Coming Soon: Second Nature: The Valentine-Adelson Collection at the Hammer

Second Nature: The Valentine-Adelson Collection at the Hammer

On View July 19 - October 4, 2009

Second Nature: The Valentine-Adelson Collection at the Hammer is the first public presentation of sculpture from the extraordinary gift made by Dean Valentine and Amy Adelson to the Hammer Museum in 2007, when Valentine joined the Museum's Board of Overseers. The Valentine-Adelson Collection comprises more than 50 sculptures by 29 Los Angeles artists, made from 1995 to the present. The exhibition will present a selection of work from The Valentine-Adelson Collection and will be mounted in the Hammer's permanent collection galleries. This exhibition is curated by Douglas Fogle, Chief Curator and Deputy Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs at the Hammer and Ali Subotnick, curator.

Sculpture has been a vital and inventive area of artistic practice in Los Angeles for more than forty years. In particular during the last two decades a significant number of artists working in sculpture have emerged from MFA programs in Southern California and Valentine and Adelson have been keenly aware of this emerging talent. The Valentine-Adelson Collection includes many of these artists such as Liz Craft, Sam Durant, Katie Grinnan, Evan Holloway, Matt Johnson, Nathan Mabry, Jason Meadows, and Paul Sietsema. Influenced by popular culture, work by the artists in this collection is often imagistic, highly fanciful, and playful. Much of the sculpture is made by combining unusual and unorthodox materials and shares a careful, hand-crafted sensibility. The works in The Valentine-Adelson Collection range from small discrete objects to room-scale installations and include many of the key works by this new generation of artists who are rapidly emerging with national and international recognition. Together, this collection comprises a snapshot of an important moment in the extensive legacy of the Los Angeles contemporary art scene, which has seen significant expansion in the possibilities of sculptural practice.

Artists included in the exhibition:

Edgar Arceneaux, Frank Benson, Jonathan Pylypchuk (aka Rudy Bust), Xavier Cha, Eduardo Consuegra, Liz Craft, Sam Durant, Chris Finley, Hannah Greely, Katie Grinnan, Evan Holloway, Matt Johnson, Martin Kersels, Lisa Lapinski, Won Ju Lim, Nathan Mabry, Jason Meadows, Pentti Monkkonen, Ruby Neri, Ry Rocklen, Sterling Ruby, Paul Sietsema, and Eric Wesley.