Photos Brooke Hall
Words Justin Allen
Immersion into the latest exhibit at the American Visionary Art Museum, All Things Round: Galaxies, Eyeballs, & Karma, is a unique and fascinating experience that’s difficult to relate using words, but I’ll give it a shot. This exhibit probes the kind of philosophical questions that each of us have pondered since the moment we became aware of ourselves. It explores the full breadth of existence from the majesty of the cosmos and the fundamental components of reality, to ideas that relate to things that all cultures hold sacred such as the cycle of life, family, spirituality, and mythos.
What AVAM has managed to do is curate an exhibit that is wholly interactive without necessarily needing to be tactile. As you wander through the galleries and corridors you’ll feel your imagination being teased out into the open from within its cerebral confines where it can dance with the wondrous possibilities that make being human such a blessing.
The timing of this exhibit couldn’t me more appropriate. As we near the peak of the greatest shift in consciousness in human history many of us find ourselves imagining what might be waiting for us on the other side. The implications of the emergence of free flowing information has started to show promise of providing for a more aware society. One that is readily willing to entertain the wily debate of existence and unmistakable evidence of our need for interconnectedness, as well as the framework of the collective consciousness.
To put it simply, this is an exhibit that will feed your soul. And after waking from the malaise of the 20th Century, where conversations about enlightenment were marginalized, you owe it to yourself to pay a visit to AVAM and experience it first hand.
Here are some of the highlights from our visit a few weeks ago.
Shawn Theron’s journey as an artist began as the dying wish of the closest person in his life, his grandmother Red. She told him to do great things and left him with a single word, SOGH, which is the impetus for everything he creates (to learn more about SOGH read our artist profile on Shawn). In the first year after her death Shawn started to take at least a picture a day without realizing that he was documenting his life during that year. At the museum you’ll find a 75,000 image montage that chronicles those 365 days.
Soon after, Shaun started painting. Within a short time he contacted Rebecca Hoffberger who offered space in AVAM’s gift shop for him to hang his work. Within thirty minutes two paintings sold. He sold 1357 pieces in his first year of painting and currently over 10,000 of his works are circulating the globe, taking residence in places like the Eifel Tower and the South Pole.
Shawn Theron and his grandmother Red.
Rolling Through the Bay by Scott Weaver
This sculpture consists of over 100,000 toothpicks from around the world, including on from Mr. Rains Fun House. It took 37 years to complete. The Sculpture hosts five ping pong ball tours through the San Francisco Bay Area filtered through Scott’s imagination and experience. Many of the locations and symbols are pulled directly from his life including the time of day each of his children were born.
This day he started his presentation by pointing out all the of different locations that tie into his family
“My great grandfather came over from Bellinzona in the 1870’s, started a wine cellar saloon right here (points into the sculpture), the Lorenzo Verda Wine Cellar. He bought a house from my grandmother 518 12th Avenue, between Anza and Balboa. My other grandfather had a gymnasium, 2350 Geary…”
He dropped the balls into different entry points and begins to give us a personal tour complete with perfectly timed anecdotes to illustrate the journey. He’s not only a visionary artist, he’s a master story teller as well.
See a video of the tours here.
Parisian painter Stephanie Lucas’ work is featured in the Divine Feminie – Vesica Piscis gallery. She describes her process as taking her brush to the canvas while letting the energy come to her and “take her hand” to create the first stratum which informs the direction of her painting. She speaks of her work as a portal of energy, something channeled rather than conceived. This seems to be a theme repeated throughout the exhibit.
