News at the TAM

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Sept 29, 2009

Congratulations To Our 2009 ZOOM Artists & Thank You To All The Artists Who Applied!
The Opening Reception For ZOOM Will be Held November 21, 2009, 6–9 pm

Artists from all over California, Arizona, Nevada, and Baja submitted applications and our curatorial staff had a challenging job choosing from the over 300 submissions we received.
The 2009 ZOOM artists are: David Adey, Kelly Barrie, York Chang, Allison Cortson, Roni Feldman, Tony Maher, Daniel Nevers, Nobuhito Nishigawara, Andrew Schoultz, Christina Shurts, Ali Smith, Cheryl Sorg.

Sept 29, 2009

'More Art In Torrance'
Artist Leaves Sign at Museum

And boy do we agree! More Art! More Art! Perhaps this larger than normal note is a comment on the scale of the current exhibition here at the museum, or perhaps a premonition referring to some of our future exhibitions.

In any case, the sentiment was duly noted, and echoed, here are the TAM.

Cultural Services Manager, Eve Rappoport, shows off the sign found Monday morning in front of the museum. We may not know who the artist may be, but we are with you- More Art In Torrance!

Sept 23, 2009

Opening Reception a Sucess
Baker's Dozen | Natural Artifice

The crowds were out in force for the opening reception of Baker's Dozen and Natural Artifice on Saturday September 19, 2009. All of the artists were in attendance as the community and artworld joined together in welcoming the newest exhibition at the TAM.

Sept 1, 2009

Band to Play Baker's Dozen Opening Reception Saturday, September 19, 2009
Hop-Frog's Drum Jester Devotional

Hop-Frog's Drum Jester Devotional is a project of the Los Angeles-based Hop-Frog Kollectiv. They exemplify the West-Coast-originated "Post-Asiatic" or "Post-World" style for lack of better description. Jeremy Morelock started the project based on dreams of ancient silk trade routes linking West with East, combining alternately tuned electric guitars, eastern acoustic drone instrumentation and rhythms, with experimental electronics, the psychedelic integrity of everyone's Krautrock and Post-Punk heroes, the melancholy power inherent in Swans/Larsen territory, and dark spiritual longing of Hermann Hesse. The current lineup includes three guitar players: Morelock, Denise Owens (Volcanosis), and Josh Peters, as well as Kirk Pickler (formerly of Between Ravens and Crows) on drums.

Aug 3, 2009

Kim Kori Sculpture Finds a Temporary Home in the TAM's Sculpture Garden
Dreaming of the Kiss, Cast in Bronze, Stands 3 1/2 Feet Tall

A gift to the City of Torrance by former Mayor Dan Walker, this sculpture will consider the TAM its 'pad' for the near future. Be sure to bring the family and check it out before it hops away. Artist Kim Kori sculptures can be viewed in several cities, including: Sedona and Mesa, Arizona; Loveland, Colorado; Orange County, Florida; Tulsa, Oklahoma; Ontario, Canada; and Winterthur, Switzerland. She was recognized for her work at the 2007 and 2004 American Women Artists Juried Competition, and at the Sedona Arts Center Juried members Annual Show. In 1994, Dreaming of the Kiss won the Best of Show Award and the People’s Choice Award at the Hillside Sculpture Invitational. Later this year she will be showing at the 2009 Sculpture in the Park Show in Loveland, CO and at the Society of Animal Artists 49th Annual “Art and the Animal” Exhibition in Salina, KS.

July 27, 2009

12 Gauge Exhibition Artist Featured in Whitehot Magazine
Review of Mary Anna Pomonis Work, Titled The Handwriting is on the Wall, Written by Journalist Sandra Vista

Sandra Vista: I was present for Mary Anna’s exhibition in which she openly discussed her creative process - skeletons and all. Mary Anna’s graphite drawings are overflowing with psychological metaphors and references to psychoanalysts like Jacques Lacan and his theory of the “mirror stage”. The drawings are Mary Anna’s guide dogs, helping her navigate through her inquires about her life as an artist and a woman... click here for full text
Re-visit Mary Anna Pomonis in her 12 GAUGE exhibition by visiting the 12 GAUGE site

July 23, 2009
The Torrance Art Museum Invites Proposals From Curators TAM's 'Call for Gonzo Curating' Announced on re-title.com July 22, 2009 Call for Proposals: On Gonzo Curating I was interested to read recently, on oncurating.org and at newcurator.com, some of their reader’s responses to the questions regarding topics that should be raised and what the purpose of a museum is, respectively. While I feel that there is space and time enough in the world to cover many areas and to be many things the bottom line must remain actual exhibitions/curatorial projects. The last thing we need is to become so academic that we end up talking to ourselves about ourselves only - as can be seen in some arenas. This is not to downplay the importance of a dialogue and the conceptualizing of our field but more as a warning not to become too hermetic in our relationship to the world at large. A move towards self-reflexivity in our programming and a determined drive to ask harder questions about our own practices as an institutional art site are welcome, as is an extended scope of possibilities within curatorial approaches – which many curators and institutions are addressing admirably in various countries and that we also can contribute to. To engage others, to become more collaborative and interactive with outside curators and professionals worldwide, to see our programming develop more hand-in-hand with a global enquiry and with curators in different contexts with different aims and agendas, alongside fulfilling our obligation to visually and intellectually engage a myriad of different types of visitor, can perhaps be sought via different routes, for example a form of crowd-sourcing? This is one potential approach we at TAM would like to follow up on… To this end I would like to invite artists and curators (or anyone else for that matter) to present project proposals to the Torrance Art Museum. My feeling is that as a small museum of contemporary art our strength lies in our ability to react to moments in art, quickly (for a museum) and efficiently, within a limited budget. We cannot compete with large museum blockbuster shows but we can respond to the ideas referencing the role of art, curators, museums, etc within the world. What better way to do this than by actually offering a site for the production of some of these projects that deal with our concerns directly. TAM should be an artist’s museum, a curator’s museum and our audience’s museum for active engagement – so if this strikes a chord with you then feel free to send proposals to us. We will respond to them all and will shortlist those that we respond the strongest to (whatever that subjectively means) and try to schedule a number of these for the 2011/2012 programming. We make no claims for this being an original idea, nor innovative, nor groundbreaking and we have no real idea how this experiment will succeed or fail but we feel it is worth finding out - so…proposals on a disc please to: Torrance Art Museum c/o Max Presneill, Curator 3320 Civic Center Torrance, CA 90503, USA
	BM Box 5163 London WC1N 3XX United Kingdom +44 (0) 870 922 0438
Are you an artist interested in sending a prosposal for the Curator to review, an idea for an exhibition, or want to share something realy cool with our Curitorial Team? Then click here to share it with us.

July 16 , 2009
TAM Joins the Flavorpill 50 New Site Launches July 15, 2009 The Torrance Art Museum joins such venerable institutions as the Getty, LACMA, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall on the new Flavorpill 50. From the people who brought you Flavorwire and the Daily Dose, this snazzy new site brings you low down on cultural events all around town, lets you leave comments at your favorite venues, and offers a host of cool giveaways.

July 14 , 2009
Zoom – Open Call For Artists August 1 – October 1, 2009 ZOOM is the new prestigious annual group show of contemporary artists from So Cal, Baja, Nevada and Arizona. The exhibition will run November 19 – December 19. It will be a survey of some of the best art from the region, showing developing trends and current dialogues for artists living and working in the south west states of America and northern Mexico. ZOOM will be an open call to artists and free to apply. Click here for more info.

July 11 , 2009

South Bay Watercolor Society
Juried Winners Announced
This past Saturday's opening reception for the SBWC 2009 juried exhibition drew a lare crowd as guest juror Albert Setton announced this years winners. Mary Higuchi captured the honor for Best of Show while Audrey Suer, Pat Wooley, and Douglas Stenhouse took first, second and third place honors respectively. The Henry Fukahara Award was bestowed upon Bronwyn Towle and Marjorie Martin was awarded the Milford Zones Award. Honorable mentions went to Dawn Quinones, Carla Staight and Etty Andreani.

Congratulations to all of the juried show participants!

Opening Reception Saturday July 11, 2009

June 26, 2009

Susan Collis Chosen as 2010 Armory Show Commissioned Artist
Artist Will Exhibit Work Next Spring @ the TAM
Susan Collis, who will exhibit work at TAM in gallery 2 next spring has just been announced the Armory Show's commissioned artist for 2010. Collis joins past commissioner's such as Mary Heilmann, John Wesley, John Waters, and many more who are invited to create a small edition work for one of the most important art fairs in the world.

Collis' work turns every day mundane objects into spectacular moments of beauty. The above pictured pieces are comprised of coral, black onyx, 18 carrot white gold, diamond, silver, opals, turquoise, garnets, seed pearls, mother of pearls, fresh water pearl, marcacite, and of course, a wooden broom.

To see more work by Collis visit http://www.seventeengallery.com who represents her work in London.

May 14 , 2009
David French Sculpture Arrives at the TAM Artwork 'Stands Guard' in Anticipation of Upcoming September Exhibition A piece by Los Angeles based sculptor David French that will grace the lobby here at the TAM arrived today in all of it's shining glory. The sculpture will be on display ahead of French's and Seth Kaufman's September exhibition, Natural Artifice, in Gallery Two.