Xu Bing: Spotlight Artist in Residence speaks Thursday

Nov. 3, 4:30 – 6 p.m., Wyatt Pavilion Theatre

 

About The California Studio

Xu Bing is the fall quarter spotlight artist in residence in The California Studio: Manetti Shrem Artist Residencies. The talk is organized by The California Studio and co-sponsored by the Department of Art and Art History, East Asian Studies and Global Affairs. The UC Davis studio art program visiting artists program is one of the most extensive in the nation. The California Studio: Manetti Shrem Artist Residencies at UC Davis hosts five internationally recognized artists annually in quarter and weeklong residencies focused on teaching at the undergraduate and graduate level. The program launched in fall 2021. 

Xu Bing is a visual artist internationally recognized for his experiments with written script. Bing garnered international attention in the late 1980s for his experiments with the Chinese written script created using woodblock carving and printing to produce a series of nonsensical characters.

Since then, Bing has explored the ways in which the written script bridges different systems of writing and engages audiences across different cultures. His work incorporates a wide variety of media including ink rubbings, stencils, scrolls, computer manipulations, organic materials and living animals.

He has received the MacArthur Fellowship, Fukuoka Asian Culture Award, Artes Mundi Prize, a lifetime achievement award from the Southern Graphics Council and the U.S. State Department Medal of Arts. His work has been included in the 45th, 51st and 56th Venice Biennials, Sydney Biennial, and Johannesburg Biennial, among other international exhibitions.

More in this story.

A debut feature film of Bing's was screened earlier this week at UC Davis. See a trailer below.

Ann Lavin, Clarinet and Dagenais Smiley, Violin in concert

Thursday, Nov. 3, 12:05 – 1 p.m., free, a Shinkoskey Noon Concert

Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center

The program includes Maurice Ravel: Pièce en forme de Habanera, Krzysztof Penderecki: Three Miniatures for Clarinet and Piano, and George Gershwin: Three Preludes for Clarinet and Piano, arr. Cohn. 

Find a link to the livestream here.

A Conversation with Academy Award Winner Joseph Patel

Thursday, Nov. 3, 4:30 p.m., Vanderhoef Studio Theatre, Mondavi Center

Join Chancellor Gary May at the Fall 2022 edition of the Chancellor’s Colloquium Distinguished Speaker Series. Chancellor May welcomes Joseph Patel ’94. Patel is one of the producers, including Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, of the theatrical film Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) for which he received an Oscar, Grammy, BAFTA, and other awards. Patel graduated from UC Davis in 1994 with a B.A. in Economics. He was heavily involved with KDVS, the campus student-run radio station.

Find more information and purchase tickets here.

Read more about the conference here.

Conference looks at culture in the Fukushima disaster of 2011

Thursday, Nov. 3, 6:30 p.m., 1002 Cruess Hall, and Nov. 4, 9:30 a.m., Student Community Center, Multipurpose Room

Fukushima, Japan, was struck by a triple disaster on March 11, 2011 — earthquake, tsunami and nuclear power plant failure. The disaster and its impact on the nation’s psyche has been explored extensively through film, literature and art during the decade since the disaster.

The UC Davis Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures will take a closer look at creative work that grew out of the disaster in the conference “The Culture of the Fukushima Disasters: Japanese Film, Literature, Manga, and Photography after 3.11” taking place Nov. 3 and 4. The event will include a film screening and presentations by scholars from around the country. The conference is being presented for the annual Alan Templeton Distinguished Lecture in Foreign Languages, Literatures and Cultures. All events are free and open to the public.

Read more about the conference here.

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Purnamasari concert Friday at Pitzer, conference on Indonesian music Saturday

Friday, Nov. 4, 7 p.m., Ann E. Pitzer Center 

(Note, this event precedes a concert on Indonesian music the next day. See below).

Bay Area Indonesian-Folk-Rock fusion group Purnamasari grew out of the idea of supporting a new generation of artists from both sides of the world through music and dance. The concert takes place on the eve of the LUCE Foundation’s conference “Rethinking the History of Indonesian Music.”

Purnamasari, led by Indonesian born, San Francisco Bay Area singer-songwriter Lisa Graciano, integrates Indonesian gamelan instruments and ideas into original, yet accessible guitar-based songs and compositions. Purnamasari means Essence of the Full Moon and features performers experienced in both gamelan and Western music, mixing and extending traditional techniques. They create a unique musical fusion, using a variety of gamelan instruments and tuning systems, mixed with western instruments tuned to a pitch allowing interaction with the gamelan.

Purnamasari grew out of the Indonesian American Cross Cultural Music Project, a collaboration between Lisa and gamelan player Paul Miller, and includes musicians Megan Hewitt, Patrick Liddell, Richard Phillips, Keenan Pepper, Nami Murata and Julia Martin. The band performed at the San Francisco International Arts Festival 2021, and the concert was also sponsored in part by grants from the Sam Mazza Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, and marked the release of Purnamasari’s concept album titled Le Gong.

Find more information and purchase tickets here. 

‘Rethinking the History of Indonesian Music’

Saturday, Nov. 5, 9 a.m. – 5 p.m., Ann E. Pitzer Center

• Free to attend — and lunch will be provided—for those that pre-register for the conference. Please submit your registration by Thursday, Nov. 3.
• For those unable to attend, the conference will be livestreamed beginning at 9:20 am. Please note that interaction is not possible over the livestream.

For the conference “Rethinking the History of Indonesian Music” eight scholars will present 30-minute papers, followed by 10-minute prepared responses from local respondents, on topics related to the broad subject of music history in the geographical area currently identified as the Indonesian archipelago. The conference is part of a broader Luce Foundation project titled “Toward a Music History of the Indonesian Archipelago,” which will take place over two years. With this open approach, the conference seeks to explore topics of indigeneity, colonialism, the evolving artistry of modern gamelan, and the rethinking of Indonesian history.

Find the full conference schedule and more information here.

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Graduate student featured in ‘Black Voices in Art’

Will Maxen (M.F.A., ‘23) is participating in a new group show at The Museum of Northern California Art entitled “Black Voices in Art.” This exhibition showcasing contemporary art is presented in collaboration with ”Footsteps to You,” a collection of over 15,000 historical freedom artifacts.

Both shows run through Dec. 4.

The vision of the Museum of Northern California Art is to be a vehicle for communities in the region to experience and create art for the sake of enjoyment, expression, social cohesion, innovation and communication. They are located at 900 Esplanade, Chico. Visit their website for visitor hours and more information here.

Don’t Fence Me In: Paintings by Jan Walker at the Pence

Nov. 4 – 27, Artist Reception: Nov. 11, 6 – 9 p.m.

Jan Walker’s paintings celebrate the beauty and freedom of the wild horses who roam the Western states. As an artist, she is deeply inspired by their strength, and the bonds that they form with different generations of their herd. As she writes of their strong connection to the land, “They are as equally of the wild as they are the wild itself.” The current plight of wild horses is tied to ongoing threats from the cattle industry, who lobby efforts by the federal government to cull and confine the herds. A portion of the sales from her paintings will be donated to organizations that promote the humane treatment of wild horses.

Jan Walker’s exhibit is on view at the Pence Gallery, located at 212 D Street, Davis. Find more information here.

Last chance to see 'Worthy Mysteries' at the Pence

Steve Briscoe’s exhibit, Worthy Mysteries, currently on view at the Pence gallery, closes Nov. 5. This exhibit includes a stunning selection of found object sculpture, paintings, and installations that invite both contemplation and joyful delight. Using second-hand objects such as old signs, stencils, and chairs, he builds structures that seem precariously connected. His series of hand-made tools of unknown function seems to hint at our universal ability to create implements that embody the potential for both creative use and abuse.

In his paintings, Briscoe questions our ability to build understanding through language. Bits of words, diagrams, and symbols float across fields of color, offering multiple entry points to communication. Briscoe’s work embraces the simplicity of the everyday object — the tool, the box, the sign — but recontextualizes it to allow for a new understanding of our world as we experience it.

Visit the exhibit before it closes Nov. 5. Find more information about current exhibits here.

Save these dates

'Connecting Threads' with S&B Fiber Arts Club at the Manetti Shrem Museum next week

Thursday, Nov. 10, 2 – 4 p.m., Carol and Gerry Parker Art Studio, Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, UC Davis

Get your fiber art square ready. Celebrate (with food and music) the completion of a community blanket, organized by S&B Fiber Arts Club, to create a snapshot of UC Davis pieced together from individual squares created by fiber arts enthusiasts across campus and inspired by a pair of embroidered portraits by Chiffon Thomas in Young, Gifted and Black.

To participate, create an 8x8-inch square using the fiber art medium of your choice that represents who you are.

Visit the Art Spark page for more art making opportunities.

'Persian Serenades of the West' is lecture/recital

Nov. 10, 12:05 – 1 p.m., free, a Shinkoskey Noon Concert, Recital Hall, Ann E. Pitzer Center

Maryam Farshadfar, piano and Shawyon Malek-Salehi, violin.

Maryam Farshadfar, piano (Ph.D., ethnomusicology, University of Montreal) and Shawyon Malek-Salehi, violin (B.A., music, UC Davis, ‘14) present this lecture-recital, which discusses the history of piano and violin in Iran, and the influence of Persian culture on Western composers from the late 19th century to the present. The recital includes performances of a variety of lesser-known pieces by Western and Persian composers, including pieces by Samin Baghcheban, Gena Branscombe, Henry Cowell, and others.

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