walkabout day 11

Putting the Walk back in the About, II.

I walked down, or up, depending on your hemisphere, Santa Barbara's State Street main drag and visited a couple of museums. The Museum of Contemporary Art has a show of architects who wanted to be artists, or vice versa, making some sort of statement about how they are or are not, verso visa, the same thing. However the SB Museum of [regular old] Art has a lot of regular old and tastefully interesting work, with an added special on Delacroix (sorry...closed today). PLUS two spectacular new shows which opened yesterday evening -- I missed the openings but in consolation could see the work without the sheep.

First, Alice Aycock. Amongst: a maquette in machined aluminum for this (32' high) piece at Storm King in NY:

Three-fold Manifestation II, 1987

As well as a large number of large and intricate drawings for which I will simply reference her website: http://www.aaycock.com/drawings.html. She's an incredible drafts-person, an architect, and has no need to whine about how she really wanted to be an artist.

Second, Michelle Stuart, whom I had never heard of before, much to my detriment. She seems to be a contemporary of all our other favorite Land Artists, doing similarly veined work:

Stone Alignments/Solstice Cairns, 1979

Along with a lot of more conceptual drawings, rubbings, and assemblage for which I will again just reference the relevant: http://www.michellestuartstudio.com/index.htm.

All in all not a bad way to wear down my sneakers...followed by bar-food at the Enterprise Fish Company where martinis are .666666% the price of anywhere yet to be accessed and the uber-hipster girls at the bar deigned to discuss Star Dreck trivia for moments on end before returning to ignoring their boyfriends.