GARBOUSHIAN GALLERY EXHIBIT TO HIGHLIGHT DEFINING ROLE OF ARMENIAN ARTISTS IN CONTEMPORARY ART
Leo Krikorian
asbarez
Tuesday, August 30th, 2011
“California Armenian Pacific Standard Time” exhibition will include
works by John Altoon, Charles Garabedian, Leo Krikorian, Paul
Sarkisian, William Saroyan and Sam Tchakalian
BEVERELY HILLS-GARBOUSHIAN GALLERY will present California Armenian
Pacific Standard Time, from September 15 to November 5. Planned
artworks include pieces by John Altoon, Charles Garabedian, Leo
Krikorian, Paul Sarkisian, Sam Tchakalian and writer/poet William
Saroyan, among others.
These artists are featured not only because they are California
Armenian Americans, but precisely because of the vital role they
played and some still continue to play in defining Californian art,
both at the aesthetic and institutional level, in the second half of
the 20th century. California Armenian Pacific Standard Time is part
of Pacific Standard Time, an unprecedented collaboration, initiated by
the Getty, which brings together more than sixty cultural institutions
from across Southern California for six months beginning October 2011
to tell the story of the birth of the L.A. art scene.
John Altoon from a the Joan and Jack Quinn collection The Armenian
Diaspora, comprised of immigrants and their descendants, is centered
predominately in Los Angeles and the Central Valley regions of
California and benefits from a confluence of unique influences on its
art making tradition, including a history of social marginalization,
individualistic resilience, and a strong cultural emphasis on the
arts as a whole. GARBOUSHIAN GALLERY’s California Armenian Pacific
Standard Time exhibition attempts to chronicle the post-war history
of Armenian American art making through an interconnection of these
individuals-some well known, some lesser known-and the exceptional
work they have produced.
Just as Armenian American artist Arshile Gorky was highly influential
in shaping American Abstract Expressionism in New York a generation
earlier, a fiercely independent group of painters was quietly taking
hold after World War II in Los Angeles; among them was John Altoon
(1925-1969) and Paul Sarkisian (b. 1928). Altoon was a gifted painter
and big personality who often struggled with fits of depression and
mania. His vaguely figurative abstractions are heralded today for
helping to define both a gallery-L.A.’s Ferus Gallery-and the city it
occupied. Altoon was influential as both an artist and educator; he
taught at Chouinard Art Institute (now CalArts) and Art Center College
of Design, and attended both colleges as well as Otis Art Institute.
Altoon’s work is in major museum collections including the Smithsonian
American Art Museum, National Gallery of Art, Hirshorn Museum and
LACMA, among others.
Sam Tchakalian Sarkisian’s noteworthy international art career
took root in Los Angeles in the mid-1950s, amid contemporaries
John Altoon, Wallace Berman, Ed Kienholz, Walter Hopps and Irving
Blum. Noted first for his abstraction and photorealism, and later
for his finish fetish works, Sarkisian first showed at Walter Hopps’
Syndell Studio which led to inclusion in Hopps’ seminal 1955 Action
exhibition (aka “The Merry Go Round Show” because it was staged within
the carousel building on the Santa Monica pier), and later his Ferus
Gallery. Sarkisian has exhibited his work at the Metropolitan Museum
of Art, New York, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Hirshorn Museum, Whitney
Museum, Chicago Art Institute, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
(in which he was in a two person show with artist Chuck Close),
Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the prestigious Documenta III (1964) and
Documenta V exhibitions (1972), LACMA and the Pasadena Museum of Art,
among others. Sarkisian now lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Also central to the story about Los Angeles art is Charles Garabedian
(b. 1923). Having started painting relatively late in life (he first
began painting at age 32), Garabedian was first lauded for his work in
the 1960s and is a highly celebrated artist who consistently receives
well-deserved recognition as he continues to paint to this day. He
recently closed a major retrospective at the Santa Barbara Museum of
Art, and is included in public collections such as the Metropolitan
Museum of Art (New York), Whitney Museum (New York), Corcoran Gallery
of Art (Washington D.C.), LACMA, and MOCA. Garabedian’s iconoclastic
figurative paintings are precursors to, influences upon, and objects
of affection for the generations of West Coast artists and collectors
that closely follow him.
Meanwhile, outside of Los Angeles city limits, a number of other
Armenian American artists were making their mark on California’s
blossoming cultural landscape. Sam Tchakalian (1929-2004) was a key
figure in San Francisco Abstract Expressionism. Over the course of
his career, he also explored Minimalism and a synthesis of Minimalism
and Abstract Expressionism. Tchakalian has had solo exhibitions at the
De Young Museum and SF MOMA, and his work is included in collections
at MOCA, SF MOMA, the Whitney Museum, and Brooklyn Museum among others.
Also, born in Fresno, William Saroyan (1908-1981) was best known as
an acclaimed fiction writer and playwright, yet by the late 1960s
he would try his hand at visual art too, with an exceptional body of
abstract pieces to his name.
Leo Krikorian (1922-2005) was perhaps the most central, unifying figure
of the arts at the time. Known as the “Grandfather of the Beats,”
(referring to the Beatnik movement of the 1950s, which gave birth to
the hippie movement) Krikorian would indeed host important artists,
writers, musicians, intellectuals and luminaries of the time (including
Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, and Dave Brubeck)
in his cafe The Place in San Francisco’s North Beach-however it was
Krikorian’s painting that warrants his inclusion in California Armenian
Pacific Standard Time. A student of Josef Albers and Ilya Bolotowsky
at Black Mountain College, Krikorian’s masterful geometric abstractions
offer a sterling example of West Coast Modernism-they strive eloquently
for a universal minimalism while still retaining the loose exchange
of colors, flavors and ideas that defines mid-century California.
About Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945 – 1980 Pacific Standard
Time is a collaboration of more than sixty cultural institutions
across Southern California, coming together for six months beginning
in October 2011 to tell the story of the birth of the Los Angeles
art scene and how it became a major new force in the art world. Each
institution will make its own contribution to this grand-scale story
of artistic innovation and social change, told through a multitude
of simultaneous exhibitions and programs.
Exploring and celebrating the significance of the crucial post-World
War II years through the tumultuous period of the 1960s and 70s,
Pacific Standard Time encompasses developments from L.A. Pop to
post-minimalism; from modernist architecture and design to multi-media
installations; from the films of the African American L.A. Rebellion
to the feminist activities of the Woman’s Building; from ceramics
to Chicano performance art; and from Japanese American design to the
pioneering work of artists’ collectives.
Initiated through a $10 million in grant from the Getty Foundation,
Pacific Standard Time involves cultural institutions of every size
and character across Southern California, from Greater Los Angeles
to San Diego and Santa Barbara to Palm Springs.
Pacific Standard Time is an initiative of the Getty. The presenting
sponsor is Bank of America.
WHAT California Armenian Pacific Standard Time – an exhibition of
paintings by California Armenian American artists that pays homage
to the vital role these artists have played and continue to play
in defining California contemporary art.California Armenian Pacific
Standard Time is part of Pacific Standard Time.
Exhibition include pieces by John Altoon, Charles Garabedian, Leo
Krikorian, Paul Sarkisian, Sam Tchakalian and writer/poet William
Saroyan among others.
WHEN Opening Reception: September 14, 2011, 6 – 9 pm Exhibition:
September 15 – November 5, 2011 Gallery Hours: Monday – Friday,
10 am – 5 pm, or by appointment
WHERE GARBOUSHIAN GALLERY 427 North Camden Drive