PRESS RELEASES for immediate release:
October 21, 28, and November 4, 11, 18
Contact at media@galleryrouteone.org
Download Press Release PDF
PLEASE NOTE: GALLERY ROUTE ONE FOLLOWS CURRENTLY RECOMMENDED COVID-19 SAFETY PROTOCOLS. Masks are encouraged.
GALLERY ROUTE ONE EXHIBITIONS:
Vickisa: Vickisa Unleashed
Bernie Schimbke: Progressions
Gallery Route One Juried Exhibition: Truth: Artist Books and Broadsides
On exhibit Saturday, January 12 to Sunday, February 12, 2023
In-Person Opening Reception: Saturday, January 8, 2023, 3 – 5pm
Artist talks begin at 3:30pm.
Virtual Exhibition Walk-Through available at www.galleryrouteone.org
The gallery is open to visitors Thursday to Monday, 11 – 5
Project Space
Truth: Artist Books and Broadsides
SUMMARY: Truth: Artist Books and Broadsides is a juried exhibition exploring the shifting definition of “truth” through artist-created books and broadsides.
The Visiting Artist Program at Gallery Route One presents, Truth: Artist Books and Broadsides, a juried exhibition. The word “truth” has become politicized in the US and continues to take a beating in politics and social media. Can “truth” still mean anything? Can an artist embody or express truth in their artwork?
For this exhibition, artists were invited to express their ideas about truth in the form of handmade, handbound artist books, altered books, and broadsides. The artist books in the current exhibition range from personal, sometimes wildly expressive objects—to high craft creations.
For centuries, the book, in its various forms, was identified with the notion of “truth” —through encyclopedias, dictionaries, and books of scripture. Because of their visual and material relationship to historical books, contemporary artist books as presented here can be a medium for the expression of political, philosophical, and spiritual ideas.
Artist books can be made from scratch and hand bound or the artist may start with a manufactured book and create an artwork by physically altering it in many ways. Artist books also include scrolls, accordions, folded and sculptural objects, and assemblages.
The exhibition was juried by Sas Colby, a visual artist whose practice includes artist books and work with text. Colby notes, “Truth is a rich and provocative subject in today’s world which one might say is more attuned to ‘truthiness,’ the quality of seeming to be true out of a desire for something to be true, as coined by Stephen Colbert. The concept of truth has long been associated with books, and there was a time when the printed word was taken for truth. In a gentler century, Emily Dickinson wrote, ‘Tell all the truth but tell it slant,’ not wishing to shock with the totality of a revelation all at once. Our digital world lacks this subtlety and our culture fiercely defends the principle that we’re each entitled to our own truth.”
Center Gallery
Vickisa: Vickisa Unleashed
SUMMARY: Vickisa presents a collection of artist books and paintings focused on daily life and music festivals.
Gallery Route One is pleased to present Vickisa Unleashed, an exhibition incorporating paintings, painted drawings, and limited-edition, accordion-style artist books, all created through the use of acrylics and watercolor pencil media. The exhibition’s title represents her artistic approach: to use color with abandon and see endless possibilities in her daily life.
She has chronicled countless music festivals, including the New Orleans French Quarter Festival and her favorite, San Francisco’s Hardly Strictly Bluegrass which are depicted in her selection of artist-crafted, fold-out accordion books. The artist has created more than fifty of these books, largely focused on the music festivals she has attended. She explains, “My passion is creating accordion books from these festivals. At the recent Hardly Strictly Bluegrass music festival. I found myself right in front of the stage quickly sketching the exciting activities swirling around me and taking some photographs too. The process of sketching, collaging, and creating a handwritten story is something I never tire of.”
Included in the exhibition is an original artwork created for Maria Muldaur’s 2021 award-winning jazz album, “Let’s Get Happy Together.”
Many of Vickisa’s painted drawings were created in front of a live audience at the Mill Valley Art Festival and are also included, as well as a diptych depicting five men on horseback, whom Vickisa met outside of a saloon in Bolinas. “To my dismay, I lost their contact information,” Vickisa explains. “If you recognize these guys, please let me know!”
After attending Bard College and the University of Arizona, she earned a master’s degree from the San Francisco Art Institute. A long-standing member of Gallery Route One in Point Reyes Station, Vickisa also hosts a radio show, “Coastal Airwaves,” on KWMR.
Annex Gallery
Bernie Schimbke: Progressions
SUMMARY: Watercolorist Bernie Schimbke presents Progressions, a series of pictorial and abstract works focusing on the artist’s shift in approach and process through exploring the inner self.
Gallery Route One presents Progressions, as series of paintings by watercolorist Bernie Schimbke. Aptly named, the included works progress from smaller, pictorial landscapes to his most current painting, Synapsis. Large in scale and abstract, the painting is layered with gold, sage, and aqua hues. “My work has become much more of an exploration on the progression of my life and of the inner self,” Schimbke notes.
Schimbke has worked professionally with many arts organizations through the years, such as ACT, Berkeley Rep, California Shakespeare Festival and Cal Performances, providing services in graphic design and advertising, in the development of pictorial and typographical images for plays, and set design for KQED. Retiring six years ago, he has been able to again pick up the brush to resume his exploration of the processes and techniques learned many years ago.
About Gallery Route One:
A regional landmark since 1983, Gallery Route One is a nonprofit arts organization located in the town of Point Reyes Station, adjacent to the entry for Marin County’s Point Reyes National Seashore. Besides offering rotating exhibits by member artists, GRO also maintains its outreach programs: the Latino Photography Project, the Artists in the Schools Program, the Artist Fellowship Program, as well as Visiting Artist Program exhibitions in the Project Space addressing environmental, immigration and social justice issues. For more information, please visit www.galleryrouteone.org.