Category: Art

Solano Avenue Stroll 2023

Today I had my artwork on display at the Solano Avenue Stroll. The Stroll is the East Bay’s largest street festival. It features over four hundred vendors including 50 entertainers, 25 food booths, 100 government and non-profit agencies, 100 artisans, jewelers, makers, and much more! I’ve participated in the Stroll in the past with the last time being 2015. Since then, I was so busy with my commercial photography it didn’t make much sense to participate. Now it’s time to get my artwork in front of more people so here we are. The stroll draws some 100,000 people. This year it seemed be well attended.

We were on the street setting up at 7:15 in the morning. The event opened to the public at 10:00 and ran until 5:00 PM. It was quite well attended with a constant flow people walking up and down the mile of vendors. Over the course of the day, we connected with friends we hadn’t seen in years, and we made many new acquaintances. We had a number of panoramic images on display.

To attract interest, I offered to give away a framed print, Wreck of the Reyes. I had quite a few people sign up to win, and after the event I spun the Wheel of Names to select a winner.

Congratulations to Thomas! Thanks to everybody that stopped by to visit. It was a fun event. And if you’d like to follow me and my fine art photography visit store.treve.com and sign up for my newsletter. We run a number of giveaways and sales over the course of the year.

Ansel Adams at the de Young Museum

In the summer of 1980, I had to opportunity to participate in the last photography workshop Ansel Adams taught in Yosemite. Needless to say that was a key steppingstone in the path that led to where I am today. So, when I saw the announcement that the show Ansel Adams in Our Time was up at the de Young Museum in San Francisco, I put a date on my calendar.

This turned out to be quite an extensive exhibit with over 100 of Adam’s prints. It also includes the work of others 19th-century landscape photographers, such as Carleton Watkins and Eadweard Muybridge, and contemporary artists like Trevor Paglen, Will Wilson, and Catherine Opie. It is interesting to see how contemporary artists treat some of the grand landscapes of Yosemite. We spent a good 2 1/2 hours in the exhibit, and that didn’t even seem like enough. The exhibit goes through July 23. Well worth the visit.

SFMOMA: Diego Rivera

November 22 was a day to play tourist in our own back yard. We had reservations to see the Diego Rivera exhibit at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. We also included a visit to Salesforce Park, an amazing park situated 70 feet in the air and spanning four blocks.

Our outing started with a short drive to the El Cerrito Plaza BART Station. We were concerned about parking, but when we got to the station at 11 a.m., there was an abundance of empty parking slots. We rode the train into the city and got off at Montgomery Station. It was noon when we exited the BART station. Downtown San Francisco was like a ghost town. There were very few people and many of the restaurants were closed. We walked the short distance to SFMOMA and headed to Café 5 on the fifth floor.

We both ordered the Chicken and Cilantro soup and then found a table outside in the Jean and James Douglas Family Sculpture Garden. One of the gingko trees was in full fall display and the “Love” sculpture seemed to be calling me. I’m hearing “can’t buy me love,” by the Beatles.

The soup was delicious, although it was a bit tepid by the time it reached us. Our tickets for the Diego Rivera exhibit were for 2 p.m. so we had some time to explore the museum. The Oculus Tunnel by Olafur Eliasson was fun.

Then it was time to explore the Diego Rivera exhibit. I was able to pull up the audio tour on my iPhone and listen to the discussion about Rivera’s work. My hearing aids act as wireless earbud, which makes for easy listening. While I was aware of some of Rivera’s work, I had forgotten about his involvement with communism and the influence he had on the art world. It is quite an extensive display and well worth a visit.

One of the pieces on display is the Pan American Unity mural which is huge. I thought it would be interesting to see if I could photograph it in sections and stitch the sections together. My effort worked better than I had imagined, although I ended up losing some of the top and bottom of the work.

From SFMOMA we walked to the Salesforce Transit Center where we found our way up to the park, home to 600 trees and 16,000 plants arranged in 13 different ecological zones. I was intrigued with the “Bus Fountain” that dances to the movement of the busses on the lower level.

Playing tourist in our own back yard was fun. Sometimes we forget how much there is to see and enjoy here. We’re making a list of more things to do locally so stay tuned. In the meantime, feel free to view more photos online.

The Turquoise Trail

On July 17 our route took us through Taos, where we stopped at Ranchos de Taos to see the San Francisco de Asis Catholic Mission Church; always a notable stop with the abode buttresses and surrounding architecture providing plenty of photo opportunities in both color and black and white.

Then we passed through Santa Fe, making a brief stop for ice cream. Consulting the map we noticed an alternate route, so rather than blasting through on I25 we headed for Highway 14, also known as the Turquoise Trail. The drive took us through several small towns. We stopped Los Cerrillos, where we explored the grounds of the church and some of the colorful buildings around town. The town was very quiet during our visit, but it was clear that a number of art galleries and artists would make this a busy spot when tourists are out.

We had to do a double take as we passed a herd of colorful origami horses. Having driven past, we made do a U-turn to take a closer look; something that’s not uncommon, and one of the reasons we like the less travelled routes. I wouldn’t even think about doubling back if we were on a four-lane divided highway. The Outside the Box Studio was closed, but we had a clear view to look over the barbed wire fence.

Continuing on we were struck by a small church near Golden, and again stopped to take a few photos.

Then it was back on the main highway, I25, to make our way through Albuquerque and on to our campsite at The Golden Rose Ranch near Prewitt, New Mexico.

Immersed in Van Gogh

With museums opening up we decided to visit the Immersive Van Gogh exhibit in San Francisco. We bought tickets ahead of time for an off-peak visit for an 11 AM entry on June 22. This was our first venture out into a public space in over 15 months.

To experience the exhibit you enter a large room where animated images of Van Gogh’s work are projected on all four walls of the room as well as the floor. Music accompanies the visuals. It’s a spell-binding experience. In the middle of the room is an elevated viewing platform. We waited for the opportunity to climb the stairs and spent some time on the platform letting the images and music wash over us. Then we returned to the ground floor where we found a spot to sit with the cushions provided and experience more of the show. My still images do not do the show justice.

I’ve been around long enough to recall when a high tech slide show used two slide projectors and dissolve-synchronizer, so this seemed mind-boggling considering how many projectors were involved and the technology required to create and produce this show. The show was created by Massimiliano Siccardi and a team of creatives.

We were mesmerized by the moving visuals and the music, and we found ourselves using our iPhones to capture video clips. Here’s a two minute compilation of clips that will give you the feel for the show.

The show cycles about every 35 minutes and we found ourselves staying through two cycles. Our only regret was driving. Parking was a challenge. In hindsight, it would have been easier to take BART. After driving around looking for parking we ended up paying $25 for public parking a short distance away.

No Spectators

“No Spectators: The Art of Burning Man” is an exhibit currently running at the Oakland Museum of California in Oakland. The exhibit runs through February 16, 2020.

Treve with one of the Burning Man art pieces.

Burning Man had its origins in 1986 when Larry Harvey and Jerry James built a human effigy and burned it on a San Francisco beach. The fire drew a crowd of 35 people. Since then the event has moved to the Black Rock Desert in Nevada, where it now draws over 70,000 people from all over the world.

An entire city rises out of the dust of the desert and provides a canvas for experimental art installations. Some of those art pieces along with a glimpse of the history and culture of Burning Man are on exhibit. Burning Man is governed by ten principles: Radical Inclusion, Gifting, Decommodification, Radical Self-reliance, Radical Self-expression, Communal Effort, Civic Responsibility, Leaving No Trace, Participation, and Immediacy.

  • Burning Man fashion
  • Ten Principles
  • Burning Man art

Having not been to Burning Man, I found the exhibit quite enlightening; I recommend it to anybody with an interest in culture, art and creativity.

The ultimate goal of Burning Man is to encourage the culture of creativity. -Marian Goodell

  • Burning Man temple
  • Burning Man art
  • Burning Man art

You can view more photos from the Oakland Museum exhibit here. Burning Man now has a network to facilitate and extend the culture that originates with the Burning Man event into the larger world.

If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash. – Leonard Cohen

Dead Nuts

What is the ultimate machined object? This question is explored in fascinating detail at the Museum of Craft and Design in San Francisco. The exhibit is titled Dead Nuts: A Search for the Ultimate Machined Object. The exhibit runs through December 1, 2019.

We stumbled onto this exhibit several weeks ago when we were out on a photo shoot. We being my assistant and myself. We had a couple of hours of down time between photo shoots and and the museum was close to our work sites.

The museum is located on Third Street in the Dog Patch neighborhood. It’s off the beaten track for most tourists, but it’s well worth the visit if you’re in this part of town or if you are a hardware geek.

The exhibit covers everything from the humble nut and bolt, to a microprocessor, to the space shuttle with all sorts of fascinating subjects. The exhibit originated out of an online forum called Practical Machinist. The members of the forum debated the question “What is the ultimate machine object/mechanism?” They proposed their favorite ideas in an ongoing conversation. Much of that discussion is represented in the exhibit.

La Pedrera

May 28. Our first day of touring in Barcelona starts with a tour of La Pedrera, one of the architectural wonders created by Antoni Gaudi. Casa Mila, or La Pedrera as it is commonly known was built in the early 20th century. Construction began in 1906 and the building was finished in 1912. Well worth the tour if you are visiting Barcelona. Get your tickets ahead of time though. We arrived at 9:00 am, a little flustered since we started off on the wrong direction on our walk, and then discovered that we had left the tickets in the motel room. Internet connection was sparse so we had trouble pulling up the confirmation email on Joann’s iPhone. It seems that the clerk at the counter was gracious enough to believe our story and we were able to tour. The tour is self-guided with handsets to listen to narration about the features of the building. Gaudi in known for drawing inspiration from nature and his devotion to the Church.

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The tour starts on the roof of the structure with the fanciful design of the roof vents. From there you go down the the attic where you can see the rib like structures that support the roof. The attic served as the work area for servants. The building itself was designed as an apartment building.

From the attic you go down to one of the apartments which is furnished as it might have been in the early 20th century.

Sea Ranch Exhibit

Treve at The Sea Ranch exhitit at SFMOMA.

May 7, 2019 2 pm. We are at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art touring an exhibit “The Sea Ranch.” The exhibit ends on June 2, so if you are a fan of architecture and California modernism this exhibit is worth seeing.

Sea Ranch is a development on the California Coast about 100 miles north of San Francisco. Architect and planner Al Boeke envisioned a community that would preserve the area’s natural beauty. Boeke hired landscape architect Lawrence Halprin to create the master plan which grew to encompass 10 miles of the Sonoma County coastline. The development is considered a beacon of modernism on the Northern California coast. The first building was completed in 1965 and the development was envisioned as a progressive, inclusive community, guided by the idealistic principles of good design, economy of space, and harmony with the natural environment.

The design guidelines require that the buildings become part of the landscape. Exteriors are unpainted wood or muted stains and the roofs lack overhanging eaves.

We found the exhibit to be quite interesting with many photos and drawings and some of Lawrence Halprin’s original notes and photos by Morley Baer .

At the moment there are some 1800 homes in the development with many of them serving as vacation rentals.

Global Cooling Event 2019

Global Cooling Event at Dance-A-Rama 2019.

It remains to be seen what effect our Global Cooling Event will have on global temperatures. If nothing else, we raised some awareness of global warming and had some fun in the process.

The event took place as part of Dance-A-Rama 2019, an annual open studio event with free dance performances. While I do not profess to be a dancer, I have been involved with Dance-A-Rama since 2003. I had been working with dancers on a dance photography project for several years and one of the dancers suggested that I do a performance piece.

At 2:45 this afternoon, I stepped out into the middle of the performance space and invited the audience to join me. After a few minutes assigning roles to the willing audience members, we had one person holding a large inflatable globe, three people with fans cooling the earth, two people holding a scroll with the words of Brother Eagle Sister Sky, an excerpt from a speech by Chief Seattle, and three people with cameras capturing images. At the sound of a chime, the earth begins orbiting the room. The fans, and photographers follow. A reader begins reading the words on the scroll. I continue to use the chime to direct the motion of the earth. When the reading ends I thank the participants and they return to their seats. I have yet to compile the video and still images into something presentable, but here are a few stills from the event.

Dance-A-Rama is sponsored by Terrain A Dance and Performance Collective. I would like to thank fellow Terrain members Mary Reid, Ruth Botchan and former Terrain member Ann Swigart for their help with today’s piece. I would also like to thank the members of the audience that were courageous enough to leave their chairs to join us on stage. Dance-A-Rama marks a 20 year anniversary with today’s event.

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