PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
For more information, contact: Allison Walton, 510-535-1702
High Res JPEGS and extensive artist bios available, contact Allison Walton, 510-535-1702
Media: The media is welcome to "experience" a complementary float
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www.thefloatcenter.com
Homeland Obscurity
Group Show of Paintings & Sculpture
Aug 16, 2007-Sept 13, 2007
Featured artists:
Catherine Richardson, Paintings, Drawings, Maps
Will Tait, Sculpture
Artist Opening Party August 18, 2007
6-9pm
Refreshments
Free
Location of the show:
FLOAT, Floatation Center & Art Gallery
1091 Calcot Place, Unit # 116
(located in a store front loft of the historic Cotton Mill Studios)
Oakland, CA 94606
www.thefloatcenter.com
Hours: 10 AM up to 10 PM Tuesday – Saturday. Please call for appointment
About this show:
Float is pleased to announce “Homeland Obscurity”, a group art show of paintings and sculpture, opening August 16, 2007 and running through September 13, 2007. There will
be a reception for the artists Catherine Richardson and Will Tait on Saturday August 18, 2007 from 6-9pm to which the public is invited.
Even though utilizing different media, Catherine Richardson, painter, and Will Tait, sculptor both investigate the notion of sense of place and connection to home. Resonances both artists share include a search for the deep seated meaning of “home” and “land” which they share with us through their process and their work. Nature and tangible space plays an important role in both artists’ work as well.
Don’t miss this exhibit at Float new ways of seeing “home” and “places” are explored through the art of Catherine Richardson and Will Tait. A thought provoking intersection where art meets fanciful and tangible reality!
About Catherine Richardson:
Catherine Richardson was born in, and grew up in, Yorkshire, North England, and later, London. Catherine made deep connections to the natural world at an early age, as her play areas were the Dales and Moors. Walking is a major pastime in the UK due to public access to land. She moved all over the UK and in order to understand each place and Catherine would walk everywhere, often getting lost, only to discover... new home.
Catherine has a BFA in Metal sculpture and silversmithing from West Surrey College of Art & Design (UK) and an MFA from JFKU (Berkeley) and currently lives in Petaluma CA. While studying for her MFA at JFKU in Berkeley, she allowed the connection to the natural world of her childhood to become what her artwork was really about.
For more information about Catherine Richardson check out her website at http://cjrich.com/
Catherine Richardson~In Her Own Words:
The artwork in this show is my investigation into location and its connections to
"home" when the home of origin is in another country. I wonder what makes my current place a home. The idea of home becomes obscure; dimmed by relocation, commuting and
overly busy lives. What experiences and perceptions, of a locale, can be created to help
evolve a sense of belonging when one is missing? In our ever-changing environments, the natural world is a constant and provides a reference of the real. Pieces in this show illustrate my walking the locale while I deepen my levels of perception and awareness, unveiling the obscurities of place until I understand my connection to it.
Exploring the idea of “belonging” as one of the senses, I am curious to know how it evolves; whether we live most of our lives in one region or we take a nomadic trail, I am interested in what is it that gives us a sense of belonging. What is a constant in an ever-changing landscape? There are many layers of a locale to explore, just as there are levels of responses when we are intent on realizing them through relationship to place. I investigate these questions in each location that I inhabit. I attempt to cultivate a sensual exchange with the natural world utilizing the approach of phenomenology, a philosophical discipline that describes ways the natural world makes itself evident to our awareness. As I research this fluid region of direct experience and the structures and sub-structures of place, my artwork defines a personal connection separate from the purely objectified, mapped world, and I come to understand more fully, a sense of “belonging”.
Catherine Richardson “Maps”, Drawings and Paintings:
The “maps” and paintings are larger 2D format. They follow the system of a map without being navigational tools, but rather a collection of stories of my experiences in relation to place.
About Will Tait:
Tait’s first conscious memory of making artwork goes back to when he was six years old. Fascinated by how the Old Masters created the illusion on a two-dimensional surface of objects in space, as he grew up he drew what was around him. For the most part Will drew flowers, leaves, trees, weeds in fields, and other natural subjects. Later Tait studied for several years at The Art Students League of New York in Manhattan.
In addition to sculpture Will paints, draws, creates one of a kind furniture, and also uses computers as a creative medium. Will Tait’s work is in corporate collections, the Palace of the Legion of Honor, several galleries and he has exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art artist’s gallery. http://willtait.com/
Will was in the original Dr. John Lilly floatation studies (inventor of the floatation tank) and he is an active floater at FLOAT.
Will Tait~ Sculpture~ In His Own Words:
Inspiration for my wood sculpture has always been gleaned from nature. Currently (2007) I look to the physical manifestation of the interplay between natural forces. These forces can be ephemeral like the shapes formed by foam on the edge of waves interacting as they meet the sandy beach and, at other times, a more solid manifestation, such as bark shaped by the growth of a tree, or roots shaped as they grow by the resistance of nearby soil and rocks. For me these manifestations exist in what I think of as the space between the seen and the unseen. This constantly fluctuating space, filled with dynamic energy in constant flux, influences my process and my art profoundly. “My work is more about beauty as I find it in the natural world than intellectual concepts. I suppose at heart I am a romantic.,” stated Will recently
About FLOAT-Floatation Center & Art Gallery:
Founded in 2006, Float is the only floatation center and art gallery in the San Francisco Bay Area. Floatation therapy is a unique and powerful tool that allows you to shut out the world and drift into the deepest possible level of physical and mental relaxation.
FLOAT, an urban art spa in the exciting Jingletown District of Oakland, offers new, public exhibits of local artists monthly to stimulate and challenge your senses.
Come for a Float ~ Stay for the Art
FLOAT, Floatation Center - Art Gallery 1091 Calcot Place, Unit # 116 (located in a store front loft of the historic Cotton Mill Studios) Oakland, CA 94606
www.thefloatcenter.com
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About the Press Release
FLOAT Gallery is pleased to announce “Homeland Obscurity”, a group art show of paintings and sculpture, opening August 16, 2007 and running through September 13, 2007.
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