Shiva Ahmadi, a professor in the UC Davis Department of Art and Art History, has an upcoming exhibition of 19 paintings in “Shiva Ahmadi: Strands of Resilience” at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art Jan. 28 – May 6.
Malaquías Montoya, a professor emeritus of Chicana and Chicano studies at UC Davis, is being widely celebrated with two major exhibitions at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art at UC Davis and at the Oakland Museum of California. But he is much more than an artist. Montoya, 85, has influenced several generations of students who went on to make art or make a mark on the world in other ways.
One of UC Davis’ most famous artist alumnae and an influential UC Davis professor emeritus will have major exhibitions at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art this fall. Both shows open Oct. 1 as part of the museum’s fall celebration from 2:30 to 5 p.m. Admission to the museum is free.
The Gorman Museum of Native American Art at the University of California, Davis — unique in focusing on, exhibiting and collecting contemporary Native American art — will reopen in a new, greatly expanded location with a celebratory weekend Sept. 22 and 23 (Friday and Saturday). The occasion also marks the museum’s 50th anniversary.
“Black mustard” is what people call the thick oil that is often visible — particularly at sunset — on the surface of Newtown Creek, which borders Queens and Brooklyn in New York City. The estimated 30 million gallons of oil is one of many toxins in the creek, an Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site. This would seem an unlikely place to not only inspire, but to also be the venue, for an opera, but it is. The opera "Newtown Odyssey," by UC Davis professor Kurt Rohde, visual artist Marie Lorenz and writer Dana Spiotta, is being premiered this weekend.
With the movie “Oppenheimer” drawing big crowds to see the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer, who led the development of the atomic bomb, it’s a good time to catch up with UC Davis alumnus Stephen Whisler (B.A., art, ‘76), who created many works connected to the bombs dropped on Japan.
At this year’s Arts and Humanities Graduate Exhibition, on view June 8-25 at the Jan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, students in history, performance studies and English as well as design and art will take part. A free, public opening celebration will take place June 8 from 6 to 9 p.m. Art history students will present their research the following day. In all, 30 Master of Fine Arts, Master of Arts and doctoral students are participating.
Mauricio Ernesto Ramírez, a postdoctoral scholar in the UC Davis Department of Chicana and Chicano Studies, first walked through Balmy Alley when he was a student at a nearby elementary school in San Francisco’s Mission District. The block-long alley contains the most concentrated collection of murals in a city that’s a tapestry of murals. The alley’s art — which first began appearing in the early 1970s —has long been about issues relevant to the many Mission residents who trace their roots to Mexico and Central America.
UC Davis College of Letters and Science graduate students will share their work with the public as the multidisciplinary “Arts and Humanities 2022 Graduate Exhibition” returns to theJan Shrem and Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art following two years of virtual exhibitions.
A public opening event with a poetry reading, music and dance will take place June 2 from 6 to 9 p.m.
When Wayne Thiebaud arrived at UC Davis in 1961, the university had been an independent campus for only two years. The art department was in an embryonic stage. Then in 1962, Thiebaud had a groundbreaking exhibition in New York and, during the decades that followed, his reputation only grew. Along the way he was joined by other art faculty who soon developed national reputations as well, and UC Davis became nearly as well-known for art as for agriculture.
