Recent Acquisitions

Snow in the High Sierras

painting with rocks and a river in the foreground and snowy mountain range in the background
Edgar Payne, Snow in the High Sierras, Early 20th century, Oil on canvas, 31 x 39 in. UCI Jack and Shanaz Langson Institute and Museum of California Art, Donated in Memory of Christian A. Gerola

Snow in the High Sierras

Edgar Payne

Snow in the High Sierras (early 20th century)
Donated in Memory of Christian A. Gerola

Edgar Payne (1883 – 1947)
Primarily self-taught, Edgar Payne is widely recognized as one of the most prominent California Impressionist painters of the early to mid-20th century. An avid plein air artist, he produced dramatic coastal views and mountainous scenes of which the Sierra Nevada mountain range was a favorite. Snow in the High Sierras showcases Payne’s modulation of color to produce atmospheric depth. Payne was a founding member and first president of the Laguna Beach Art Association, an organization that would eventually become the Laguna Art Museum, and wrote in 1941 the influential instructional manual Composition of Outdoor Painting, a book that remains in print. Langson IMCA’s collection includes eight other paintings by Payne.

Year acquired: 2021

S+T

Abstract artwork with red and black horizontal bands punctuated with diagonal streaks of orange, yellow and green
Helen Pashgian, S+T, 1984, Epoxy on canvas, 48 x 90 in. UCI Jack and Shanaz Langson Institute and Museum of California Art, Gift from the collection of Huddie Ryland Behrens and Amy Behrens

S+T

Helen Pashgian

S+T (1984)
Gifted by Huddie Ryland Behrens and Amy Behrens

Helen Pashgian (b. 1934)
In the 1960s, Helen Pashgian was an early pioneer of and central figure in the Light and Space movement in Southern California where she currently lives and works. She employs industrial materials to produce sculptural works that manipulate light, utilizing light itself as a medium. S+T is one of a series of transitional works from the 1970s and 1980s during which Pashgian experimented with new materials and developed resin recipes. This work was produced using a series of thin resin molds and resin pours to slowly build up its translucent surface, resulting in an effect that hovers between painterly and photographic. Langson IMCA’s collection includes five other works by Pashgian spanning the 1960s through 2010s.

Year acquired: 2021

Sometimes I Daydream of Flying Away

multi-dimensional artwork featuring a human wearing painted wings, accompanied by two green parrots, flying over a lawnmower and bird bath
Jay Lynn Gomez, Sometimes I Daydream of Flying Away , 2019, Acrylic, house paint, and cardboard on canvas, 72 x 96 in. UCI Jack and Shanaz Langson Institute and Museum of California Art, Gift of Robert Hayden III and Richard Silver

Sometimes I Daydream of Flying Away

Jay Lynn Gomez

Sometimes I Daydream of Flying Away (2019)
Gifted by Robert Hayden III and Richard Silver

Jay Lynn Gomez (b. 1986)
This work by Jay Lynn Gomez contains themes of landscape, labor, race, and representation. Gomez began making work by painting figures of workers into images in Architectural Digest magazines during her breaks while working as a nanny. Her paintings often highlight unseen workers, in particular, Latinx nannies, gardeners, construction workers, and valets. She reinserts these workers—as cardboard cutout figures—into visual representations of landscapes where they are otherwise frequently omitted.

Gomez continues to work with cutout figures, placing them free standing around her exhibitions and collaging them onto her paintings, as seen in Sometimes I Daydream of Flying Away—a work that reveals the artist’s and subjects’ identities as well as features specific to Southern California. In an interview with Carolina Miranda for the Los Angeles Times Gomez stated, “I’m painting my own mother. I’m painting about my dad. I’m painting about myself.”

Year acquired: 2021

 

Untitled

print of a black rectangle with soft edges and an empty oval shape in the upper middle of the rectangle
John Paul Jones, Untitled, probably 1962-1963, Lithograph, 11 x 7 in. UCI Jack and Shanaz Langson Institute and Museum of California Art, Gift of Theodore Barnett

Untitled

John Paul Jones

Untitled (probably 1962 – 63)
Gifted by Theodore Barnett

John Paul Jones (1924 – 1999)
Artist and educator John Paul Jones was considered a leading American printmaker during the 1960s. His work has been associated with postwar New Figuration, a period of figurative painting revived in the 1960s by such artists as Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud, Philip Gustin, and David Hockney. Jones taught for a decade at UCLA, from 1953 to 1963, where he established the printmaking department, and at UC Irvine for two decades, from 1969 to 1990. Untitled was produced at the Tamarind Lithography Workshop, an important print shop in Los Angeles at the time. Inspired by European artists like Francis Bacon, Alberto Giacometti, and Francisco Goya, shadowy figures emerging from dark backgrounds are a recurring motif in Jones’ work.

Year acquired: 2021

Coastal Landscape

graphite drawing of waves crashing on rocks
Stanton Macdonald-Wright, Coastal Landscape, 1950, Graphite on paper, 20 x 26 in. UCI Jack and Shanaz Langson Institute and Museum of California Art, Gift of Maxine Stussy Frankel

Coastal Landscape

Stanton Macdonald-Wright

Coastal Landscape (1950)
Gifted by Maxine Stussy Frankel

Stanton Macdonald-Wright (1890 – 1973)
Stanton Macdonald-Wright launched the Synchromism movement in 1913 in Paris with fellow American artist Morgan Russell (1886 – 1953). Considered one of the first American modernist movements, Synchromism advanced the theory that light, space, and form could be evoked through the modulation of color alone. Macdonald-Wright was introduced to Chinese art while studying at the Sorbonne (Paris, FR) from 1907 to 1908. East Asian art would be an ongoing source of inspiration for the artist and educator throughout his life. Coastal Landscape demonstrates his engagement with Chinese and Japanese painting styles, here applied to California coastal scenes.

Year acquired: 2021

Landscape

pencil drawing of a rocky hillside with trees below
Jan Stussy, Landscape, 1959, Graphite on paper, 29 x 22 in. UCI Jack and Shanaz Langson Institute and Museum of California Art, Gift of Maxine Stussy Frankel

Landscape

Jan Stussy

Landscape (1959)
Gifted by Maxine Stussy Frankel

Jan Stussy (1921 – 1990)
Artist, film producer, and arts educator Jan Stussy took an eclectic, figurative approach to his work that went against the grain of Abstract Expressionism, the dominant style of the post-war period. His idiosyncratic paintings and drawings of contorted figures bring together cubist, surrealist, and expressionist characteristics. Landscape, a graphite work on paper, illustrates the importance of Chinese and Japanese art for Stussy, an interest passed down to him from his mentor, Stanton Macdonald-Wright. It demonstrates Stussy’s commitment to draftsmanship, something he espoused as an educator as a core element of an arts curriculum.

Year acquired: 2021