Santa Cruz Museum Of Art And History

Dec

07

Nina Simon

Local scientist, curator, writer, educator, Nina Simon came into the KZSC studio to talk with Nada about her fairly new position at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History (MAH).

In May of 2011, Nina was named Executive Director of the MAH. Prior to that, Nina spent her time writing, consulting, and designing interactive exhibits for museums and galleries all over the world out of her home in the Santa Cruz Mountains. She launched her blog, Museum 2.0, in late 2006 and has received over 600,000 visits.

Nina is a wonderful addition to our community and the Museum. She is one of the industry’s most prominent outside-the-gallery thinkers. We talked about her goal to remake the MAH as the primary cultural touchstone of the Santa Cruz community that best embodies our unique cultural vibe.

How does one go about “remaking” a museum and what is involved? In her blog, Museum 2.0, Nina explains that to remake the museum experience, one must get more active participation. This is in alignement with contemporary art theory. We talked about how her ideas relate and were inspired by Tim O’Reilly’s definition of Web 2.0. Without getting into the nitty gritty, Nina explained that the core her work is the simple idea that more participation creates a better cultural institution and/or art piece.

From these ideas, in 2010, Nina published, The Participatory Museum. This book is a comprehensive, practical guide to visitor and staff participation in cultural institutions. This is how she and MAH staff are remaking of our Museum.

Lastly, we discussed the whole slew of upcoming events happening at the museum: STARS, to the newly instituted Third Friday events. and the four new exhibitions going up December 17th; the Rydell Winners, the Espresso Police, Futzie Nutzle, the Butterfly Effect.

December 10th is the Museum’s 20th annual fundraising gala, STARS. This event features an art auction, culinary fare and dancing. All proceeds support the Museum’s exhibitions, collections, events and educational programs throughout the year. This year’s them is the “Roaring 20s” so get out your flapper dresses and Zoot suits. Get your tickets fast, this event always sells out.

To hear our broadcast in its entirety, please click the gray ‘play’ button below:

Here’s the video taken during our show with an iPad2:

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Dec

07

Rupa Dhillon on Gamers on Game

Gamers on Game / Podcast

On December 5, 2011, digital artist, programmer, musician, inventor, educator and DANM alum, Rupa Dhillon, came onto Gamers on Game to talk about her current project, Rock Vibe. Rock Vibe is a Rock Band-like game that can be played by sighted and blind gamers. Instead of using a screen to deliver information, it uses vibrations. When a player feels a vibration on a certain spot, such as the index finger, she must press a certain button on a Rock Band instrument, computer keyboard or MIDI instrument to increase her score.

Rupa created Rock Vibe with two other colleagues as a school project for the Human Computer Interactive class at UC Santa Cruz. The original game allowed blind gamers to play a version of Rock Band on their PCs by responding to vibrations on their arms. Game testers and people who’ve experienced Rock Vibe say that they would like to see the game fully developed. Rock Vibe was recently launched on Kickstarter which is a new founding platform focused on a broad spectrum of creative projects. There are quite a few rewards available to people who donate to the project. Check out Rock Vibe on Kickstarter and help this project happen.

We also talked about her previous work particularly her 2009 piece, Listen. This immersive listening space in which sound is experienced by the body, ears, and eyes was exhibited at the Santa Cruz MAH. The installation’s purpose was to redefine the term “listening” by calling attention to the multisensory nature of sound by allowing it to be heard, felt, and seen. At the core of the installation was a ten-channel speaker system consisting of six subwoofers placed inside a purpose-built bed, with four additional speakers surrounding the space. This large bed allowed visitors to feel the sounds through their bodies and a visualization of the soundscape is projected directly above it. The effect was that of a full body surround sound experience. It is one of my all-time favorite museum installations.

To hear our broadcast in its entirety, please click the gray ‘play’ button below:

Here’s the video of our broadcast:

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Mar

31

Jimbo Phillips Guest for Artists on Art 3/30/10 KZSC Radio Show

Artist Interviews

Jimbo creating his next great piec

Graphic artist and local treasure Jimbo Phillips was on Artists on Art for the last Tuesday in March 2010. You can see his work all over town. His current posters for the Santa Cruz Derby Girls are beloved and tacked to many a teenager’s wall all across the Santa Cruz county. Here’s a picture of one of his posters for the Derby girls.

The time flew by during this half-hour radio show. We had a great time talking about his early training (mostly self-taught with a few classes from Cabrillo, our local junior college) to his emergence in the field of poster and deck graphic arts, logo design and even video games. His illustrations can be seen in Tony Hawk’s American Wasteland.

Jimbo got his start right after graduating from high school working in his father’s studio, the world renowned graphic designer, Jim Phillips. Many a vintage skateboard and surfboard are graced with Jim’s art. Jim started creating surf art in the 60s continuing into the 70s when he became the art director for Santa Cruz Skateboards.

Jimbo is continuing the legacy. Jimbo’s early influences of R. Crumb were greatly motivated by his father. During our show, Jimbo told us a great story of his father planting Mad Magazines in his bedroom when he was a youngster.

Way back in the 80′s, Jimbo started his career from the bottom, literally, sweeping the floors in his dad’s studio. Within a year, though, he had moved up to drawing comics. His passions, commonly shared by many Santa Cruz locals, for skateboarding and snowboarding quickly translated into deck art for skateboards, snowboards, and surfboards. You can find Jimbo’s work here in town at the NHC outlet store at the Santa Cruz BoardRoom on 41st or online at NHS Fun Factory.

Another place to see Jimbo’s work is at the Santa Cruz Museum of Art and History in the current exhibition entitled, Surf City Santa Cruz, A wave of Inspiration. This multi-media, museum wide exhibition features almost half a dozen poster art pieces by Jimbo. There are also many surf boards and movies to be seen in this unique museum show. The show began March 27 and runs through July 25, 2010.

If you missed the live broadcast, you can listen to our show in entirety by clicking on the triangle below.

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Photo by George Sakkestad

Here is a photo of the father and son artists duo taken for a Metro Santa Cruz article back in April of 1999 for an exhibition, Surf’s Up, they had at the Pajaro Gallery.

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Jan

14

Felicia Rice Guest on Artists on Art 1/12/10

Artist Interviews

For the second show of 2010, I had the great pleasure of interviewing Felicia Rice about her current projects that involve her MOVING PARTS PRESS, a fine art and literary publishing press that she began in the late 70s here in Santa Cruz. Currently, she is involved with two exhibitions one as a curator and the other as a participant.

Ms. Rice collaborates with visual artists, performing artists and writers to create book structures in which word and image meet and merge. She employs traditional typography and bookmaking methods in conjunction with digital technology, bringing the flexibility of screen-based design to the texture and history of the letterpress-printed page.

Our show can be heard in entirety by clicking on the triangle below.

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Right now, Felicia has an installation at the The Museum of Art & History @ the McPherson Center in the Rydell Visual Arts Fellowships Exhibition. It is running now through March 14, 2010. This exhibition showcases local artists: the works of William “Skip” Epperson, Felicia Rice, Terri Garland and Daniella Woolf. They are the recipients of the 2008 and 2009 Rydell Visual Arts Fellowship Program at The Community Foundation of Santa Cruz County. The Rydell Visual Arts Fund was created by Roy and Frances Rydell to promote Santa Cruz County artists and arts organizations.

During the show, Felicia told a wonderful story about one of the pieces in exhibition that involved her father that was a painter . We didn’t get to discuss in great detail one of the other works, a work in progress that she is doing in collaboration with a dream team, Guillermo Gomez-Peña, Jennifer A. González, and Gustavo Vazquez. When I first saw this “work-in-progress”, I fell in love. This piece is more than a book it is an museum installation out of box. I fell in love with this book/alter/suitcase art piece.

The exhibition that we didn’t get to due time constraints is the exhibition in preparation, the Book as Medium: Holding/Withholding Text. Felicia is co-curating with this exhibiton with the Sesnon gallery director, Shelby Graham. The show runs January 27 – March 6, 2010 at the Sesnon Gallery, Porter College, UCSC. The public reception takes place Wednesday, January 27, 5:00-7:00pm.

Below is a little video of Felicia talking more about the Book as Medium: Holding/Withholding Text.

This exhibition Book as Medium: Holding/Withholding Text is an international invitational exhibition featuring 28 book artists. Each of the participants probes issues of content, form, material, collaboration and accessibility with wide ranging results. The exhibition is sponsored by the UCSC Art Department, Charles Griffin Farr Fund, Porter College and Cowell College.

There are related events occurring on Friday, March 5, 2010. First there will be a Bookmaking Demonstration @ Cowell Press: 2:00-3:30pm with Gary Young. There will be a panel discussion @ Cowell Provost House: 4:00-5:30pm with Julie Chen, Harry Reese, Sandra Liddell Reese and Felicia Rice, moderated by Shelby Graham. The Closing Reception is at the Sesnon Gallery: 5:30-6:30pm. Events are free and open to the public.

I hope to have her back on the show one day. We didn’t get to really finish our conversation.