Water Music: A Group Exhibition Exploring the Element & Mystery of Water

Water Music features works of art in various media inspired by the element and mystery of water: the sensual and emotional attraction we have to water; visual representations informed by leitmotifs from classic antiquity to contemporary abstractions; and works of art incorporating scientific inquiries into an element essential to life itself.

Philip Bewley, DZINE Gallery's curator, developed the theme for the Water Music exhibition from conversations that he had with artists in their San Francisco Bay Area studios

"I am interested in what artists are thinking about right now. From these conversations I find connections between the artists that will compose the theme.

The artists are remarkably prescient in uncovering and predicting ideas and events that emerge months later when the exhibition opens. Most of the artwork on view in Water Music was created especially for this exhibition. My curatorial mission for DZINE Gallery is to present original works of art from San Francisco Bay Area artists in exhibitions that are relevant, thought provoking and inspiring."

The show features work by 22 San Francisco Bay Area artists working with different materials and mediums - from sculptures and installations to photography and paintings.

One of the artists, Sasinun Kladpetch, is experimenting with materials such as concrete, clay, soil and plants:

"I think of my installations as a self-portrait and a reflection of how the environment has impressed me. I would like my audience to think about issues of nature living through my work and hope that the audience will appreciate the beauty of nature more than they were before."

For over ten years Georgina Reskala has been photographing the beach, always from the same point of view, same spot. The result is hundreds of images of the same place but tremendously different.

"Sometimes the sea seems peaceful and tranquil and others, intense and foreboding. What they all have in common is that they remind us of a never ending continual change. The longing to capture a moment, from a constant point of view."

The sea is a metaphor for permanence and memory at once. It also remind us that although it may seem permanent, it is always in motion.

In an effort to relinquish control and create an emotional piece, Georgina cut up her photographs. She changed the way they were supposed to be and sewed them back together.

"Making and unmaking until everything was there, once again; but never the same. The ever changing waves that give so much and take away with a force that can only be felt not told."

Jenny Phillips' Waters Edge series is inspired by the movement and color of the ocean on a foggy day. The work is about the feeling you get when you are at the edge of the ocean and see how it is constantly changing, depending on your angle. Using the interplay of line, texture, and repetitive patterns, Jenny seeks to balance simplicity of expression with rich sensory qualities. This piece is best viewed while moving around it.

"If it was up to me, I would start every day with a quick dip in the ocean, clearing my mind with a swim through a kelp forest or a coral reef. Given that this is currently not a possibility, I make do with the next best thing: these whimsical explorations of the undersea world are how I loosen mind and body at the start of my day."

Diane DallasKidd loves to experiment with material and often works in repetition, allowing the medium to reveal content and form organically. In her Waves series, Diane wanted to express the movement of the act of weaving by allowing long strands of thread to suspend freely between 2 points rather than being mostly interwoven. As she passed the shuttle through the shed and packed the threads down on the loom, she began to equate the loose weft thread to water and the movement of weaving to the force of waves.

In the current works with thread and paper Tracing Waves Diane uses recorded water levels of the San Francisco Bay to illustrate a tidal range.

For the Water Music exhibition, she chose to plot the tidal range for the Super Full Moon and Micro Full Moon in 2018. This process of connecting water, time and space with thread while being aware of the moon’s proximity to earth was a way for Diane to pay homage to the interconnected forces at work.

Influenced by my background in Mathematics and Computer Science, Lian Ng creates art and design that incorporates mathematical algorithms, as well as typography and architectural references.

"My interest in pattern generation has been a recurring theme in my art, often resulting in works that show elements being expanded or manipulated to create complex systems. I’m fascinated by naturally recurring pattern, or texture, that is non-repeating but influenced by the environment—as in the case of patterns in wood grain, the residual effects from the process of evaporation."

Carrie Ann Plank is recognized for her innovation in combining traditional printmaking methods with new, post-internet digital fabrication techniques. Plank creates large-scale work that incorporates new technology to explore information systems and how we visually process them.

"The major focus of my work deals with visual portrayals of information systems. The work considers reinterpreting and reorganizing visual information systems and how context shifts meaning.

I work with many layers of data visualization, from charting to mathematical equations to scientific principles. Mapping, numerical sequences, fractals, wave patterns, sound sources, magnetic field variations and other systems of scientific observation, overlay one another to create a pastiche of information visualization. I'm interested in the resulting noise of these visual systems, be it organically or theoretically derived, and how they interact. Layers overlap and interfere while creating abstraction from the concrete."

Paule Dubois Dupuis's work is influenced by what she sees and what she feels: "By the time the canvas is covered with lines, words, numbers, colors, scratches and then more layers, I find a certain relief or explanation of all the emotions I feel in my daily life. I am either black or white, rarely gray, so I need that dialogue to survive, or better, live fully and express that visceral passion."

"The paintings cannot be repeated because they involve my journey from one emotion to the next. They are internal debates that I am attempting to externalize: Be bold. Be free. Be true. Those words are the essence of my experience."

Filmmaker and Photographer Austin Forbord presents a new body of photographic work created expressly for the exhibition. Forbord shares, "For this new body of work I photographed professional dancers underwater.

As a choreographer I would lie in bed at night imagining movement where gravity would not intersect with reality; where gravity disappears. This work fulfills that vision."

Both Three Graces 1, 2, 3, presented as a large-format triptych, and the work, Water Nymph (Chantelle), is shot by the artist in soft-focus, giving a chiaroscuro to the modeling of the figures. The various attitudes of the figures arranged with flowing drapery is reminiscent of leitmotifs in Western art, from Classical Antiquity, to the respective periods of art from the Renaissance, Baroque to Neoclassicism.

"My father was in the foreign service and we lived for a time in an apartment in Rome near the Villa Borghese. I went there frequently to look at the art collection there, and to stand in awe before Benini’s Apollo and Daphne. This current work is directly inspired by that experience in my youth, with additional influences of the numerous artistic representations of The Three Graces - by artists such as Raphael, Botticelli and Canova."

Forbord’s most recent body of work continues his explorations in the depiction of reality: alternately revealing it and transcending it; of a lineage in art depicting the human form, with its attendant concerns of beauty and mystery.

Silvia Poloto is known for her lively abstract canvases and mixed-media sculptures. Poloto exploits a vibrant visual vocabulary of boldness and subtlety. Her deftly handled juxtapositions unfold in rich, textured hues and expressive gesture. The result is a body of work characterized by equal amounts of surprise, playfulness and provocation.

Christopher Stark photographed Venezia series while on location at the Lido during an art residency in Venice, Italy, in 2017.

"While there, I bore witness to a timeless setting that evoked the long lazy summer days and nights of youth. Many of the works are titled in Italian inspired by classic 60s Italian films, while others are given names from Greek and Roman mythology in order to elevate the subjects to mythical archetypes of desire and unrequited love. A melancholic aspect is present because there is a yearning for youth while mourning the loss of our own.

This continuous passing of time and our attempt to stop it is as futile as grasping at water. Carefree abandon is the risk and reward for this elusive season of enchantment where this mix of sun, salty air, and water create an atmosphere that is fleeting as our youth."

Victoria Mara Heilweil and Phil Spitler are this exhibition's local makers, presenting Luminous Waveforms, illuminated seating made up of parametrically designed, sculpted wooden benches.

Luminous Waveforms is an illuminated seating arrangement made up of parametrically designed, sculpted wooden benches. The organic curves are inspired by nature and sound waves, sliced into a repeating rhythm. The fluid elegance of the forms and gradual color shifts from the interior illumination transform the physical experience of the seating. The seating is both form and function.

Water Music is on view at DZINE Gallery, May 3 - Oct. 25, 2019. DZINE Gallery is located at 128 Utah Street in San Francisco. For more information, visit www.dzinegallery.com