Monica Wyatt: C U R I O U S E R

MorYork Gallery, Los Angeles, CA  2022

Monica Wyatt: C U R I O U S E R
Assemblage Creations from Wonderland
MorYork Gallery, Los Angeles, CA  2022

Press Release:

The title of the exhibition, C U R I O U S E R, whimsically hints at Alice in Wonderland. Entering MorYork’s kaleidoscopic 7,200 square foot space, visitors will be immersed in a showcase of Wyatt’s creations cohabiting with gallery owner and artist Clare Graham’s. “I’m deep down the rabbit hole with my exploration of materials, where I can take them, and how they converse in concert with Clare’s,” said Wyatt. “I hope to entice viewers to plunge into this wonderland of the imagination.”

Most of the pieces in C U R I O U S E R were created during the pandemic, when both Wyatt’s children were concurrently college bound. Among the most recent work is a series of suspended assemblage sculptures made out of sewing machine bobbins and wire, their curved contours hollowed out with gleaming openings redolent of nests and maternity. Another prominent work, The Far Side of a Cloud, suggests a floating intricate winterscape composed of acrylic tubes and hemp cord that interlace with a graceful network of refracted light.

The daughter of a physicist/inventor, Wyatt re-imagines unexpected and overlooked materials, transforming them into intimate assemblage sculpture. Through her material alchemy, ordinary objects – zip ties, hairnets, electrical components – defy the confines of their humble origins, metamorphosing into poetic three-dimensional creations that look as though they might have evolved organically. As a mixed media artist, her visions are manifested through a fusion of artistic instinct and a seemingly scientific approach to experimentation and innovation.

As the contextual backdrop for the exhibition, MorYork is a historic building in Highland Park. Originally a Safeway Market in the 1930s and later a roller rink, today the gallery and studio houses a vast display of Graham’s own sculpture as well as his and Bob Breen’s 50-year cornucopia of flea market collections. A self-described craftsman, Graham creates assemblage work from a treasure trove of recycled materials. He refers to MorYork as a cabinet of curiosities, tying seamlessly into the theme of Wyatt’s show.

Wyatt’s work has been shown in numerous museums and galleries, including, most recently, the Ronald H. Silverman Fine Arts Gallery at Cal State University, Los Angeles, the California Museum of Art Thousand Oaks, Newport Beach Civic Center Sculpture Park, the Brand Library, and Lancaster Museum of Art and History/ MOAH Cedar (solo exhibition). Her sculpture is held in private collections across the United States.

Re.iterate, Launch LA Gallery

Lorraine Heitzman (curator)

Los Angeles, CA 2023

Re.iterate, Launch LA Gallery
Los Angeles, CA 2023
Curator’s words: Lorraine Heitzman

Curated by Lorraine Heitzman, the three artists in Re.iterate rely on systems of repetition in both measured and effusive ways. Raghubir Kintisch, Monica Wyatt and Heitzman explore mystical, natural and psychological worlds through reiteration, and each finds meaning in the process. The impulse to reiterate is fundamental. Repetition creates rhythms, lending emphasis to amplify and clarify; it is a way of making sense of something, just as it is a tool for learning. In Re.iterate, Heitzman, Kintisch and Wyatt show us that, contrary to the common idiom, more is sometimes more.

Raghubir Kintisch paints vivid images on paper that can be construed as an alphabet for a spiritual language drawn from her kundalini practice. Her process involves reimagining and reconfiguring her paintings as her understanding has evolved through introspection and reinvention. Some of her paintings honor gurus and deities, while others approach divination and mysticism in more abstracted ways, in the manner of mandalas and other forms of spiritual art. Each painting is self-sufficient, but the installation emphasizes her repeated use of religious elements, adding to an intensified, immersive holistic experience.

Monica Wyatt finds beauty in the cast-off detritus of manufacturing. With an eye towards the idiosyncratic, she repurposes zip-ties and bobbins into elegant hanging sculptures that belie the humble origins of her materials. Her woven sculptures assume organic forms like hanging bird nests or cell structures that are devoid of color, but ooze with texture. In Wyatt’s hands, the industrial by-products and incidental hardware are given a new life. Her imaginative use of materials is both convincing and fantastical, balancing between the wonder of natural structures and inventive facsimiles.

Launch LA believes exposure to the arts enhances quality of life and strengthens community for all through the shared appreciation of creative expression in all its forms and hybrids. Launch LA is passionate about providing all artists, regardless of race, color, creed or sexual orientation, with quality opportunities to present themselves and their creations that reflect our times to a curious and enthusiastic audience at important happenings throughout Los Angeles.

Diverted Destruction #14:

Cal State LA Edition

Liz Gordon and Mika Cho (curators)

Ronald H. Silverman Fine Arts Gallery

Los Angeles, CA 2022 

Diverted Destruction #14:
Cal State LA Edition
Ronald H. Silverman Fine Arts Gallery
Los Angeles, CA 2022
Curators’ words: Liz Gordon and Mika Cho

The exhibition, Diverted Destruction #14 @Cal State LA, co-curated by Liz Gordon and Mika Cho, highlights art made of discarded objects to address global environmentalism and sustainability.

The exhibit (opening 1/25 and closing 2/26) features the works of eight Southern California artists (Michael Arata, Chelle Barbour, Kate Carvellas, Aaron Kramer, Dave Lovejoy, Vojislav Radovanovic, Anna Stump, and Monica Wyatt) and Cal State LA art students whose works were produced in collaboration with the aforementioned artists. Of particular interest is the novel display of art produced in twofold spaces; one in the artists’ studios and the other at the exhibit site.

The invited artists, the Cal State LA students, and the curators will collect refuse and other found materials destined for the trash and produce art in two collage and assemblage workshops at the gallery in view of the visitors. A panel of the invited artists and participating students will engage in an artist-talk to address various aspects of recycling in Los Angeles.

The exhibition Diverted Destruction, started initially and curated by Liz Gordon (gallerist, Loft at Liz’s), has been shown in various galleries. The latest version #13, “The Fashion Edition,” was hosted at The Loft at Liz’s in 2021. Gordon’s first collaboration with university students is this upcoming Diverted Destruction #14: Cal State LA Edition at the Ronald H. Silverman Fine Arts Gallery. One of many unique aspects of the Diverted Destruction exhibition is the curator, Gordon’s, installation: Diverted Destruction giveaway tables have been included in every Diverted Destruction exhibition, where artists, workshop participants, gallery audiences, and students in this upcoming exhibition can collect materials, which Gordon provides to create recycled and repurposed art.

With support from the Pasadena Art Alliance (PAA), this exhibition delivers on its mission to transform lives and sustain thriving communities and cultures. The PAA supports academic learning and real-world experiences for Cal State LA art students through the experience of working with professional curators and artists and developing their unique talents and diverse life experiences through engaged learning. This exhibition manifests educational priorities and advances the PAA’s mission to foster an appreciation for contemporary visual arts in Southern California by supporting artists, exhibitions, educational programs, and art-oriented, non-profit institutions.

This exhibit may also be viewed virtually at the Ronald H. Silverman Fine Arts Gallery website:

www.ronaldhsilvermangallery.com

By Liz Gordon and Mika Cho

Monica Wyatt: Continuum (solo exhibition)
Lancaster Museum of Art and History
Lancaster, CA  2018
jillithmoniz, PhD (curator)

Monica Wyatt: Continuum (solo exhibition)
Lancaster Museum of Art and History
Lancaster, CA 2018
Curator’s words: jillith moniz, PhD

MOAH: CEDAR presents Continuum, Monica Wyatt’s first installation at the museum and the ongoing collaboration with curator jill moniz. Wyatt is an artistic alchemist, collecting materials and turning them into precious objects. In this process, she fuses the history of disparate materials to create new beginnings, representing the cyclic nature of all things. Continuum is Wyatt’s three-dimensional expression of love, death and creativity. She shares her intentions in this deeply emotional and meaningful aesthetic through themes that speak to sustainability of joy, family, and the environment.

Wyatt’s assemblage has evolved from the early influence of Joseph Cornell to a more outside of the box approach. She credits Betye Saar, Claire Falkenstein, Ruth Asawa, Louise Bourgeois, Eva Hesse and Lee Bontecou with giving her the courage and impetus to pursue engaging themes and compositions that reflect her love for materials, and the new life and meaning she gives them.

Passionate in her hunt for materials, Wyatt honors the histories of these elements whilst stripping them bare so that her reworking feels organic and never forced. She dissembles organs, pianos, sieves and other utilitarian items from a past when people valued human production and craftsmanship and creates reimagined contexts for her constructs.

With assemblage made from both organic and manmade materials, Monica Wyatt challenges the viewer to consider the aesthetic qualities of each as they contribute to her compositions. She makes electric capacitors look like plants and zip ties mimic deep sea life in order to further a dialog about preserving all the things we should hold dear.