"My images are the result of blending dozens of photographs of multiple objects such as art deco coffee pots, bathroom scales, electric razors and such. Once I've found an object of interest I'll tear it down to its component parts, photograph the individual pieces, and start building them into architectural structures in Photoshop."

The inspiration for this series came from a review of an exhibition held several years ago at the Victoria and Albert Museum. Titled "Cold War Modem," it looked at the role of design during the Cold War. The article mentioned a telecommunications tower built in Czechoslovakia that housed a hotel and dining room for the military.

"This combination of machinery and architecture fit nicely with my previous bodies of work. With the Spyfrost Project I wanted to combine the technological aspects of my creations with a futuristic architectural element. I wanted to create a plausible explanation of the origins of our common household appliances."

A typical image may be the result of hundreds of photos painstakingly combined in the computer. "The majority of the images in my archives were photographed with specific projects in mind," he says. "But there's also a large collection of random places and things that may be of use in the future. For example, I just took day-trip to Buffalo, and went on an impromptu art deco tour of the downtown area. I took hundreds of images of building details: windows, archways, landscaping - none of which I have a current use for, but I never know what I'll need in the future.

"I've been attending a very interesting lecture series here in Toronto called 'Architecture in Combination,' that invites artists to present the: work and talk about how their work uses and relates to architecture. A few months ago I presented my Spyfrost photographs and it led to a fascinating discussion, with real structural engineers, on the feasibility of constructing my buildings. The consensus for the evening was that if I found a patron rich and eccentric enough, I could probably have some of these built."

By David Best

Artist Reception: Out of Con(text) Featuring Andrew Uchin

Please join dnj Gallery on Saturday, July 23, 2011 from 6-8pm for the opening of our new exhibition titled Out of Con(text) featuring Andrew Uchin.

The exhibition will showcase nine dnj Gallery artists including Michael Eastman, Richard Gilles, Cynthia Greig, Annie Seaton, Bill Sosin, Tom Stone, David Trautrimas and Dylan Vitone.

This exhibition will run from July 23 - September 3, 2011

Andrew Uchin Featured on "The Photo Exchange" Blog - dnj Gallery

dnj's group show titled Out of Con(text) featuring the work of Andrew Uchin has been featured on "The Photo Exchange" blog! Thanks for all your hard work Jim McKinniss!

Out of Con(text) will run from July 23 - September 3, 2011 with an artist reception held on Saturday, July 23, 2011 from 6-8pm.

Laura Parker News

Congratulations dnj Gallery artist, Laura Parker, for her inclusion in "No Mirrors" taking place at Rayko Photo Center June 16 - August 2, 2011.


Chris Colville

Laura Parker's "Rotations & Rubbings" Series Reviewed in ArtScene

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Laura Parker, for her recent review in ArtScene Magazine! "Rotations & Rubbings" is Laura Parker's second solo show at dnj Gallery and will run through July 16, 2011.

If you would like to see more of Laura's work in person, please stop by the gallery in Bergamot Station.




CONTINUING AND RECOMMENDED EXHIBITIONS, JULY/AUGUST, 2011

The two series of color photographs presented in Laura Parker's exhibition "Rotations and Rubbings" are made both with and without the camera. In the "Rotations" series Parker combines a projected image with a photogram so as to create a disconnect between the observable and the fabricated. Each image contained inside the circle is an abstracted landscape that is silhouetted against a black ground. The multiple panel works cascade up and down the wall, evoking the movement of the natural landscape. The "Rubbings" series consists of photographic abstractions made from rubbing the exposed and developed paper's surface, which exposes the colors underneath. Each of Parker's rubbings starts and ends as a circle that serves as a perfect complement to the “Rotations.” Both bodies of work explore what is possible when the real and the imagined are juxtaposed (dnj Gallery, Santa Monica).

Jody Zellen

David Trautrimas' Spyfrost Project in Seoul Korea

A big congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, David Trautrimas, for his recent inclusion in the Imagine Earth exhibition taking place in Seoul Korea.

On June 3rd the group exhibition 'Imagine Earth' opened at the Korean Arts Centre in Seoul Korea. Several works from "The Spyfrost" series and one from "Habitat Machines" are included in the show. For the official exhibition website please visit jigusangsang.co.kr.

Ginny Mangrum News

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Ginny Mangrum, for her inclusion in The Brooklyn Artists Gym’s group exhibition titled Voyeur opening this Saturday, June 25, 2011. If you are in the Brooklyn area, definitely stop by to see the show which features over twenty artists.

Brooklyn Artists Gym is an artist studio and gallery facility in the Park Slope/Gowanus area of Brooklyn, New York. BAG’s mission is to help make it possible for artists to further their work and careers at a reasonable cost.




Ginny Mangrum, House,
archival lightjet print, 16" x 20"

Pasadena's Armory Center For The Arts "Street Sight" Exhibition

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artists, Jane O'Neal and Darryl Curran, for their inclusion in the Armory's Street Sight exhibition opening next Saturday, June 25, 2011!

An opening reception, free and open to the public, will take place on Saturday, June 25, from 7-9pm.


Jane O'Neal, A&W Sunset, California,1976,
cibachrome print, 16" x 20"

Armory Center for the Arts is pleased to present a major exhibition of Southern California street photography from the late 1960s through early 1980s entitled, Street Sight. The exhibition, organized by curator Tim B. Wride, will be on display in the Armory’s Caldwell Gallery from Sunday, June 26 – September 11, 2011. Exhibiting artists will include Adam Bartos, Darryl Curran, Bevan Davies, John Divola, Judy Fiskin, Robbert Flick, Dennis Hopper, Graham Howe, Grant Mudford, Jane O’Neal, Marvin Rand, Seymour Rosen, Ed Ruscha, Julian Wasser, and Terry Wild. The exhibition will be accompanied by an illustrated publication with a scholarly essay by the curator.

Street Sight takes into account the factors that contributed to the post-war shift in Southern California-based photography from imagery that was picturesque, image oriented, and anecdotal in nature, to a more conceptually motivated style of representation and object-making that was decisively suburban, process-oriented, and experiential. The artists whose work is included in the exhibition have made a prepositional shift away from the description and distillation of activity and inhabitants that are seen on the street to an emphasis on those elements, extensions, and experiences that are not just of the street, but, of the street that is dominated, defined, and experienced by the automobile.

For artists Robbert Flick and Ed Ruscha, this resulted in a meditative celebration and typology, respectively, of the parking lot. Darryl Curran elevates the conflation of sexually charged imagery with the shapes and icons of gasoline stations into totems of a new potency. The typologies of Bevan Davies, Judy Fiskin, John Divola, and Seymour Rosen overlay economic and architectural accumulations made possible by the car’s fluid access to broad geographies. Jane O’Neal’s saturated color imagery provides the
experience of the street from within the car with carnivalesque garishness, while images by Marvin Rand and Julian Wasser use montage and time-exposure strategies to formally distill the motion of the street. Adam Bartos celebrates the two ends of the
spectrum of road quality with his cinematic treatment of a freeway overpass and a hillside overlook. And, for Australian transplants Graham Howe and Grant Mudford the traces, boundaries, and borders of streets themselves elicited formal responses that underpin insightful psychological descriptions of both place and medium.

Street Sight is an examination of the quintessentially automobile-centric Southern Californian experience of place. This type of experience is distinguished from a “roadtrip” sensibility in so far as it is predicated on a day-to-day reliance on getting from place to place by car. For those in the region, the car is an indispensable appendage for accessing the flow of daily life; it is the tool through which they understand the spaces and map the environment in which they live. For artists in the region whose interests veered toward their understanding of “place,” this meant a reliance on new ways of contextualizing, cataloguing, codifying and transcribing their experience. Theirs was a pioneering moment that drew from the emergent sensibilities that informed New Topographics, embraced the unbridled nature of their art making community, and seamlessly internalized the unique street culture that cemented the disparate geographies of Southern California. Theirs was a new way of seeing, a different mode of experience, and a conceptually charged means of mapping that created a potent, postmodern approach to street photography.

“Street Sight” is on view in the Susan and John Caldwell Gallery at the Armory Center for the Arts, 145 North Raymond Avenue, Pasadena, CA, 91103. Gallery hours are Tuesday – Sunday, noon-5pm. $5 suggested donation. Armory members, students, and
seniors are free. The Armory is easily accessible from the Gold Line Memorial Park Station in Pasadena. For information about Armory exhibitions and events, please call 626.792.5101 x122. or visit the Armory website at www.armoryarts.org

Helen K. Garber News

dnj Gallery artist, Helen K. Garber, is putting her beloved "Miss Lucy" up for auction at Bergamot Station via the Santa Monica Auctions this Saturday and Sunday - June 18/19th 2011.



Here is the link to her catalogue listing: http://www.smauctions.com/g.htm

An unusual offering at the upcoming Santa Monica Auctions, Bergamot Station on June 18/19th is a functional object of art - the re-use of a 1955 Shasta 5th Wheel Trailer that was found stripped and abandoned in the forest in Idyllwild, CA by Venice artist, Helen K. Garber.

Ms. Garber got permission to remove the trailer from the local ranger station, had it towed down the mountain by Banning Discount RV, who then stored her for 6 months, repaired for her for travel and prepared her for her useful status as the first mixed media mobile projection hub.

Duce, the renowned graffiti writer who had collaborated with Helen on their Night View Collaboration the year before, created a 4-sided mural depicting the state of the US economy in 2010.

She was used for 3 installations as the center projection hub of Group SC 2009, An Intimate View of Southern CA, in collaboration with MINARC, Santa Monica and 50 fine art photographers who documented their own neighborhood in Southern CA over the course of the year. We projected their stories to rear view screens through 4 windows in Miss Lucy, one on each side. The screens were set 90 degrees from each other (see youtube video link below). The territory covered from San Diego to Palm Springs, North to San Ynez and all through LA County and Orange County too. www.galleryskart.com/groupsc2009 for more info on the project. The projection equipment and slide shows are not included in this sale.

Miss Lucy traveled to Bergamot Station for Month of Photography's Opening Night 2010 and then later to Pershing Square to be the centerpiece of the Autumn Lights Festival, 2010.

To see her in action at the Autumn Lights Festival, please watch this short you tube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPw4ae2Uw18

She would make an excellent outdoor sculpture, child's playroom or fantastic dog house for a loving home. The interior is stripped, and she locks securely, registered with the DMV, so she can also help out by storing or hauling things . She is truly a functional object of art.

Miss Lucy will be auctioned in the company of important work by prestigious artists such as Frank Gehry, Richard Avedon, Ed Moses, Larry Bell, Raymond Pettibon and Dennis Hopper.

Laura Parker Featured on COAGULA's Weekend Bender

A big thank you to Bryan Chagolla and COAGULA Art Journal for including dnj Gallery artist, Laura Parker, in the Weekend Bender!

Laura Parker's second solo show titled, Rotations & Rubbings is currently on view through July 16, 2011, so stop by Bergamot Station for a visit!


Laura Parker, Rubbings (Labyrinth, Red IV),
2011, chromogenic color print, 23" x 23"



Laura Parker, Rotations (Collecting Pool), detail,
2010, 5 panel chromogenic color prints, 82" x 48" overall

Artist Reception: Elliott Wilcox and Laura Parker

Thanks to everyone who made it out for the opening on Saturday!

dnj Staff

Laura Parker News

dnj Gallery artist, Laura Parker, will be taking part in No Mirrors: A juried show of camera-less photography at Rayko Photo Center in San Francisco this month. Congratulations Laura!

EXHIBITION ON VIEW: JUNE 16-AUGUST 2

ARTIST RECEPTION: THURSDAY, JUNE 16, 6-8PM

Artist Reception: Elliott Wilcox and Laura Parker

Please join dnj Gallery on Saturday, June 11, 2011 from 5-7pm for Elliott Wilcox and Laura Parker's artist reception!


Elliott Wilcox, Real Tennis 05, c-print, 2009, 30" x 40"


Laura Parker, Rotations (Labyrinth, Red III), chromogenic monotype print, 2011, 20" x 20"



dnj Gallery is pleased to announce its upcoming exhibition and American debut of “Courts” by the young British photographer Elliott Wilcox. In Gallery II, we present “Rotations and Rubbings” by Southern California artist Laura Parker.

In Courts, Elliott Wilcox photographs racquet, squash, and traditional ‘Real Tennis’ courts absent any games or players. With an interest in discovering the details that are overlooked, Wilcox focuses on the graphic qualities of the open spaces with an emphasis on bold, flat colors and formal, linear structures. Wilcox explains, “the vivid stains, ball marks, blood and scratches force the viewer to focus on these details rather then just the courts.” His rich colors and simple shapes create a strong exhibition.

This is Elliott Wilcox’s first solo show at dnj Gallery and in the United States. He has exhibited internationally. His Court series caught the attention of Charles Saatchi, and the famed collector shortlisted Wilcox for his BBC documentary television show, School of Saatchi. Additionally, his work was selected to be part of the exhibition PRUNE- Abstracting Reality at Fotografiemuseum Amsterdam (FOAM). He is the recipient of several awards including a Judges Award at the Nikon Discovery Awards, a New York Photo Award and has only just won a Lucie Award for the Discovery of the Year at the International Photography Awards.

Laura Parker resumes her examination of time, structure and curious ideas in relation to perception. Each photograph combines a projected negative and a photogram, an image made without a camera by placing objects directly onto the surface of a photo-sensitive material and then exposing it to light. Her images then appear within a black field with a “light halo” around the object. In the end, each picture results in a circle. “From the planetary to the simple hollow of a bowl, I find myself attracted to the circle. It is perfectly balanced, there is a reference to optics and to the human eye, and a circle holds the tension between both unending movement and utter stillness.”

Laura Parker is collected privately throughout California and the United States. She earned her BFA, Magna cum Laude from UCLA and her MFA from CalArts, Valencia. She currently lives and works in Pasadena, CA. Her work was recently selected to be part of Influential Element: Exploring the Impact of Water, Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, California. Parker also had an exhibit, with some of this work, at the Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena, California. This is her second solo show at dnj Gallery.

"Plexagraphs" Exhibition Featured in California Homes Magazine

Michael Eastman's Plexagraphs exhibition is currently featured in the Calendar section of California Homes Magazine!

To see more images by Michael Eastman, please stop by the gallery or visit our web site.

This exhibition will run through May 28, 2011.

dnj Gallery - VIP Room For "Incognito" 2011

dnj Gallery would like to thank the Santa Monica Museum of Art for inviting us to host the 2011 VIP Room for their annual Incognito event! It was a pleasure working with you all! Here are a few pictures taken by Helen K. Garber to enjoy. Thank you!

dnj Staff

Michael Eastman and Maria Luisa Morando Exhibitions on "The Photo Exchange"

dnj Gallery would like thank Jim McKinniss for his recent blog post on The Photo Exchange regarding Michael Eastman and Maria Luisa Morando's current exhibitions!

Plexagraphs and Silver are currently on view through May 28, 2011 at Bergamot Station, so be sure to stop by for a visit.

dnj Staff


Michael Eastman, GW 2, 2010,
plexagraph (plexi w/lightjet print), 30" x 30"


Maria Luisa Morando, Silver V,
2009, c-print, 48" x 48"

Cynthia Greig News

Congratulations to dnj Gallery artist, Cynthia Greig, for her recent inclusion in Fred Torres' LIVE FROM DETROIT group exhibition opening next Thursday, April 14 from 6-8pm!


LIVE FROM DETROIT
curated by Monica Bowman, Director of The Butcher's Daughter

Artists include:
Kevin Beasley
Susan Goethel Campbell
Kate Daughdrill
Christina Galasso
Dick Goody
Cynthia Greig
Chido Johnson
Leon Johnson
Laith Karmo
Nate Morgan
George Rahme
Marvin Shaouni

This endeavor is aimed at creating fresh discourse beyond economy and geography and offers a fresh perspective on the work happening in our community today. Creative culture moving forward: steadfast in the goal to transform our lives in the image of our design.

From the Fred Torres Collaborations press release:

Curator Monica Bowman says it best, "Artists working in Detroit have access to almost unlimited resources: raw materials, land, vast enclosed spaces, low rent, a viable community committed to cultural renewal. Choices beyond blind circumstance. Through economy we have reclaimed and rediscovered abundant options and fleeting luxuries: time, space and the notion of closeness. Our work: symbiosis for the sake of sustainability (i.e., what I need you may have: what can I offer you?)"

The artists in LIVE FROM DETROIT have a unique view of the socio-economic developments of the past few years and are able to interact and react to the events shaping Detroit, producing an exciting commentary about the state of one city, on the soil of another. This exhibition creates context for artists operating within a certain geographical boundary. It exposes their work to a national audience and illustrates the scope of their imprimatur. The goal is to foster discourse about community, materials, social intimacy and sustainability. Works on view include collage, installation, monoprints, objects d'art, painting, photography, public interventions/relational aesthetics, sculpture, video and works on paper.

Fred Torres Collaborations
527 West 29th Street, Third Floor, New York, NY 10001

Huffington Post and Artweek LA - Michael Eastman Exhibition

We would like to thank Bill Bush for his recent post on dnj Gallery artist Michael Eastman and his new Plexagraph exhibition running now through May 28, 2011. Thanks for all you do Bill!

dnj Staff

In this new series, Eastman focuses on much smaller objects, windows and building design elements. Opens March 26 at dnj Gallery.


Michael Eastman, GW 2, plexagraph, 2010, 30" x 30"

Michael Eastman's prior work featured photographs of richly colored American landscapes and captivating architectural settings. In this new series, he focuses on much smaller objects, windows and building design elements. As before, Eastman portrays a nostalgic elegance. But the artwork is as much about the presentation of the photograph, as the photograph itself. Eastman has developed a new process, a layered, sculptural photograph. As he states, "I have worked with all kind of mediums and surfaces and techniques that seemed to mostly 'artify' the surface of the image but left the image still only representational. After years of exploration, I discovered a new medium that enabled me to create abstractions and print them so they now were my photographs of my paintings."

This is Michael Eastman's second solo show with dnj Gallery. He has exhibited across the country and his work is included in several esteemed institutions, such as the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, The International Center of Photography, The High Museum of Art and the Art Institute of Chicago.