On view September 9 – October 6, 2005
The newest paintings by Christophe Cassidy will be featured in the Kwan Fong Gallery of Art and Culture from Friday, Sept. 9, through Thursday, Oct. 6. An opening reception will be held in the galleryon Friday, Sept. 9, at 7 p.m. Admission is free.
The Veteran Fishermen of Ballona is a series of paintings inspired by the concrete landscape/seascape of Ballona Creek, which runs through Los Angeles under the 405 and 90 freeways and pours out into the Pacific at the mouth of Marina del Rey harbor. The place has a semi–industrial, semi–wild feel to it, and a vast variety of animals and birds inhabit its concrete route. It can also be a solitary space where many people find refuge from urban life. These paintings are a tribute to this poetic concrete wilderness.
Cassidy is a successful painter and muralist who lives and works in Los Angeles. He moved to California as a boy from his native France and grew up visiting museums in the United States and Europe. He is well versed in contemporary trends and materials, but it is the purity of painting on canvas or paper that continues to allure him.
The Christophe Cassidy art exhibit is just one of several professional shows planned for the Kwan Fong Gallery of Art and Culture this year. Sponsored by the Art Department, the exhibits will be curated by Michael Pearce, M.F.A., a new assistant professor in the Art Department. An acclaimed painter in his own right, the native of England says that one of his goals is to bring more art to venues in the Conejo Valley.
“The CLU campus is the perfect place to showcase many forms of performing and visual art,” explains Pearce who has already planned two multimedia shows and an exhibit affiliated with World AIDS Day this fall. In 2006, he is working on a faculty show of paintings, sculpture, mixed media, photographs, ceramics and illustration, followed by The Distillery Collective exhibit and top works of CLU art students.
