Donald writes:

Just like the big department stores, artists are enamored of the holiday season because they hope they can actually SELL something. You can tell that the economy is on the minds of a lot of people when you consider that the local focus this season seems to be on smaller, less expensive artworks for sale. Both the Fresno Art Museum, which has a wonderful show-slash-raffle going on titled "Small Treasures: Artist Miniatures," and Gallery 25, which this month has a group show, mostly of smaller pieces, titled "Affordable Art," are interested in tapping the "less is good" mindset.

Because December ArtHop tends to be so group-show heavy, it isn't always the best time to set out with a critical eye. And Felicia and I have both been swamped with the holiday cultural rush. But we each managed to get to a couple of ArtHop locales on the actual night. (I plan to check out some more venues this coming week. Any recommendations?)

I often find myself drawn to Corridor 2122, and for good reason: This small, plucky cooperative gallery consistently piques my artistic interest. This month's show, which continues through January as well, is a group exhibition titled "Shrines." It's an intriguing and disparate collection dedicated to a theme that has inspired and preoccupied artists for centuries. Leaving a mark on this Earth once a loved one has departed for the great beyond -- whether it's a tiny gravestone or mammoth mausoleum -- seems to be a symptom of the species.

The show includes works by many of the usual names at Corridor 2122, including Aimee Dent (a strong site-specific piece), Steve Dzerigian (whose photos include an intriguing three-dimensional cut-out package of a tomb that could potentially have been gimmicky but somehow works) and Stephen Dent (a cheeky found-object piece in the form of a complete refrigerator plastered with the kind of detritus -- newspaper clippings, photos, scraps of everyday life and death -- that form such a common archival mode in kitchens across the land).

One work I'm especially drawn to is Quinn Gomez-Heitzeberg's "Untitled (Effigy Tomb)," a piece that has a feel of a theatrical set. (It's shown above; some people might recognize it from the Fresno Art Museum's fourth annual "Contemporary-Contemporaneo" show.) As Gomez-Heitzeberg explains it: "A variety of simple monochrome images of architectural elements cover plain wooden panels. Taken together, they create a human scaled environment for the viewer to enter. Iconographically, these elements point to a chapel or tomb, an architectural space set-aside for the dead."

For me, the most interesting aspect to this piece is the images that the artist chose. He used iconic architectural images that he found in a standard dictionary, then enlarged them. The larger scale puts these common images -- one of a rose stained glass window, another a font, or basin, in front of statuary, and the third a niche, or small indentation in a stone wall -- into a whole new context. And they made me think: Why is it that we associate certain secular images with religious meaning? There's nothing inherently religious about an abstract stained glass window, say, or one of a beautiful flower, yet when I see one in the context of Gomez-Heitzeberg's "set," my first thought is of a shrine or a church. If the artist had more realistically portrayed his iconagraphy -- if his rose window had been full-color "beautiful" -- it wouldn't have had the same impact. By reducing these symbols to a grainy single color, it drains them of their power to affect us aesthetically. They become more mechanical and utilitarian. It forces us into a more intellectual contemplation of the trappings of mortality.

Another of my favorite pieces in the show belongs to Quinn's mother, Nan Gomez-Heitzeberg, whose "Old World Visions," shown below, consists of a series of cut-out corrugated-cardboard angels. The material is so transient and insubstantial against the ravages of time that it almost seems comical. But is there any less thought and meaning that goes into a "sculpture" made out of cardboard than one made from marble? True, the marble will last a lot longer. But in the glacial scheme of things, even rock finally wears away. The effort to depict angels -- icons of immortality -- will in the end fade away regardless of what material you use. As will every shrine on this Earth, eventually. It's an intriguing question: How does art celebrate the immortal when it itself is destined to itself expire?

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Felicia writes:

At Gallery 25, the energetic images of young talent dominates half the space. It comes from the vision of Hrach Vardanyan (pictured above), the venue's guest artist-in-residence from Armenia, as part of an artist exchange. This is his first trip to the U.S. He's been here about a month and will He's only 22 but shows forth a sure hand in his abstract pieces.

To simplify what he does, he calls these creations paintings. But they don't exactly look like paintings. Some of these works involve a petrol (oil) material that dries quickly. So Vardanyan must work rapidly when he draws into the material. The result are images of furious and tense-filled energy. Dark lines of animals are frenetic but not jitteringly chaotic -- they have their own sense of scattered flow. Colors, in reds or golds, scale into the scenes for heightened drama.

For one series of seven images, Vardanyan uses dogs to explore the sociological behavior of humans. Some of the scenes are how a dog would see things, while others show dogs in roles of domination or battle. They have titles such as "Crossing Spaces," "Prison," and "Fight." As Vardanyan says, part of what's happening here are the dogs trying to grab a piece of territory through brute force or intimidation. To me, they do this either for self-preservation or full-fledged greed. Or both.

What enhances the presentation is Vardanyan's black ink sketch studies for these scenes on white paper. They are arranged on the wall -- with strings connecting one batch of fanned-out papers to another -- along the sides of the seven images. It allows the viewer to see Vardanyan's evolution of creativity.

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Donald writes:

I'm not always a big fan of group shows without a theme, and I tend to avoid the holiday hodge-podge events, but I ducked in for a quick look at Fig Tree Gallery. A nice show all around. As I did the quick-breeze browse, I found myself stopping at Evany Zirul's strong pen-and-ink drawings. Her "A Change in Sight" is remarkable.

By the way: I'm giving you the link to the gallery's Web site, but I'm doing it under protest. And, I'll go ahead and declare publicly right here: I'll continue to whine about Fig Tree's Web site -- which has been poorly maintained the past few months -- until it gets fixed. In this day and age, a gallery should consider its Web site one of the most crucial ways of communicating with an audience.)

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Felicia writes:

I also dropped in at Ashtree Studios, where the work of seven women artists -- including co-owner Aileen Imperatrice -- are on exhibit. The others are Sandy Schulte-Day, Donnalee Dunne, Anne Fraker, Jamie Meadows, Christina Motta and Pat Chimenti.

Imperatrice says she invited artists who she knew and had recently come to know. And,it just so happens, each artist brought pieces that could be part of a series, which gives the show a more cohesive feel. Imperatrice, for instance, has three paintings of chairs, which she has become known. Each reflects an emotional experience.

One of the new artists to Imperatrice is Meadows, whose three pieces here exude a moody, mysterious vibe. They are mostly done in inks, color pencils and graphite. One is called "Again" in which a young man in a suit stands in utter aloneness, his head cast down so that you can't see his face. One hand holds a briefcase. The word "Again" is written to the upper right of his head. Has he just been fired again? Has he again failed at an assignment? Is he just feeling sorry for himself?

Dunne, who produced dramatic expressionistic paintings of apocalyptic horses at a recent show in Fresno, in this installation returns to nature: These are still life paintings of fruit. But, what enhances these images is her use of stripped bed linens glued to the canvas. By painting on this material, the fruits' texture and appeal come through more vividly.