Continuing through June 12, 2011
Her artwork was as obsessively personal as it was cumulative, detailed, layered, painted and embellished. So it seems fitting that "The Curiosities of Janice Lowry," a retrospective for the well known Orange County artist who died of cancer in 2009, is similarly jam-packed with over 100 assemblages, collages, paintings and drawings made by the artist over her 30-year career. But what we quickly realize from looking at so many art works is how dedicated and invested Lowry was in using art to make all her thoughts visual.
Each small glass enclosed box, framed collage or tactile-rich journal page is a wealth of unexpected, often surprising images or objects. Like a snapshot made from someone else's dream, the juxtapositions are often playful, sometimes disturbing and frequently completely puzzling. Yet we can't help but be intrigued by the meticulous labor that went into each of them. It's not surprising then to learn that in 2007 the Smithsonian immediately accepted into their collection the over 120 elaborate journals that Lowry created over her career to keep track of her sketches, to-do lists, dreams, and essays. She once said, "Art is just another way of keeping a diary", and this exhibition gives us an idea just how visually dense and rich a lifetime's chronicle can be.
CSU Grand Central Art Center Gallery
Published courtesy of ArtSceneCal ©2011
