February 27th, 2013 – April 24, 2013 Exhibition
Conference: March 8, 10am-5pm
Student exhibitions: March 9, 10am-5pm
Prices: follow the registration link for prices.
The Art of Painting in the 21st Century is an annual conference geared towards nurturing dialog on contemporary painting and the shared ideas that define current trends in the field. Many painters work alone, an isolated process that deprives the artist of thriving debate until the work is shown. The conference provides a unique venue for artists to participate in panel discussions, breakout groups and attend lectures by some of the most exciting visionaries in the field, including Glenn Brill, Kelly Detweiler, F Scott Hess and John Seed . Five downtown Davis student exhibitions, curated by the instructors of Northern California universities and colleges, are meant to encourage youth participation and community involvement.
“If you are an instructor at a college or university in California, and would like an exhibition space to promote your school, please contact us at : art[at]natsoulas[dot]com. Limited space available. There will be free exhibition space provided within walking distance from the conference headquarters.
The exhibitions begin the afternoon of Friday, March 8, 2013, with one opening reception at the John Natsoulas Gallery and the student reception at the Hallmark Inn in the evening. The majority of the educational events will take place Saturday, March 9, from 10 to 5pm, and both days are filled with panel discussions, lectures and breakout groups intended for all conferees.
The conference’s goal is to gather artists from varying communities, allowing for open interaction between young students and professionals in the field, fostering the strong tradition of painting and culture in the Northern California region.
Participating Panelists and Lecturers:
John Seed
John Seed portrait by F.Scott Hess
John Seed is a professor of art and art history at Mt. San Jacinto College in Southern California. He is the most well known art critque in the country and writes for the Huffington Post. He is the winner of a 2002 Society of Professional Journalist’s award in artand entertainment writing. He was written about art and artists for Harvard Magazine, MauuNo Ka Oi, Honolulu, Christie’s Hong Kong, Yerevan, and Art Ltd.
F. Scott Hess
F. Scott Hess is a narrative realist painter whose work explores and questions contemporary themes such as alienation, identity, loss, family, sex, and popular culture. Hess’s work focuses on mankind’s struggle to give life meaning and one of the major throughlines of his oeuvre is the belief that there are common baselines, or universals, shared by all, a belief that art critic Donald Kuspit refers to as Hess’s “New Humanism.”1
Kuspit calls Hess a “New Old Master,”2 someone who employs the complex formalism of the old masters to depict incidents that are both poetically ambiguous and intellectually rich with symbolic, literary, and art historical references. While his paintings employ “profane realism to represent the sacred moments of life,”3 they also raise as many questions as they answer with their psychologically charged, sometimes controversial, subject matter.
1. Donald Kuspit, “Self-Portraits and Old Masters: F. Scott Hess’s Humanistic Painting,” F. Scott Hess: The Seven Laughters of God (San Francisco: Hackett-Freedman Gallery, 2005). 2. Ibid. 3. Ibid.
Jordana Moore Saggese
Jordana Moore Saggese is an assistant professor of Visual Studies, and affiliated faculty in the Graduate Program in Visual and Critical Studies and the Graduate Program in Fine Arts.
Since 2009 she has served as CCA’s faculty mentor to students of color. Trained as an art historian, her work focuses on modern and contemporary art with an emphasis on the expressions and theorizations of blackness.
- Glenn Brill, St. Juste
With over 30 years of experience, Glenn Brill has a reputation of finding the essence of the creative vision within all paradigms of the art world. An accomplished artist, renowned educator, art material specialist and Tamarind Master Printer, Glenn’s versatile expertise is in high demand throughout the U.S., Western Europe and Asia.
Kelly Detweiler
Kelly is a Professor of Art at Santa Clara University where he has taught for the past 30 years. He served as Chair of the Department for more than ten years and helped make the Department one of the best departments amongst liberal arts universities of it’s size. He has shown extensively in the area and has also had opportunities to exhibit in Korea, Japan, Italy and Germany over the past 20 years. His work can be found in many private collections and in public collections including the Microsoft Collection, the De Saisset Museum, the Triton Museum, the Skowhegan School Collection, and the Nelson Collection at UCD.
Kelly was selected as the 2012 Artist Laureate by the Silicon Valley Arts Council in the “On the Wall” category. Kelly was also part of the Davis Mural Team in 2012 and created a large mural on the main Post Office in Davis. He is the owner and sole proprietor of YE$ Industries, which is a small art making enterprise, which provides luxury items for those who can afford them. Although the company has never made an actual sell they are dedicated to their company plan of making millions.
As a student at California State University at Hayward and then at U.C. Davis he had the opportunity to study with a veritable who’s who of California Art, including Arneson, De Forest, Neri, Thiebaud, Saunders, Bailey, Ramos just to mention a few.
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