Sweet Subversives: Contemporary California Drawings

Long Beach CA – The Long Beach Museum of Art is preparing a new exhibition
titled Sweet Subversives, which will open October 16, 2009 on the first floor of
the Museum’s gallery pavilion. Sweet Subversives is a unique gathering of 31
drawings by Southern California artists who explore their personal vision of
what a drawing means to them and how they achieve this vision. Many artists
stretch themselves within the traditions of mark-making on paper. Although all
artists begin their creative process with the seemingly simple concept of a
drawing, each artwork is taken on a complex journey—the media becomes
mixed, papers become installation, and how we think about drawing moves
within the complexities of each artist’s vision. Every artist in this exhibition
represents the best of contemporary drawings and mixed media drawings in
the greater Los Angeles area. Selected artists include Kiel Johnson, Tom
Knechtel, Erika Lizée and Adonna Khare.

While each work in Sweet Subversives is unique, each piece reflects the artist’s
personal interest. The artists challenge themselves artistically and conceptually
with line drawings on paper. Regardless of the media, these artist drawings in
all forms are much more than sweetly subversive to the restrictive
understanding of drawings, the work in fact broadly includes abstract concepts
and ideas, implied narratives, mathematics and issues of identity and personal
expression. This exhibition further explores the growing pluralism in
contemporary art, especially as artists address drawing. The eclectic intellectual
and practical functions of drawings are substantial. Regardless of the subject or
materials these drawings reflect the idiosyncratic but widely fantastic art
created in the LA area. Sweet Subversives will close February 14, 2010.