Montalvo's artists in residence open their studios to the public
By Shari Kaplan
Combining visual arts, poetry, fiction and music, Villa Montalvo's annual Artist Residency Open Studios offers something for all types, no matter what their creative bent.
On May 23, five resident artists--Claudia Aranovich, Tina Born, Tina Chang, Molly Giles and Hye Kyung Lee--will visit with the public from 2 to 3 p.m. and again from 4 to 5 p.m. in their on-site studio cottages. Readings and musical presentations are scheduled from 3 to 4 p.m. at the Carriage House Theater. The event is free and open to the public.
A visual artist, Aranovich has exhibited extensively in Argentina, Mexico, Ecuador, Spain, Germany and Cuba and is the recipient of numerous grants and awards. She was also named Young Artist of the Year in 1995 by the Critics of Art Association of Argentina. At Montalvo, Aranovich is investigating the use of natural and industrial materials in art, as well as their formal meanings. She will also finish a research project on art in public sites.
Born, who works with object-making, installations and video, has been exhibiting in the United States and internationally since 1992, including shows in the United Kingdom, Iceland and Mexico. While at Montalvo, Born is working primarily with video--collecting material dealing with Villa Montalvo as it relates to her seeing the area for the first time. Her videos are minimalist in nature, focusing mainly on single observations for just a few seconds each.
Poet Chang is working on her first collection of poems, Half-Lit Houses. The work documents a young woman's early life, the loss of her father and the father's presence as a mythical figure in the speaker's life. The collection is also punctuated by a movement backward in history to Hunan, China, in the late 1930s and early 1940s. In this context, the speaker whom Chang has created begins to imagine her life as part of a continuing chain of loss and acceptance. Chang is using her time at Montalvo to concentrate on this poetic work.
Giles is the author of two short story collections: Creek Walk, the winner of two literary awards, and Rough Translations, which won three literary awards and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Her first novel, Iron Shoes, is scheduled for publication by Simon and Schuster next spring. Many of Giles' stories have been read on NPR's Symphony Space. A professor of creative writing at San Francisco State University, Giles also holds several artists' grants. She is doing final edits on Iron Shoes while staying at Montalvo.
Lee, a composer, holds many honors in the field of music, including the 1998 ASCAP Standard Award and the 1997 Nancy Van de Vate Prize for Orchestral Music by the International Alliance for Women in Music. Her Suite for Solo Piano is available on New Ariel Recordings, and her Sonatina for Soprano, Saxophone and Piano has recently been published by Musik Fabrik of Paris. During her Montalvo stay, Lee is working on a large-scale sonata for solo piano and a duo for cello and piano.
The international, multidisciplinary Artist Residency Program brings up to 35 artists per year to Montalvo to participate in a working residency for one to three months in a setting that offers privacy, creative reflection and--during open studios--a chance to interact with the public. The program is funded through the Friends of Montalvo.
Villa Montalvo is at 15400 Montalvo Road, Saratoga. For more information, call artist residency director Kathryn Funk at 961-5818.
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Los Gatos, California Since 1881
