With art programs under fire at even the university level, it’s heartening that graduate students still find room in SoCal galleries—let alone that our colleges of art and design are still afloat. It might be a nice backslap to bureaucrats who seek to gut these programs in the name of necessary budget cuts (while leaving sports programs largely untouched) to visit Otis College of Art and Design’s newest exhibition at their Ben Maltz Gallery: The Story of O: Graduate Fine Arts 1989-2009.
Here, they (and you) will find what 20 years of promoting art can create—a roster of professionals who attended Otis’ fine arts graduate program under the leadership of artist and chair Roy Dowell and emerged to bring more beauty and thought-provoking art into the world. Selected by a distinguished list of curators (including Orange County Museum of Art curator Sarah Bancroft) from a list of artists who have exhibited all over the world, the works include sculpture, video, painting, photography and installations using a broad range of materials—from horse hair to computer parts. Art, like all alternatives to the mainstream, might be under attack, but it ain’t dead yet. (Stacy Davies)
What: The Story of O.
When/Where: Tue-Sat from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. through June 5 at the Ben Maltz Gallery., Otis College of Art and Design, 9045 Lincoln Blvd., Los Angeles.
Info: Call (310) 665-6905, or visit www. HYPERLINK “http://otis.edu/benmaltzgallery” otis.edu/benmaltzgallery. It’s free.
