嘿嘿视频

A Real Treasure, Inside and Out

Museum Holds Grand Opening This Sunday

News
The Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art is adorned with a ribbon.
A chain of fabric-covered foam rings wraps around the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art to prepare for its grand opening. (Gregory Urquiaga/嘿嘿视频)e

AT A GLANCE

WHAT: Grand opening, Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art

WHEN: Sunday, Nov. 13

  • Street fair 鈥 10 a.m.-4 p.m.
  • 鈥淩ibbon cutting鈥 鈥 noon
  • Museum open 鈥 noon-5 p.m.

WHERE: The and are next door.

ADMISSION: Free to the street fair and museum. In fact, museum admission is free every day.

REGULAR HOURS:

  • Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday 鈥 noon-6 p.m.
  • Thursday 鈥 noon-10 p.m.
  • Saturday and Sunday 鈥 11 a.m.-5 p.m.

You鈥檝e probably seen the outside of the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum with its Grand Canopy; now come see the inside and the treasures it holds.

Art treasures, of course.

But there are so many other treasures in the $30 million museum, which holds its grand opening this Sunday (Nov. 13). Consider:

  • The treasure of space, indoors and out, interconnected and flexible, depending on exhibition needs.
  • The treasure of an indoor-outdoor studio 鈥 the only one of its kind in a university art museum 鈥 where you can see art in the making and make your own art.
  • The treasure of education, in a 125-seat hall, the Collections Classroom and study areas. A third of the museum is devoted to arts education.
  • And in one of the inaugural exhibitions, the treasured history of the 嘿嘿视频 art department, founded in 1958.

鈥楢rt Wide Open鈥 and free

Admission is free 鈥 not just for the grand opening, but always. 鈥淭hanks to our Manetti Shrem Museum partners, we are free for all,鈥 said Rachel Teagle, the museum鈥檚 founding director, in her introduction to the grand-opening program. 鈥淲e believe art should be accessible and approachable to everyone who walks through our doors. No admission fee. Just great art.鈥

 Museum interior.
The treasure of space, now filled with four exhibitions, including Out Our Way. (Photo by Iwan Baan)

Sunday鈥檚 鈥淎rt Wide Open鈥 celebration starts with a street fair at 10 a.m. on Alumni Lane, on the museum鈥檚 east side. The festivities will include performance art and other entertainment, plus screen printing and other activities, including the opportunity to decorate party hats in celebration of the birthdays of two of 嘿嘿视频鈥 art emeriti: Roland Petersen and Wayne Thiebaud. The fair, complete with food trucks, will run until 4 p.m.

嘿嘿视频 Staff Appreciation

The museum invites current and retired 嘿嘿视频 staff members to an open house and reception, 3 to 6 p.m. Friday, Nov. 18.

The museum is collaborating with Sacramento鈥檚 Verge Center for the Arts on the street fair and the 鈥渞ibbon cutting.鈥 The ceremony starts at noon 鈥 but without a ribbon and without any cutting!

Instead, the ceremony will feature site-specific art by Lisa Rybovich Crall茅, who received a Master of Fine Arts degree from 嘿嘿视频 in 2011. She has created a 1,500-foot-long chain of 500 fabric-covered foam rings, painted by members of the community in four public events on campus and off, to hang from the Grand Canopy. She鈥檒l add 200 gold-plated charms to turn the chain into 鈥渁 gigantic charm bracelet for the building to wear,鈥 and come Sunday, the chain will be unlinked rather than cut.

 Robert Arneson, sculpting.
Arneson works on 鈥楬is and Hers鈥 in TB9 on campus, circa 1964. (Photo by David Freund)

A tribute and retrospective

The museum opens with four exhibitions, led by Out Our Way, exploring the development of the 鈥渞evolutionary鈥 art department (as described in the grand-opening program) and featuring works by the department鈥檚 first-generation faculty.

鈥淔ounding Chair Richard L. Nelson built his department as a 鈥榯eam of rivals,鈥 intentionally bringing together artists with differing opinions about aesthetics and teaching philosophy, while all shared an exceptional grasp of the properties of their materials. In this creative community, relentless experimentation prevailed.鈥

Petersen and Thiebaud are on the first-generation list, along with Robert Arneson, John Baxter, Roy De Forest, Jane Garritson, Tio Giambruni, Ruth Horsting, Ralph Johnson, Manuel Neri, Daniel Shapiro and William T. Wiley. Each of them while at 嘿嘿视频 realized a 鈥減ivotal moment鈥 in his or her career, the program continues. Arneson, for example, created his Johns series 鈥 10 sculptures of toilets and urinals 鈥 in the 1960s. Out Our Way reunites all of the Johns for the first time since they were made. (Arneson, of course, would later make 嘿嘿视频鈥Eggheads.)

Opening Exhibitions

  • The legacy of the 嘿嘿视频 Department of Art, showcasing works by the first-generation faculty. Through March 26.
  • Video installation by Bay Area artist Chris Sollars, highlighting the symbiotic relationship between animals and students at 嘿嘿视频. Through Feb. 19.
  • Participatory sculptural installation by Pia Camil, inspired by the outdoor market booths of her native Mexico City, as well as indigenous gifting economies and modernist art and design. Through Feb. 19.
  • 鈥 Artifacts that illustrate and interpret the process of creating the museum. Through July 30.

MORE TO EXPERIENCE:

  • Wish Trees for Peace (1996鈥2016) 鈥 Yoko Ono
  • Copper Cage and Rosemary Place (1994) 鈥 Sandra Shannonhouse
  • Gong (1986) 鈥 William T. Wiley

As noted in a news release, the museum assembled Out Our Way from the collections of major museums and private collections nationwide as well as 嘿嘿视频鈥 permanent collection, gathering 240 paintings, sculptures, drawings and prints. 鈥淐haracteristic of the majority is an instinctive embrace of the vernacular and the desire to ingeniously transform the stuff of daily life.鈥

Out Our Way revives the 鈥渟pirit of defiant provincialism鈥 that, in merely 10 years, propelled the department to be recognized as one of the most courageous and wildly inventive community of artists in the world, the program states.

Author, artist and art critic Peter Plagens, in an essay included in the program, attributes the art department鈥檚 evolution to 鈥渟erendipity and secret sauce,鈥 including Nelson鈥檚 鈥渢alent鈥 for picking teacher-artists.

Plagens said the department eschewed 鈥渢he syllabus-besotted mode鈥 of teaching and proved to be 鈥渨ay ahead of the curve on artists鈥 drawing on other disciplines 鈥 and perhaps more important 鈥 turning to materials not usually common to art, in order to make their work.鈥

The department also demonstrated how the art world extended beyond the confines of artists鈥 ghettoes in big cities. Davis wasn't New York. It wasn't San Francisco. And that was a good thing.

鈥淣o pressure to keep in step with fashio, and no expectation that a big-time gallery show would be the kind of break for which artists in the main American art metropoli are always yearning,鈥 Plagens wrote.

 Aerial of museum.
The Manetti Shrem Museum and its Grand Canopy blend into agricultural land to the south. (Photo by Iwan Baan)

Engaging all forms of creativity

Building on the department鈥檚 legacy, the new museum stands out as a piece of art all by itself, and affords the same kind of artistic opportunity that 嘿嘿视频 offered to its first-generation art faculty.

The campus had long envision a museum at the campus's south entry, as part of an arts corridor with the Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts. The road to museum construction began in late 2011 with a $10 million donation from Jan Shrem, founder of Clos Pegase winery in the Napa Valley, and his friend and fellow art patron, and now wife, Maria Manetti Shrem. They had been inspired by their friend, Margrit Mondavi, who jump-started the museum campaign with a $2 million donation in 2010.

Related Events

  • Chancellor鈥檚 Colloquium: 鈥淢useum Building in Unpredictable Times鈥 鈥 With Florian Idenberg, a principal at SO鈥揑L, part of the Manetti Shrem Museum鈥檚 architectural team. 4-5:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 8, Vanderhoef Studio Theatre, .
  • 鈥淧eter Plagens at the Museum鈥 鈥 The author, artist and art critic will discuss 鈥渢he secret sauce鈥 that made 嘿嘿视频 a center for artistic experimentation and innovation. 2:30-4 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 15, Community Education Room, .

Associated architects SO鈥揑L and Bohlin Cywinski Jackson won a public design-build competition that called for an edifice that engaged not only with 嘿嘿视频鈥 art legacy but also with the university鈥檚 deep connection to the land.

Thus you have the 50,000-square-foot Bill and Nancy Roe Grand Canopy, filtering light like the campus's tree canopy, and, owing to the way the 921 aluminum beams are laid out, resembling a patchwork of crops like those that stretch south from 嘿嘿视频.

The artistic opportunity in the museum's 19,000 square feet of exhibition and public spaces under the canopy extends to everyone. 鈥淎t the Manetti Shrem Museum, education is out front and personal,鈥 the grand-opening program states. 鈥淲e welcome students of all ages to engage in an interdisciplinary approach to art, to cultivate individual creativity, and to gets hands on in the Carol and Gerry Parker Art Studio and Art Yard.鈥

The Paul LeBaron Thiebaud Collections Classroom provides direct access to world-class art, in display classes that line a wall behind the room鈥檚 large conference table. The art will rotate in and out of the university鈥檚 Fine Arts Collection.

 Roland Petersen's Picnic.
Roland Petersen, 鈥楶icnic,鈥 1965, oil on canvas, 68 inches by 52 inches. Gift of the artist to the Memorial Union Gallery, 1972.

Teagle said the museum鈥檚 dynamic program celebrates the best of the university鈥檚 innovative research and engages all forms of creativity, including everything from yoga in the galleries to a discussion about interspecies medicine.

In the words of Florian Idenburg, a founding principal of SO鈥揑L, the Manetti Shrem Museum is 鈥渘either isolated nor exclusive, but open and permeable; not a static shrine, but a constantly evolving public event.鈥

Karen Nikos-Rose and Jeffrey Day contributed to this report. Nikos-Rose, associate director in the Office of Strategic Communications, is serving as the museum鈥檚 public information representative; and Day is a content strategist in the Division of Humanities, Arts and Cultural Studies, College of Letters and Science.

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