Warning: Attempt to read property "zones" on null in /home/rln1300/public_html/randomlengthsnews.com/wp-content/plugins/broadstreet/Broadstreet/Vendor/Broadstreet.php on line 273
In 2024, downtown San Pedro had one gallery close in September, the Menduiña Schneider Gallery or MS Gallery, run for nearly 10 years by husband and wife team Alejandra Menduiña and Jorge Schneider. It was a sad loss to the longstanding arts district, which has been designated as one of 14 California Cultural Districts. But this November, San Pedro welcomes the first new gallery to open after many years. ‘solo.’ and Peter Scherrer present an inaugural exhibition featuring paintings by Nancy Crawford. Curated by artist Ron Linden, Nancy Crawford at solo. will begin with an artist’s reception on Nov. 17 and will run through Jan. 12.
Artist, curator Ron Linden called Nancy Crawford a painter of moods and atmospheres; of seas and skies occasionally punctuated by isolated, dream-like, solitary figures. “Her work invites the viewer to enter a near-cinematic space, a space of anticipation or longing, an in-between space ripe with possibility.”
For her part, Crawford describes her process, saying that she begins each subject matter with a series of paintings, an exploration of light and color.
“I am never sure where the journey will take me. I try to leave room for the viewer to enter this world and share my excursion.”
Crawford attended San Jose State University, Chouinard Art Institute, and the Art Center College of Design. Her work has been exhibited in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, and Atlanta.
Gallery owner Peter Scherrer said the name “solo.” is a nod to the gallery showing a solo show every two months. Scherrer looks forward to having six shows a year, mainly from local artists who he admires. solo. may also include a few people from Los Angeles.
“We have all these artists and talent here and a lot of them just do their work, but don’t really promote it,” said Scherrer, who himself is an artist and graphic designer.
Scherrer is trying to make it worthwhile — and to work — for the artists. This opening exhibition of Crawford’s works is a good example of what he’d like to show. It renders the look of a serious gallery, “that the art is important, not a ton of pieces,” he said. “I deliberately wanted Ron to curate the first show here and I wanted to have someone for the first show [to be] from this building [of studios]. And Ron, for me, is sort of the ‘Don’ of all the artists.”
Over time he hopes for people to feel like he is doing something important here, and that they will also come from farther away. He never intended to have a gallery. but when the space opened up, he said he was going to try it.
The owner, Robin Hinchliffe, treats this building as a gift to the arts district in part by keeping the rent reasonable, Scheerer noted. He wants to support this gallery for the arts district.
“The talent is here, San Pedro has great artists,” Scherrer said. “I feel this place has the potential to be an arts destination where people want to come to see different artists and galleries. Seventh Street could be like Gallery Row.”
Nancy Crawford has exhibited in Los Angeles, West Hollywood, Hollywood, Pasadena, Santa Barbara, San Francisco, Chicago and Atlanta. She explained that Scheerer told her he was interested in getting an artist from the building that the gallery is housed in for the first show.
“It was First Thursday (the night of San Pedro’s monthly ArtWalk) and he said he was going to do this gallery,” said Crawford. “He asked me if I’d do a show. I said, ‘Sure.’”
Crawford has lived and worked in San Pedro for 20 years, about 10 years in her current studio, and before that, she had a studio right across 7th Street for 10 years. Her arrival coincided with the nascent San Pedro arts district. She echoed Scheerer’s comments about Hinchcliffe regarding the gallery building, but Crawford also noted that the artist was instrumental in starting the First Thursday ArtWalk.
“I moved here before there was an arts district,” she said. “People opened their studios but it was really casual and friendly and more informal.”
The Works
When asked how she would describe her works, Crawford discussed their process of evolution.
“It’s like you start something and you think you know what it is, and sometimes that’s what happens,” she said. “Other times, it kind of gets a life of its own and becomes something else.
Like, if I have any commission, it’s a job. I’m still painting, using the same tools, but it’s a job. When you’re painting or doing music or writing or anything creative for yourself, it can take a path of its own and that’s the part of it that I like. But it’s sometimes hard to get to that place. And it’s not always that way and, you know, you have to make a living.”
The television and film industries have bought or rented many of Crawford’s pieces. But lately, she said, the film industry seems to have slowed down and many production companies have moved out of town.
“I feel like I’ve been fortunate that I’ve been able to make a living from painting,” she said.
Crawford said, quite humbly, that most of her recent work is “pleasant,” including the pieces in this show. But it used to be much edgier. She described one of those (untitled) edgier pieces in the show as one of her better pieces. In part, we see a ghost-like woman lying supine on a bench. The faceless figure is distinctive for its ethereal form and shroud draped over her body. Both are soft and pink and appear to be dripping like dissipating paint. It’s beautifully peaceful and softly eerie.
“I like that painting,” Crawford said. “I won’t say that about everyone. But I think that there’s some mystery or something to it.
“Painting can be really meditative,” Crawford said. “You’re spending a lot of time alone, so you’re conversing but not verbally. But it takes on a life of its own somehow and then you want to get back there. If you get interrupted, it’s difficult to get back to that space. And for me, it’s easiest if I listen to a piece of music … repetitively because that helps you get back there, if you do. Sometimes you just never do. Sometimes you’re just executing something. And sometimes it has meaning.”
Crawford appreciates different kinds of music, especially Glenn Gould, a pianist who often plays Johann Sebastian Bach. Usually, when she starts a painting, it helps her go back to that state.
A few of the paintings in this show are structures or portions of them. Crawford said she enjoys juxtaposing elements or pieces within them. In Windows I & II, located on the gallery’s back wall, Crawford’s blend of brown, black, and tan creates mysterious shadows with an industrial feel to it. Boxed sections are contrasted by small silhouette figures within them (one in an overcoat) walking through each window-pane rectangle as if inspecting the interiors; mystery men surveilling.
“It’s not a surprise, but I don’t know how to describe it,” she said of the figures. “It just seemed like a good idea at the time. I mean, you’re composing something and you want it to work. It’s like windows in an old loft or industrial building. But without the figures, it wouldn’t be as interesting.”
In another piece, Highlands, Crawford examined it and said she was thinking of the Chinese landscapes where the perspective is different. It’s one that incorporates shifting perspectives with multiple planes of view. She said it’s not like Western art — with a fixed perspective — as she held her arms out in front of her torso. Rather, she said, “It’s like this,” as her arms raised up as if hovering over a scene.
“I just do things, you know, when you’re thinking about it, you just do it,” Crawford said. “Then later, you read it or look at it and become more reflective. [First] I put some color. I usually start out with Prussian blue and then see [what comes to mind] then I go from there, adding and subtracting.”
Also on view is Midnight, Crawford’s painting of the Manzanar relocation camp (one of the American concentration camps, where more than 120,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated during World War II from 1942 to 1945). The location is now a state park in Owens Valley. Crawford’s serene scene depicts a large deep blue sky horizon and a single barrack structure casting shadow on soft white terra firma, bleeding into a blue that reflects its sky. One border of the painting appears foggy and obscure, like a vignette.
“My family all went there,” she said. “And so [the painting] is the feeling when I used to go there before they made it a state park. It takes you to a different place. But it’s like there’s a sadness there, or there used to be. And it was windy. There’s not much in that painting, but it’s not empty either. I don’t like to do things that are really obvious.”
As for this show, Crawford said, “I think Peter’s done a fabulous job. I’m amazed at what he does, really. And he’s still so nice.”
When asked what inspires her, the artist said, “Anything.” Many of her paintings include common themes of mystery and the solitary. Dreamlike indeed, Crawford paintings will draw you in, offering a melange of possibilities. A very talented painter, Nancy Crawford’s works, including her use of color, have a lot to say and many places to take her viewers. Join the discussion at solo. on Nov. 17.
The gallery is open Saturday and Sunday afternoons or by appointment.
Time: 3 to 7 p.m., Nov. 17
Details: For additional information call 310-913-5492 (Peter Scherrer) or 310-600-4873 (Ron Linden); www.solosanpedro.com
Venue: solo. 366 W. 7th St., San Pedro
