The Making of the Campus Center:
Robert A.M. Stern at Pomona College
August 31 - October 17

In 1993, distinguished New York architect Robert A.M. Stern was commissioned to design Pomona's new Campus Center. An extraordinarily complex project, it challenged the architect to provide a building that would, in its form, respect the College's original campus plan and existing buildings while also making an architectural statement appropriate to the late 20th century; and, in its function, re-focus the life of the campus community. This exhibition documents the making of the Campus Center, which opens this fall. Including rough sketches, finished renderings, models, and computer-assisted designs, it investigates the exquisitely complicated means by which abstract ideas become concrete and a work of architecture comes to form.

Stern, who was recently appointed Dean of Yale University's School of Architecture, is celebrated for the sensitivity of his buildings to their historic and contemporary contexts. Attracted to the project by the distinctiveness of Pomona's architecture and by the opportunity to work at the very center of Myron Hunt's historic 1908 campus plan, he and his associates have given the College an aesthetically distinctive building that promises to significantly enhance the quality of life on the Pomona campus.

Artist's Eye, Collector's Taste:
Paintings by Phil Dike from the
Collection of E. Gene Crain
August 31 - October 17

Since 1964, E. Gene Crain '55 has been collecting the work of Southern California artists. Particularly attracted to a group of painters who focused on images of the land and sea near Laguna Beach, he came to know many of them well, selecting works for his collection out of an intimate knowledge of their lives and concerns. Of the artists collected in depth by Crain, Phil Dike (1906-1990) stands out. A painter of great consistency and skill, his paintings simultaneously picture and evoke the sea and the life lived at its shores. A native of Claremont, Dike taught for many years at Scripps College where he was a key player in the development of a regional art style. The oil and watercolor paintings in this exhibition are from two related series- The Malibu Set and The Wave Series (1960's-70's); they exemplify Dike's mature style and powerfully express his passion for the sea. "The days I walk on the beach," he said, "are not just a search for a subject to paint, or to fill a notebook of facts and ideas, but to somehow reawaken the sensations of pleasure and wonder that I have felt for the sea in the years I have been painting. There is a deep satisfaction in the rhythm of the waves, the light, the smells, the sand and rock pieces that change from day to day..."

Phil Dike's paintings are his legacy and an invitation to share his experience of a landscape he loved. Those on view here reveal both the artist's eye and the discriminating taste of a great collector.

Changes and Continuities:
Japanese Paintings from the Sanso Collection
November 2 - December 19

From the 14th to 19th centuries, Japanese artists explored various ways to portray individuals and to represent the landscape, using different artistic styles and media. This exhibition juxtaposes paintings of similar subjects, chosen from the renowned Sanso Collection, to compare how artists employed compositional elements, brushwork techniques and distinctive formats to create unique works of personal expression. From Buddhist deities to Zen eccentrics, towering cliffs to stormy seas, these images reveal both innovative and conservative traditions within the arts of Japan over a period of five hundred years.

The exhibition was organized by Guest Curator Bruce Coats, Professor of Art, Scripps College.

Burning Heart
Philippine Photographs by Marissa Roth
November 2 - December 19

Selected from her recently published book, Burning Heart: A Portrait of the Philippines, Marissa Roth's photographs illuminate the Philippine culture both literally and metaphorically. The images, and the accompanying text by author Jessica Hagedorn, represent a journey through the Philippines. The exhibition is sponsored jointly with the Pacific Basin Institute.

Related events will include a book-signing/lecture with Roth and Hagedorn. More...

Project 3: Stas Orlovski
August 31 - October 17

Orlovski will present new drawings based on the human body. His work is informed by a mixture of 18th and 19th century medical illustration, quasi-scientific diagrams, caricature, folklore, and autobiography. More...

Project 4: Nancy Kyes
November 2 - December 19

For the last several years, Kyes has been making large-scale sculptures from hundreds of found objects and everyday materials that she builds by crushing and packing the materials together. She will exhibit new sculptures from the "Blackbody Radiation/Dish" series. More...