Orange County Museum of Art, Pacific Triennial Exhibition Review

Araya Rasdjarmrearnsook, artist  

This week I visited the Orange County Museum of Art and the California-Pacific Triennial exhibition.  Devoted to contemporary art from around the Pacific Rim, the exhibition includes the work of thirty-two artists from Canada, Mexico, Columbia, Honduras, Guatemala, Peru, Chile, Japan, Korea, China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Taiwan, Australia and the United States. The works are focused on interrelationships between the complex cultural, political, and economic issues in California and the Pacific Rim. The works represent the full range of artistic media from traditional painting, sculpture, ceramics, fiber art and drawing, to photography, video, film, performance, installation and conceptual art. The show includes over 100 pieces – my favorite is from Thai artist Araya Rasdjarmrearnsook whose video called Two Planets: Millet's The Gleaners and Thai Farmers (2008) records the humorous, thoughtful reactions of Thai villagers looking at and discussing the famous social-realism painting by Jean Francois Millet from 1857. Tiffany Chung's embroidered maps of political hot spots contrasts sharply with their individual violent history, while her gigantic pom-pom bullhorn (From Morning Merci Exercise to Techno Beat Promotion Dance, 2008) and stuffed plush loudspeakers (Morning Glory, Glorious Mornings, 2008) suggest that tools of communication can become oppressive toys. Shaun Gladwell’s video “Broken Dance”, depicts human beatboxes as they play on one wall as hip-hop dancers move to vocalizations on the opposite wall. Then there is the small room sized installation by Adriana Salazar called “Moving Plant” #30 which depicts dried dead cemetery flowers as they rotate on tiny motors turning slowly. In her video Thread Routes— Chapter 1 (2010) artist Kim Sooja creates a visually riveting exploration of traditional weaving techniques
 from the Machu Picchu region of Peru, where methods of separating out and winding fibers and threads traces back hundreds of years. By observing closely the movements and muscle memory in this traditional medium, the artist gently steers our attention away from the finished product that is the object of all this labor and toward the visual poetry of the process. These works and more are featured in this complex exhibition that could easily benefit from more than one visit to OCMA. (runs through November 17th)

Dario Escobar, artist     Escultura Transparente

Tiffany Chung, artist    Kaesong Armistice Conference Site