Opening party July 30th 6-9pm
With live improvised music by Cornelius Boots
With live improvised music by Cornelius Boots
Show runs July 24th through September 9th
Neary and Rodriguez’s combination of raw talent and passion is nothing short of magical. Beautiful is likely some of the strongest work to have ever been exhibited in our gallery.
The Sculptor
John Neary originally from Long Island NY has been living and working in the bay area since 1995. Focusing on figurative and portrait sculpture he uses clay to sculpt than utilizes rubber molds, wax and plaster casting, the lost wax process and patinas to transform the work into bronze. Neary received his BFA from Pratt Institute. He has been studying sculpture for 20 years and has attended schools such as College of Marin, the City College at Fort Mason, and UC Berkeley, as well as the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. Neary has worked in film production and also as a computer animator for video games. Currently, he is a sculpture instructor at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, California.
Sculpting, for Neary, "can be like a meditative departure, a gateway... I attempt to express and celebrate the sensation of the inner struggle. I search for poses that can awaken an emotion, non verbally reminding me to stay connected.” - John Neary
The Painter
“I live in the humble little fishing town of Martinez, California, just blocks away from where I was born. I have spent most of my life in the Bay Area, and grew up in what were then grassy fields and walnut orchards in Concord, fishing off the shores of the Delta and jumping boxcars in Pittsburg. I am a self taught artist and began painting in 2003 while living in Missoula, Montana. Presently I work full time as an artist and a teacher. These paintings came to be…with listening to see and looking to hear, the images emerge and I dust them off as best I can. I believe that the artist never gets away from being a servant, an excavator, a janitor, a builder, a seeker.”
Opening night music:
East Bay reed renegade Cornelius Boots is a progressive rock composer, bass clarinet performance specialist, wu wei woodwind instructor and Zen flute adept. Since 1996, he has led and released two albums with Edmund Welles, the world’s only composing bass clarinet quartet, for which he has composed and arranged over 60 pieces of virtuosic “heavy chamber music.” Recent projects include Sabbaticus Rex (elemental sound-structuring ensemble) and mukyoku etudes: 27 Training and Performance Pieces for Taimu shakuhachi (large Zen bamboo flute). He has three music degrees (clarinet, audio, jazz) and is currently working towards his shihan (master teaching license) in shakuhachi. sabbaticusrex.com
