AWAKE IN THE GOLDEN STATE
June 6 - July 25, 2015

OPENING: June 6, 2015 |  6pm - 8pm

Sonce Alexander Gallery is proud to present Awake in the Golden State, featuring the works of James Gobel and Sandy Rodriguez.

Composed in response to the communities and landscapes of California, James Gobel and Sandy Rodriguez's work interlinks their personal reflections on urbanity and culture.

James Gobel cites his social interactions in the San Francisco LGBT community as impetus for his practice. Checkered patterns, raw scratches and abstract forms generate bold robust lines, maneuvering and layering symbols throughout his canvases. Gobel's frenetic gestural marking 'existentially recalls abstract expressionism', while the conceptual inscription of text forms a 'highly personal, idosyncratic moral code.' Gobel responds to the intricacies of an intimate world where bathroom graffiti is strewn with elegant invitations for a double-tease, revealing and concealing an underlying sensuality.

James Gobel received his BFA from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (1996) and his MFA from the University of California, Santa Barbara (1999). Solo exhibitions include: UCLA Hammer Museum (2000); Kravets/Wehby Gallery, New York (1999, 2001, 2002, 2005); Marx & Zavattero, San Francisco (2008 & 2010) and Steve Turner Contemporary, Los Angeles (2008 & 2012). Exhibitions include: the travelling museum exhibition Las Vegas Diaspora: The Emergence of Contemporary Art from the Neon Homeland curated by Dave Hickey, Las Vegas Art Museum (2007); Surface Value, Des Moines Art Center (2011); Leslie Lohman Museum of Gay and Lesbian Art (2014), San Francisco. Gobel lives and works in San Francisco, California.

Sandy Rodriguez depicts graceful transitions and subtle moments in the city of Los Angeles. The transfiguration of overlooked environments unites with delicate strokes and ethereal street corners. Redevelopment manifests with a fragility disclosing otherwise disregarded landscapes and architecture - communities in order and disorder. Rodriguez delivers a personal perspective with fervent simplicity, exposing fractured viewpoints through the subjectivity of fire, fog, tear gas, and persistence: an artist's vision of a beloved city and its physical as well as cultural regeneration.

Sandy Rodriguez is an artist and museum educator who received her BFA from California Institute of Arts (1997). She has shown at institutions such as Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, Snite Museum of Art; University of Notre Dame - Notre Dame; Walter Maciel Gallery and Avenue 50 Studios. She was recently nominated for the 2015 Rema Hort Mann Foundation emerging artist award. Rodriguez is the 2014-2015 Artist in Residence with Art + Practice (residence organized by the Hammer Museum, founded by Mark Bradford, Eileen Harris Norton and Allan DiCastro) and education specialist for teacher audiences for the J. Paul Getty Museum. In Summer 2015 her work will be showcased at the Vincent Price Art Museum and Art + Practice foundation for her Artist in Residence. Rodriguez lives and works in Los Angeles, California.

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