(Carson, CA) – California State University, Dominguez Hills’ (CSUDH) University Art Gallery has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the Getty Foundation. The funds will be used to conduct research related to the gallery’s contribution to the next Pacific Standard Time initiative in 2024, which this time focuses on the relationship between art and science.
Entitled “Brackish Waters Los Angeles,” the CSUDH project will revolve around the concept of brackish water sites, areas where fresh and ocean water intermix. The exhibition will explore this notion both literally, with scientific research into Southern California’s waterways, and metaphorically, as an ‘in between space’ of great change and possibility, tracing the intricate ways ecology, culture, and community intersect.
“We’re excited that CSUDH is being included in this extremely prestigious program,” says Aandrea Stang, CSUDH Art Gallery director and co-curator of the project. “”We’re very honored to have our proposal accepted by the Getty Foundation, and are excited for the opportunities this will give our students.”
Under the guidance of Stang and exhibit co-curator Debra Scacco, artist and founding director of the Artist-in-Residence program at the Los Angeles Cleantech Incubator (LACI), the research component of the project will include a pair of art and design classes structured around the exhibition. Stang explains, “We will take students out to various brackish water sites and talk to them about the art and art history aspects of the project. We’ll encourage students in the natural sciences to take the classes, so we can use them as field researchers to let us (artists) know what we’re not seeing in terms of the local environmental impact and other important scientific facts about the sites.”
An interdisciplinary advisory committee has already been formed for the exhibition, including art historians, scientists, and educational directors. Together, this group will develop research “that is guided by the history and present ecology of water in the region,” according to the exhibition’s proposal. When it opens in late 2024, the exhibit will be housed at the CSUDH University Art Gallery, located in an area of South Los Angeles where the proposal states “infrastructure has transformed local rivers into concrete channels, and where industrial contamination and ecological racism have plagued the surrounding communities for generations.”
Launched in 2007, the Pacific Standard Time initiatives have supported museums and arts organizations in the presentation of broad themes on display over an intense period of time, focusing the art world’s attention on Southern California. The original Pacific Standard Time event in 2011/2012 drew 1.8 million visitors to exhibitions at 60 institutions across the region. In 2017/2018, 2.7 million visitors participated in Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA activities at 70 institutions.
