Tarik Mask: Cube 1, 2016, mixed media, ink, graphite, gouache paint 17” X 14”
From Within, a showcase of select Long Beach City College (LBCC) student artwork over recent years, will celebrate its opening reception on Saturday from 5:00PM to 9:00PM at Art Exchange (ARTX).
The exhibition is LBCC’s Club d’Art’s first partnership with local arts organizations and displays works from a new generation of talent eager to share their skill and inspiration with the local community. The club’s new advisor is Vietnamese-born Brian Doan, an artist and professor who has exhibited internationally. From Within is a collaboration between Club d’ Art, ARTX and the Long Beach Museum of Art (LBMA).
“Maya Angelou once said that ‘nothing can extinguish the light from within,’” said Lila Orshefsky, a student at LBCC. “We take that quote to heart, and have printed it in the front of our catalogue, because we feel the last two words perfectly capture what it means and what it feels like to be an artist. We as artists receive stimuli from all around us, but how we interpret these stimuli will always derive from within the soul, from our experiences and worldview.”
Everett Babcock: Bundle Slump, 2016, wire, burlap, thread, twine, 26” X 40” X 38”
Guest curated by Ron Nelson, executive director of the LBMA and executive board member at ARTX, From Within will also be accompanied with a catalog highlighting the 108 works Nelson hand-selected from multiple disciplines within the college’s art department.
“An exhibition of such a rich pool of talent doesn’t easily happen,” Nelson said. “It has been inspiring to work with the leadership and artists from LBCC and I can’t wait for all of Long Beach to view and see a solid body of work from some of Long Beach’s best.”
“It is so exciting for us to have Ron Nelson as curator and to be showing at the Art Exchange,” Orshefsky said. “Having this triangle of collaboration fosters the feeling of community, and the exchange of ideas across our lovely city.”
Helena Hsieh: Window, 2014, oil on canvas, 34” X 44”
This will be the first gallery exhibit displaying art from LBCC alumni of the Visual Arts Department, one of the largest in the California Community College system that has an on-campus gallery, several student-run periodical publications and award-winning students who have gone on to study at CSULB, UCLA, USC, the San Francisco Art Institute, the California College of the Arts, the Art Institute of Chicago, Claremont Graduate University and Yale University School of Art.
“If people walk into the Art Exchange and look at a piece for a long, long moment, intuitively soak in the experiences and ideas concealed within the material, and feel something stir inside their heart, feel a twang as a deeply personal interpretation suddenly washes over them, we will have achieved what any artist would feel proud of,” Orshefsky said.
The exhibition will be on display from Saturday, September 9 through Sunday, November 5. A curator’s talk, artist talks and lectures will be held between September 18 and November 3, with dates to be announced by ARTX.
Learn more about LBCC’s Club D’Art via their Instagram @clubdart and Facebook page here. For updates on the exhibition and catalogue, visit the webpage here.
ARTX is located at 356 East 3rd Street.
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