pt.2 Gallery has a stacked schedule this weekend as a group show runs alongside the upcoming solo with Tahnee LonsdaleAt and Past features four artists–John Gnorski, JP McNicholas, Olivia Nevins-Carbins, and Sylvia Fragoso–each of whom shares an affinity for working with lattice, whether literal, with Nevins-Carbins's gates rendered in oil pastel and paint, or visual, in the case of McNicholas’s charcoal trees and bushes.

olivianevinscarbins horiz flowergate
Cutty Flower, Oil Pastel, Oil Paint, Graphite, Acrylic on Wood Panel, 34 x 26 Inches, 2020

Nevins-Carbins borrows from San Francisco's Victorian architecture, abstracting decorative metalwork and weaving those visuals into personal narratives of safety, self-preservation, the memory of a city, isolation, and fantasy. "I am interested in gates because they’re integral to the San Francisco landscape and the image of them has always been present in my memory of growing up. I aim to integrate colors that frequently appear in public parks in San Francisco, specifically the purples and greens from eucalyptus trees in the Panhandle, to the orange of the nasturtiums popping up underneath a fence, to the fog coating the streetlights over Alamo Square at night."

Meanwhile, McNicholas's forested friends actually represent characters from a recurring dream about playing baseball during childhood. "In the dream, my teammates and I leave the game to explore the surrounding forested area of “Field 1,” under the night sky. A cosmic experience ensues between the players and the night."

johngnorski tealblack short superwideChain Of Fools, Flashe, Pastel, Charcoal, Spray Paint and Grease Pencil on Birch Plywood, 20 x 40 x 4 Inches, 2020

Gnorski’s sculptures create visuals seen only through their lattice construction; not quite figurative and not entirely abstract, they stand momentarily arrested in metamorphosis. Fragoso’s ceramics live as spiritually-inspired monuments that possess a humble beauty and strange power. She constructs mysterious clusters topped with crucifixes–a testament to her devout Catholicism–and crumbling towers, some with spiky projections jutting from their thick, glazed exteriors. Fragoso's mesmerizing abstractions and swirling striations pulsate with color and energy.

sylviafragoso S0836
Untitled (S0836), Glazed Ceramic, 8 x 7 x 5 Inches, 2019.

Each artist provides work that creates an experience of simultaneously looking at and past something.

pt.2: Oakland's At and Past group show opens on February 15, 2020, with an opening reception from 12 to 10 pm, and is on view through March 6, 2020.