PAINTING AS A SECOND LANGUAGE

Exhibition: November 5 - Nov 30
Opening Reception: November 8, 6-9pm
Gallery Rehang and Artist Talk with Emilio Villalba: November 23, 4-7pm

Tamsin Smith extends a relatively small lineage of poets who have turned to painting, not simply as a source for inspiration and titles, but as a parallel form of expression. Her dual art practice began as an exercise in balancing what is for her the cerebral work of word-craft with a more physical experience of painting.

“When I put pen to page, I enter an inner world of sound. I’m listening for and conjuring echoes. I’m tuning my ear for the way the meaning of a word refracts in different directions, as well as for how it bounces off or melts into other words. Painting is like stepping out of a cave into the sunlight. The practice of putting brush to canvas liberates me from certain strictures. I move from a realm of ear and mind and to one of eye and body.

The beauty of bilingualism is that both languages grow richer and deeper. Learning a new system of communication expands possibilities and stretches the imagination. It seems a particularly important historical moment to remind ourselves of how much we gain by immersion in different cultures.”

Tamsin Smith is a poet, painter, and essayist. Her verse appears in numerous anthologies and she has published two poetry collections, Word Cave (Risk Press) and Between First and Second Sleep (FMSBW). The art work of Emilio Villalba appear on the covers of both these books. Painting as a Second Language is Smith’s second exhibit at Adobe Books Gallery and her first solo show.

Instagram: @slipstreamer11

THE PAINTER’S ALPHABET
Tamsin Smith + Emilio Villalba
Opening Reception & Artist Talk November 23, 4-7pm

By November 23, the gallery will be rehung to feature new collaborations by Tamsin Smith and Emilio Villalba.

Creative collaborations hold unique challenges, as well as opportunities for expansion. In an effort to avoid simply merging their individual styles onto a common surface, Smith and Villalba adopt rudimentary rules as a way of building their artistic dialogues with a shared toolset. Proceeding in turns, they work through the basic strokes of “the painter’s alphabet” — vertical line, horizontal line, ascending diagonal, descending diagonal, C-curve, S-curve, then repeat, repeat, repeat — until reaching the universal question that plagues all artists: is it done?

By removing the ability to lean on personal patterns or go-to skills of portraiture and figuration, the artists create work that neither would or could have composed alone. This forced “unlearning” opened up fresh possibilities and emboldened Smith and Villalba to deliberately pursue colors they normally avoid. The sensation of learning to trust themselves and each other during these ventures into unchartered territory is one that the artists hope translates and inspires their viewers.

Emilio Villalba is known for his contemporary portraits inspired by master works of the past. His work captures the tension of life’s inherent messiness and society’s prescription for success in representational works of dissonant beauty. Villalba received his BFA from the Art Institute of California in 2006, and his MFA in Painting from the Academy of Art University in 2011. A southern California native, he currently lives and works in San Francisco, and is represented by Modern Eden Gallery.

Instagram: @emilio_villalba