UCI Art Undergraduate Honors Program Show 2015

Irvine, CA (June 3, 2015) -- UC Irvine’s Art Undergraduate Honors Program of 2015 presents, I hope we can still be friends; a culmination of a year-long studio residency directed by Daniel Joseph Martinez, along with Kevin Appel, Juli Carson and Jennifer Pastor. The six student artists: James Barnes, Adrian Garcia, Garrett Hallman, Jenny Kim, Juan Meneses, and Phonnyta Seng, will exhibit work that manifests their research over the course of the current year. I hope we can still be friends articulates the experience the six artists encountered throughout their residency offering a unique window into each individual’s practice.
James Barnes presents Fanatic, a series of life-sized drawings situated within a space of desire, depicting the artist cannibalizing his professors. The inherently erotic nature of the teacher and student relationship—a relationship alternating between dominance and submission—manifests itself into an aggressive action. By consuming the flesh of his professors he is attempting to endow himself with their characteristics: intelligence, influence, and stature.
Adrian Garcia imagines the life of a sleepwalker in Wandering Act, a single-channel video treating the condition of sleepwalking as a stand in for an overwhelming dulled state of consciousness— a detachment from the spaces inhabited by real life, people, events, feelings, and memories. The video is an attempt to work through a perpetual state of incapacitation, closing the gap between the individual and the rest of the human world, putting an end to the restless feeling of never really getting anywhere in life— of wandering aimlessly without recollection night after night.
Garrett Hallman presents the shore on which we flow, a contemplation on a horse's presence.
Overwhelmed by the incapability to find answers, Jenny Kim embodies the cry of the Question Mark in The bigger it gets, The smaller it feels. A sculpture composed of fabric torn from found clothing and a large wooden comb tangles and elicits ideas of connections, community, problems, solutions, individuality, heritage and also evokes personal struggles regarding her own ego and the desire or need to produce more.
Sedated: calm, quiet, or composed; undisturbed by passion or excitement. Our projection of our self allows people an insight into one’s state. But this only occurs if we allow our projections to do so. Using portrait photography's ability to capture the relation between the subject and photographers. Juan Meneses being the subject of the photographs along with five different artist and a family member, uses photography to capture the relationship between the individuals. The series Sedated explores how one’s projections can vary between individuals. The series of photographs documents the projection of the artist through varying images, documenting a year’s relationship to the artist dealing with personal loss.
Phonnyta Seng presents Phang Seang Hun, a mirror sculpture that has 40 bloody thumbprints on it. The blood belongs to the artist herself. She was born in Cambodia in 1992, long after the Khmer Rouge regime’s brutal takeover. Even though she did not live through the ensuing genocide, her family members, including her grandparents, parents, aunts, and uncle, remain victims. This familial lineage makes Seng the legacy of not only her family, but her country. Throughout the years, her family has shared stories about the horrific events that took place during the Khmer Rouge. These stories have fed directly into the artwork she presents for this exhibition.
The exhibition will take place in the University Art Gallery and Room Gallery on the Claire Trevor School of the Arts campus. The show will run from June 6 through June 12, 2015 with an opening reception on Saturday, June 6 from 2:00 - 5:00 pm.

Posted Date: 
Wednesday, June 3, 2015 - 21:45