Local Art History in the Making and Made

In the beginning was the Reynolds. The modest but active and ambitious Reynolds Gallery was Westmont College’s public-invited art space for many years, and served its purpose well, as the school’s art department and interests were going upwardly mobile. Tony Askew and John Carlander were professor/artists involved in the Reynolds era’s upkeep and upturn.

That seminal period begat a fuller coming-of-age expansion of the Westmont art factor, with the 2008 arrival of Judy Larson, fresh from a directorial position at the prestigious Women’s Museum in Washington, D.C., and ready to embark on the creation of a vastly larger art push on campus. Her westward trek established her as the director/curator of a new, respectable and full-fledged new museum of art, part of the expansive Adams Visual Art Center, opened in 2010.

This bit of pre-history of the museum — the most recent addition to the humble landscape of official art museum enterprises in Santa Barbara — is the implicit, rootsy backdrop of a special summer exhibition now on view, Building a Collection, 2008-2025, Honoring Director Judy Larson. As Larson leaves her formidable post and legacy, recently retiring after 17 years fighting the good fight for art’s sake, this is a ripe moment to take and do the math of her achievements.

Consider these numbers: 100,000 visitors have passed through the space so far, and the museum (more recently dubbed the Westmont Ridley-Tree Museum of Art in honor of the benefactor couple Lord and Lady Leslie Ridley-Tree) has grown from about 400 objects to nearly 2,500 in the permanent collection. Curator and now interim director Chris Rupp and Curatorial Assistant Ella Jennings dove into that ample collection vault and assembled the current sampler show, offering at least a teasing glimpse of the Larson years.

Building a Collection is well worth a visit (actually, any excuse to visit this dreamy and wooded campus is welcome). Not only does it touch on many of the past exhibitions that have passed through these museum walls — triggering memories for those of us who have made this space a regular art-going destination while paying tribute to Larson’s role in the museum’s history so far — but also, on the art’s own merits, the show represents a diverse and satisfying journey through a huge range of artistic eras and ideas, from Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot forward, through Howard Finster, Andy Goldsworthy, Kiki Smith, and a sizable survey of significant artists in our regional midst.  

The Corot connection is, in fact, a particular point of pride and artworld cachet, as the museum was bequeathed many Corot paintings and other significant 19th-century paintings and printworks by the Ridley-Trees. The Corots have been shown in a few dedicated exhibitions over the years, and we can presently eye a sampling both in the main gallery (of special interest is “Ronde de Nymphes”) and a newly opened “Permanent Collection” gallery, formerly a closed-to-the-public meeting room.

Other notable art-world names show up here, including folk art legend Finster, with “Love Not the World (1 John 2:15);” nature and time-attuned artist Goldsworthy, with his “Santa Barbara Beach Scene” (during a 1992 visit sponsored by late architect/art collector Barry Berkus); and Kiki Smith’s large, enigmatic and rough-hewn drawing “Kneeling Woman with Rabbit.” 

Among the surprise treats are Grace Nell Howell’s ceramic “slave jug” folk pottery, portraying busts of three presidents, Jessica Stockholder’s funk arty sculptural conglomeration “Made of Three Elements,” and the oil on tar paper piece “Cloud Cover,” by socially aware artist Duncan Simcoe, the subject of a fascinating recent exhibition here.

The regional art contingency is also strong and attests to this museum’s commitment to representing artistic riches bubbling up in the 805. Among the many intriguing artworks from that sector are Richard Ross’s typically irony-loaded color photograph of an Italian cemetery scene — with skulls in the decorative design — and Irma Cavat’s engaging painting “Napoli Tu Luce,” from 1955.

Collage hero William Dole’s lean elegant “Hypothesis” hangs next to Robert Burridge’s moody interior painting “Wing Cellar #2,” with its Diebenkornian palette, part of an art-parlor-like medley of pieces on one long wall. That wall also touches on work by the late Keith Puccinelli (a typically dark-toned clown image) and Dane Goodman’s “Water Suit Triptych,” a sharply drawn surreal vision, recalling the great collaborative Pooch/Goodman show here, Tug.

Askew and Carlander are also in the mix, as is the fondly remembered sculptor Jens Pedersen, whose “Voice from Within” shows his loopy lyrical charm. Around the corner, Wesley Anderegg’s witty figure drips dry wit and touches of folk-art sensibility, rerouted into Anderegg-ville.

Suffice to say, a lot of artistic energies and memories have passed through these walls in Larson’s time, and Santa Barbara’s general art legacy is much stronger for her presence and committed action. Her spirit carries forward through the collection. 

For more information, see westmont.edu/honoring-judy.