PETER LODATOSPANISH BLACK

WILLIAM TURNER GALLERYBERGAMOT STATION ARTS CENTER2525 MICHIGAN AVE., E-1 SANTA MONICA, CA 90404

P 310-453-0909 F 310-453-0908www.williamturnergallery.com

INTRODUCTION

It is a sincere pleasure to present Spanish Black, an exhibition of exquisite new paintings by Peter Lodato.

The title references a long history of Spanish masters - El Greco, Goya, Velázquez, Ribera, and de Zurbarán - whose work so exulted in the allure and mystery of the color black that they became known as The Spanish Blacks. Lodato pays homage to these classical masters and re-examines their palette in several of the large-scale works for this exhibition.

Lodato’s new paintings also continue the artist’s use of color and texture to explore effects of light and space. Adhering to reductive, often binary field / ground compositions, the paintings resonate like optical tuning forks. In addition, ibrant colors radiate beneath mono-chromed surfaces like sunlight behind the haze. The effect is subtle but compelling, activating the work with a seductive pulse.

2012

Texture plays a role as well, where deftly scumbled surfaces are set against deep voids of color. As one adjusts to the subtle rhythms within and between the paintings, there is a palpable shift in consciousness and perception, as the aesthetic experience becomes a meditative one.

Writing for the LA Times, art critic David Pagel stated, “Lodato’s art requires visitors to pay close attention to subtle fluctuations in their surroundings. In the same way that echoes remind us that seemingly empty spaces are actually full of phenomena, his works sharpen our perceptions. And, like echoes, they do not broadcast their messages loudly or aggressively: The ones with the strongest impact are those that hum just above the threshold of silence.”

Peter Lodato’s work has been exhibited at the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles and the LA County Museum of Art. In 2000, The Frederick R. Weisman Museum mounted a solo retrospective on the artist.

Peter Lodato’s work is in numerous esteemed collections, both public and private, including the Brooklyn Museum, the Seattle Art Museum, the Dallas Museum of Art, and the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art.

2012

2012

WINDOW, oil on canvas, 84”x36”

SPANISH BLACK, oil on canvas, 84”x62”

HERO, oil on canvas, 84”x62”

CARAMEL, oil on linen, 60”x60”

YIN AND YANG, oil on canvas, 84”x36”

TWO + TWO VIOLET, oil on canvas, 60”x45”

GALAXY, oil on canvas, 84”x84”

LITTLE POP, oil on linen, 48”x48”

AS INSTALLED IN GALLERY

JAPAN BOX A, oil on linen, 34”x22”

VERMILLION AND GOLD, oil on linen, 34”x22”

ALMOST GREY AND BLACK, oil on linen, 34”x22”

JAPAN BOX B, oil on linen, 34”x22”

BLUE, oil on linen, 34”x22”

PORTRAIT OF TWO POPCORN, oil on linen, 36”x36”

ROUGE, acrylic on paper, 14”x14”

VIOLET 17, acrylic on paper, 14”x14”

1-5, acrylic on paper, 9”x6” (unframed) 19.5”x13” (framed)

HOUSESFrom the late 1960’s Peter Lodato began experimenting with the perceptual effects of light upon surface. In the 1970’s he embarked upon composing studies for environmental installations in various mediums such as watercolor, oil and three- dimensional sculpture. These studies which he called “Houses,” were roughly the size of a human heart cavity depicting an empty room, without a ceiling and two doors.

Upon visiting the Pantheon in Rome in 1987, Lodato took inspiration from an underexposed photograph he captured of the effect a light rain had upon the oculus, revealing a white circle and the volume surrounding it. The image had the quality of observing the moon through a window, he made a painting of the photograph and has been doing so ever since.

Beginning in the late 1980’s Lodato moved on to his next phase of work in which he chose to reduce the image to what he thought were the most important aspects of the painting – the soft glowing edge; the interlocking vertical divisions which reversed the figure and ground; the tension between flat surface and deep space; and the sense of place.

We see in these “house” studies, the underlying motif which has carried through all of Peter’s artwork for the last four decades.

HOUSES

BIG POP, oil on canvas, 84”x84”

RED STUDIO NO STUDIO #2, oil on linen, 40”x26”

INDIGO #2, oil on canvas, 44”x28”

YEN AND YANG SERIES, oil on canvas, 22”x15”

YEN AND YANG SERIES (AS INSTALLED), oil on canvas, 22”x15”

CHINA BLUE, oil on linen, 40”x26”

BUSCAR BLUE, oil on canvas, 101.5”x75.5”

POOL #2, oil on linen, 96”x42”

RED AND WHITE, oil on linen, 84x28

BORN 1946, Los Angeles, California

EDUCATION1969-71 California State University, Northridge NorthridgeGraduate Studies, Art 1969 B.A., California State University, Northridge

TEACHING EXPERIENCE

1993- Present Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, California, Art History

1993-2000 Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, California, Graduate Advisor1981-86 Otis/Parsons Art Institute, Los Angeles, California1979-83 Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, California1975-76 California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, California1975 University of California, Irvine

AWARDS

1988 Brody Foundation Grant1977 National Endowment for the Arts Grant 1975 National Endowment for the Arts Grant

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2013 “Peter Lodato: Spanish Black,” William Turner Gallery Santa Monica, California2012 “Peter Lodato: Edge of Light” Art 1307, Napoli, Italy “Eight to Eighty: Peter Lodato Sculpture House”, Museo Emblema, Napoli, Italy2009 Zane Bennet, Santa Fe, New Mexico2008 William Turner Gallery, Santa Monica, California 2007 Castello / Childs, Phoenix, Arizona2005 Berman / Turner Projects, Santa Monica, California 2003 Peter Blake Gallery, Laguna Beach, California 2002 Bakersfield Museum, Bakersfield, California Peter Blake Gallery, Laguna Beach, California2001 “Peter Lodato”Modernism, San Francisco, California2000 Peter Blake Gallery, Laguna Beach, California “Selected works, 1980 – 2000”Weisman Museum, Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA William Turner Gallery, Venice, California 1998 William Turner Gallery, Venice, California1997 Handsel Gallery, Santa Fe, Mexico Manné Gallery, Santa Barbara, California1996 William Turner Gallery, Venice, California Open Studio, William Turner Gallery, Venice, California

PETER LODATO

1993 Special Projects – Installation, Mattress Factory, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania1991 “Silver Tower” Public Art Project, Brunswig Square, Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, California1990 “Wrathful Means Project No. 2”, Sharon Truax Fine Art, Venice, California1989 Painting, Drawing & Sculpture Hunsaker-Schlesinger Gallery, Los Angeles, California1987 “La Porta”Krygier/Landau Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, California1985 “Angeline” Burnett Miller Gallery, Los Angeles, California “La Lune Noire”Hunsaker-Schlesinger Gallery, Los Angeles, California “La Mer”La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla, California1982 “Peter Lodato”Otis /Parsons Gallery, Los Angeles, California “China”Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles, California “Peter Lodato”Aspen Center for the Visual Arts, Aspen, Colorado1981 “Meditation”Art Gallery of the Sibell-Wolle Fine Arts Building, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO “Dust”California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California: catalogue1980 “Similarity and Opposites”Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles, California1978 Special ExhibitionInstitute for Art and Urban Resources, Special Projects Room, P.S. 1, Queens, NY1976 “Peter Lodato”Minneapolis College of Fine Art and Design, Minneapolis, Minnesota “Sisters”Claire Copley Gallery, Los Angeles, California1975 “Peter Lodato”CARP, Roger Wong Studio, Los Angeles, California “Peter Lodato”Art Gallery, University of California, Irvine: catalogue1973 “Peter Lodato”Michael Walls Gallery, Los Angeles, California1971 “Peter Lodato”Brand Art Center, Glendale, California

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2012 “California Abstract Painting, 1951-2011”, Woodbury University2007 “Selected Works from the Weisman Foundation Collection” Frederick R Weisman Museum of Art, Malibu, CA 2007 American Jewish University, Los Angeles, California2006 “Peter Lodato and Eric Johnson”Los Angeles Valley College, Los Angeles, California2004 “Charles Arnoldi, Laddie John Dill, Peter Alexander, Peter Lodato” Patrick Olson Gallery, Plymouth, MI2003 “Drunken Masters: Roger Herman, Peter Lodato, James Hayward, Hubert Schmalix” Gallery C, CA1999 “Radical Past: Art and Music in Pasadena, 1960-1974” Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena, CA1995 “Charles Arnoldi, Kris Cox, Charles Hill, Peter Lodato” William Turner Gallery, Venice, California1992 “Survey of California Art, 1960 – 90”Aspen Center for Visual Arts, Aspen, Colorado1991 “Salerno Incontrid-Arts”Rassegne della Ressegne Amalfi Arte, Salerno, Italy: catalogue1988 “Sculpture Da Camera” (Chamber Sculptures) Fisher Gallery, University of Southern California “Vessels” (Collaborative Exhibition)Sharon Truax Fine Art and The Art Store Gallery, Los Angeles, CA “20th Century Watercolors: Yesterday and Today” Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, CA1987 “America. America”4 Rassegna Internazionale d’Arte Antichi Arsenali della Republica Amalfi Arte, Amalfitana, Amalfi, Italy1985 “Peter Liashkov, Peter Lodato, Susan Rankaitis” Fisher Gallery, University of Southern California1984 “New Ways of Seeing”Marilyn Pink/Master Prints and Drawings, Los Angeles, California “A Broad Spectrum”Design Center of Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California “Contemporary Water colors”Pink’s Fine Art, Santa Monica, California “California Water colors”California State University, San Diego, California “Reflections”Lonny Gans Gallery, Los Angeles, California1983 “Summer Show”Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles, California “The Nancy Yewell Collection”Baxter Art GalleryCalifornia Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA “Environs 2; Union Avenue”Art Gallery, Loyola School of Law, Los Angeles, California “Drawings by 50 California Artists” Modernism Gallery, San Francisco, California

1982 “Painted Installations”80 Langston Street, San Francisco, California “New Work”Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles, California “Rebounding Surface”Edith C. Blum Art Institute Avery Center for the Arts Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York1981 “1981 Biennial Exhibition”Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; catalogue “Nine and Wall”Art Gallery, California State University, Fullerton, California “Decade: Los Angeles Painting in the Seventies”Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA Group ShowRosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles, California “Forty Famous Californians: Recent Unique Works on Paper” Judith Christian Gallery, New York “7 form 703”Gensler and Associates/Architects, Los Angeles, California1980 “New Work”Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles, California1979 “John McLaughlin, James Hayward, Peter Lodato”Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art, LA, CA “Christmas in July”Rosamund Felsen Gallery, Los Angeles, California “California Perceptions: Light and Space; Selections from the Wortz Collection” Art Gallery, California State University, Fullerton, California1977 “100 Plus Directions in Southern California Art”Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art, LA, CA “Faculty Exhibition”School of Art and Design,California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, California1975 “Eight Artists from L.A.”San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, California Group ExhibitionArt Gallery, California State University, Los Angeles, California1973 Group ExhibitonLeslie Collins Art Gallery, Dallas, Texas “Market Street Program: Nine Los Angeles Artists”San Francisco Museum of Art, SF, CA “Jerry Anderson, Greg Card, Laddie John Dill, and Peter Lodato” Fine Art Gallery, California State University, Northridge1972 “Los Angeles: Fourteen Painters”Art Gallery, University of California, Santa Barbara, California “24 Los Angeles Artists”Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California1970 “Nine Artists”Fine Arts Gallery, University of California, Irvine, California

SELECTED COLLECTIONS

Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation Los Angeles, CaliforniaBard College: Edith C. Blum Art Institute Annandale-on-Hudson, New YorkSyracuse University: Joe and Edith Lowe Art Gallery Syracuse, New YorkBrooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, New YorkSeattle Art Museum, Seattle, WashingtonDallas Museum of Art, Dallas, TexasCollege of Purchase, State University of New York: Neuberger Museum, Purchase, New YorkHara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, JapanSan Diego Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, California Pasadena Museum of California Art, Pasadena, California

SELECTED ART CRITICSIM BY THE ARTIST

“Michael Asher”, Documenta 5, Kassel, West Germany, 1972“Three Los Angeles Sculptors: Lloyd Hamrol, George Herms, Brauce Nauman”, catalogue statement for exhibition at The Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art, September 16 – October 24, 1975, published in Journal, A Contemporary Arts Magazine, No. 8, November- December 1975, pp.50 – 57

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Museo Emblema, “Eight to Eighty: Peter Lodato Sculpture House” Catalog, March 31, 2012Roberta Caraso, “Peter Lodato at Peter Blake: Review”, Laguna News Post, Laguna, California, March 10, 2002Kenneth Baker, “Lodato Has Light Touch With Bands of Color”, San Francisco Chronicle’Galleries, November 10, 2001James Feldman, “Peter Lodato at Frederick R. Weisman Museum of Art, October 14 –December 15, 2000”, Art Issues, January/February 2001, number 66“Light and Hard Edges: Peter Lodato at Peter Blake Gallery”, Coast, December 2000, p.87“Intellect and Intuition: Watercolors by Peter Lodato at Peter Blake Gallery”, O.C. Metro,December 14, 2000, p. 87Peter Frank, “Pick of the Week”, L.A.Weekly, December 8-14, 2000, p.164David Pagel, “Images that Resonate in the Mind’s Eye”, art review, Los Angeles Times, p.F8Michael Zakian, “Selected Works, 1980 – 2000” Frederick R. Weisman Museum of Art, Pepperdine University, catalogue essay, 2000Dottie Indyke, “Peter Lodato”, New Mexican Pasi Tiempo, January 9, 1998Marina Walker, “Lit From Within”, Santa Barbara News, April 4, 1997Alsion Lee Solin, “Finding the Center”, The Independent, April 3, 1997Peter Clothier, “Los Angeles”, (review of exhibiton at Hunsaker/Schlesinger Gallery),Art News, February 1990, p.164Kenneth Baker, “Peter Lodato, La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art”, Art Forum, November, 1985, p. 114Frances Colpitt, “Peter Lodato at Burnett Miler Gallery in Los Angeles”, Art In America,September 1985, p.114Kristine McKenna, “Art Galleries”, (review of exhbition at Burnett Miller Gallery), Los AngelesTimes, Part V, May 10, 1985Merl Shipper, “A Haven for Post-Modernism”, Artweek, May 25, 1985Suzanne Muchnic, “New Listing: Four Rooms with a View” (review of exhibition at Otis/Parsons),Los Angeles Times, Calendar, February 10, 1982Robert L. Pincus, “Galleries:, Los Angeles Times, Calendar, April 16, 1982Ralph C. Bond, “On and Off the Wall” , Artweek , March 7, 1981, p.5Lora Pethik Brown and Jane Cope Pence, “Nine and the Wall”, California State University,Fullerton Art Gallery, Fullerton, California, 1981Flora Cater, “Peter Lodato’s Meditation at UC boulder”, Artspace: SouthwesternContemporary Arts Quarterly, Fall, 1981, p.66Robert Hughes, “Quirks, Clamour and Variety”, Time Magazine, Vol. 117, No. 9. March 2,1981, p. 84Christopher Knight, “A Decade of L. A. Painting Crammed into one Exhibition”, Los AngelesHerald Examiner, March 8, 1981, Part E, p.7Mark Johnstone, “Exploration and Installation”, Artweek, October 24, 1981, p.5Suzanne Muchnic, “Odd Couple Interested in Illusion”, Los Angeles Times, Calendar, October4, 1981, p. 91John Perrault, “A Singular Pluralism”, The Soho News, February 11, 1981, p.27Whitney Museum of American Art, “Biennial Exhibition”, New York, 1981William Wilson, “The Wall, Not Just to Hang Pictures”, Los AngelesTimes, February 27, 1981,Part VI, p.10William Wilson, “A Cocktail Party of the Second Kind”, Los Angeles Times, Calendar, March1, 1981, p.80Melinda Wortz, “Abstract Painting in Los Angeles 1950-1980: Selections from the Murray andRuth Gribin Collection”, published in Journal: A contemporary Arts Magazine, No. 30, Vol.3,No. 10, September – October, 1981Richard Armstrong, “California”, Flash Art, March-April, 1980, pp.30-31Hunter Drohojowska, “Artbeat; Peter Lodato’s Sensitivity to the Inobvious”, L. A. WeeklyJanuary 18 – 24, 1980Adrienne Rosenthal, “The Illumination of Seeing”, Artweek, January 2, 1980, pp.1,20William Wilson, Review”, Los Angeles Times, January 26, 1980Joseph E. Young, “Artist’s Paintings go Beyond the Edge of the Canvas”, The Arizona Republic,January 20,1980Michael Kurcfeld, “Visible Means of Support”, New West, October 9, 1979, vol.3, no.21, p.106Susan Larsen, “Where Conceptual Meets Perceptual”, Artnews, January 1979, pp.94, 96Melinda Wortz, “California ‘Perceptions: Light and Space, Selections from the Wortz Collection”, Fullerton Art Gallery, Fullerton, California“Faculty Exhibition”, California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, California, 1977William Wilson, “Irvine Exhibits Lodato, Pashgian”, Los Angeles Times, December 22, 1975,Part IV, pp. 6-7Melinda Wortz, “Peter Lodato”, University of California, Irvine, 1975Elena Canavier, “Peter Lodato: Wall Works”, Artweek, February 24, 1973, Vol. 4, No.8, pp.1, 12Fidel Danieli, “Objects as Infinite Space”, L.A. Weekly News, 1973, Part IV, p.4Barbara Hansen, “Hamburgers Feature a Satiric Bite”, Los Angeles Times, July 1, 1971, Part IV, p.1April Kingsley, “Los Angeles”, The Art Gallery, Summer 1971, pp.21, 74Hilton Kramer, “Los Angeles: Now the ‘In ‘ Art Scene”, The New York Times, June 1, 1971, p.21Maurice Tuchman and Jane Livingston, “24 Los Angeles Artists”, Los Angeles County Museumof Art, Los Angeles, 1971William Wilson, “Two Shows Give Southlanders a Broad Look at What’s New”, Los Angeles Times, Calendar, June 13, 1971, p. 48