Artists Larry and Debby Kline have been involved in a pair of collaborations with scientists, including a current engagement as artists in residence at San Diego’s Natural History Museum in Balboa Park, where they are updating the work of 19th-century ornithologist John James Audubon’s “Birds of America” portfolio.
With media that shifts depending upon the project they undertake, the pair have used everything from salt to Israeli mud, ceramics, foam, and cement to shape their works. “It is the process of experimentation that leads to truly amazing things in the studio,” they attest. Dealing with subjects both political, social, and humane, their witty, pointed, and above all, graceful, work is a conversation with the viewer.
Some medical students find drawing bodies more intimate and overwhelming than dissecting them. It’s part of UCSD School of Medicine’s artist-in-residency program, which has inspired similar endeavors at med schools across the world. Debby and Larry Kline are the new artists-in-residence at the UC San Diego School of Medicine.
We have decided to create an “act of defiance” each day in the form of Tiny Revolutions, very small hand-drawn graphite images ranging in size from ½” x ½” to 2 ½” x 2 ½.” Their size is dictated by the possibility that a day may come when Americans cannot freely voice dissent.
Navlakha uses algorithms to study similarities between biological and engineered networks, hoping to learn how to interrupt the progression of disease. The Klines use sensors to track which artworks in the exhibit hold visitors’ attention longest. Their installation includes video images of traffic patterns, networks of slime molds, herds of Pokemon Go players, and the artists, along with comfortable seating.
I am not even going to try to explain the relationship and subjects of all these collaborations between artists and scientist. Works about cancer and aging were prevalent. Some of the artists developed a great connection and collaboration. others were truly just inspired by the research of the scientists. But the quality of the artists chosen to participate was so high, that the show is a winner.
Hello All. We’d love to share our latest press release with you, a listing of some of our upcoming events. However, since we sent out this post, we also learned that we will be exhibiting at Oceanside Museum of Art in early 2018! Hope to see you at some of these events!
We were recently awarded the Calzona Prize in a ceremony at UCSD. The award includes the deed to a plot of land in the desert on the border of California and Arizona, which we will use to create art and turn the land into a way-station for travelers. The artwork will be a series of earthworks that relate to the formation of the Salton Sea. This project should take about a year to complete and will be a sister piece to Earth Igloo for Jerusalem, a piece we created for an exhibition at Museum on the Seam.
Artists collaborated with scientists from the Salk Institute for works to be included in the exhibition titled Extra-Ordinary Collusions at San Diego Art Institute. Debby and Larry Kline learn[ed] about plant symmetry and fractals from Saket Navlakha.