Cal Poly Art and Design Students to Exhibit Original Work in Downtown San Luis Obispo June 13-21
Contact: Lillie Turinsky | Artist and Project Lead | 419-967-5347; lturinsk@calpoly.edu
SAN LUIS OBISPO –– A collective of graduating Cal Poly art and design students will share their creations with the community they’ve called home for the past four years by hosting a weeklong display in the heart of downtown starting Friday, June 12.
The exhibit, “This is Not a Couch,” will be at 750 Higuera St., in the former Gaia’s Gallery that closed last September, with an opening reception set for 5-8 p.m. on Friday.
The show will continue 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily through June 21. It will feature the works of nine artists — including three from the Central Coast — with about 50 original artworks, varying in size and medium, ranging from hyperrealism to abstraction, highlighting their individual creative methodologies.
“We hope that visitors and viewers of our show will feel excited by the increasing number of young artists in San Luis Obispo, and proud of the initiative and drive we have to create and organize this event,” said Lillie Turinsky, one of the student artists and project leads.
Artwork will be for sale, as well as artist prints and merchandise made from repurposed clothing embellished with hand-carved, block-printed designs.
Turinsky and classmates Liliana Monge of San Luis Obispo, Maya Benham of Rancho Santa Margarita, California, met earlier in the school year after the Art and Design Department announced that the senior studio art retrospective exhibit would be held in early May.
“We tossed around the idea of putting on a small show during grad weekend that would allow our works to be shown to loved ones and any other visitors coming for commencement,” said Turinsky, who moved to Pismo Beach from Port Clinton, Ohio. “That talk evolved into starting a group collective and larger group show to encourage collaboration, professional ‘art world’ experience, and relationship building with our other classmates.”
“This is Not a Couch” pays homage to Belgian surrealist René Magritte’s portrait of a tobacco pipe with “Ceci n’est pas une pipe” (This is not a pipe) spelled out like a caption below the image. The 1929 piece — titled “The Treachery of Images” — “acts as a nod to the importance of visual language, the significance of symbols in art and representation vs. reality,” Turinsky said.
The collective, which calls itself Big Artist Corp., had their own symbol: A well-worn, light-blue, two-cushion couch in the shared studio in Room 127 of the Dexter Building that was a comfy place to rest over their time at Cal Poly. For the show’s poster, each student contributed a rendition of the settee.
“We all use this couch daily, and it has become an anchor point in our time at Cal Poly and in the Art Department specifically,” she added. “Our shared college experience has been shaped by the environments we collectively frequent, the art history and theory we have been exposed to, and the work we have made and witnessed each other make along the way. The title of our show exemplifies our shared environment and knowledge we have acquired as classmates and friends in this program.”
Turinsky said organizing the show has brought the classmates closer together “as coworkers and friends.”
“If the show is a success, it will be a huge boost of confidence in my leadership, organizational and communication skills,” she said. “This experience also benefits our ability to network and connect with outside sources, which in the future will help us work with galleries, collectors, buyers, etc.”
More Information: https://www.instagram.com/bigartist.corp/
Student Artists Participants:
Maya Benham
Her scrupulous painting techniques and double-entendre humor result in thoughtful, borderline theatrical paintings exploring themes of objectification, nonconformity and femininity.
Owen Isachsen
The Encinitas, California, resident transferred from nearby Mira Costa College in Oceanside. His abstract paintings of ocean photography are playful and almost topographical, teasing at an imagined bottomless world existing just below a surface bursting with vivid colors and light refractions.
Liliana Monge
She was born and raised in San Luis Obispo and by age 9 had completed a novel, “Shadow: Beyond the Walls,” that her parents helped her to self-publish. She expanded to studio art at Cuesta College before transferring. Her artwork exhibits an intense visual and conceptual depth, forged by combining cold hues, sculptural elements and cultural reconnection. The results are atmospheric, narrative paintings that invite a viewer to take a step into a melancholy dreamworld.
Cailin Nicolich
Originally from the agricultural plains of Modesto, California, she moved to San Luis Obispo to attend Cuesta College before transferring. The relocation heavily informed her relationship with landscape. Her current explorations in bold hues and panel manipulation create uncanny, ephemeral landscapes attached to fleeting memories and humanity’s impact on the environment.
Olivia Pye
The Los Altos, California, resident found her medium upon switching to oil paints from water-based acrylics to create paintings that focus on sensual depictions of the female form. Her glossy, sultry paintings offer parallels between hidden intimate moments and voyeuristic foreboding. Her small-scale canvases further the commentary and effect of glancing through a peephole at another’s secrets.
Sarah Tarquin
The resident of Kailua on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii, is passionate about creating by hand or digitally. Her looming compositions and exaggerated forms create large scale works that morph and shift elements of the body, blurring the lines between beguiling sensuality and nightmare fuel.
Tilman Stoppler
The Foster City, California resident, transferred from Santa Barbara City College. His sculptural pieces are rooted in craftsmanship and cultivating relationships with his materials. Primarily using wood, his work is perfectionistic while adaptive to flaws throughout the process, speaking to an artistic harmony between acceptance and growth.
Lillie Turinsky
Her work exists as paintings and sculptures of symbolic objects, figures and textures placed within abstract landscapes. Her work is steeped in references and symbolism regarding religious history, heritage and nature, developing a personal lore. Turinsky’s washy, swirling brushstrokes and structured-yet-elastic compositions reflect an introspective navigation through material and spiritual realms.
Alexa Valenzuela
The Central Coast resident from Guadalupe taps her subconcious to create art inspired by anxiety, eating disorders, sensory issues and relationships. The result is mixed media works that are emotionally charged, materially resourceful and deeply personal. Taking inspiration from personal stories and memories, she creates works that invite private, tender conversations.
Top Photo:
San Luis Obispo artist Liliana Monge says her artwork exhibits an intense visual and conceptual depth, forged by combining cold hues, sculptural elements and cultural reconnection. The results are atmospheric, narrative paintings that invite a viewer to take a step into a melancholy dreamworld, she says.
Photo by Amery Gill
