EVENT DETAILS

Best Kept Secret: UCI and the Development of Contemporary Art in Southern California, 1964-1971

UC Irvine was a hotbed of creativity and experimentation in the 1960s and early
’70s, a hub of innovation where exceptional teachers such as Tony DeLap, Robert
Irwin, and Vija Celmins taught talented students like Alexis Smith, Chris Burden,
and Nancy Buchanan. All but forgotten in the intervening years, this exceptional
time and place is now recovered at Laguna Art Museum in Best Kept Secret.
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Often overlooked in art history, University of California, Irvine (UCI) played a pivotal
role to the development of contemporary art. Best Kept Secret takes a look at UCI’s
formative years beginning with its inaugural year in 1964. This was also the year
that John Coplans was appointed director of the University Art Gallery. Coplans
was a writer and editor for Artforum magazine who moved its headquarters from
San Francisco to Los Angeles at this time. One of the first art professors Coplans
recruited was Tony DeLap, and the faculty grew to include Larry Bell, Ed Bereal,
Vija Celmins, Ron Davis, Robert Irwin, Craig Kauffman, Philip Leider (editor-in-
chief of Artforum, 1962–1971), John Mason, Ed Moses, Barbara Rose, and Alan
Solomon. Under the tutelage of this faculty, students included Marsha Red Adams,
Michael Asher, Nancy Buchanan, Chris Burden, Ned Evans, Marcia Hafif, Charles
Christopher Hill, Jay McCafferty, Richard Newton, Alexis Smith, Barbara T. Smith,
Bruce Richards, James Turrell, and Robert Walker. This is only a short list of
individuals, as the exhibition will show the works of about forty artists of faculty and
students during this time.
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The year 1971 marks a significant end year of exploration for this exhibition. The
Duchamp Festival—organized by Moira Roth and Barbara Rose—took place at
UCI that year. The festival included an exhibition, symposium, and a set of
performances and talks organized by faculty, students, and other artists. As artists
at UCI laid the groundwork for formative art practices, utilizing the vacuous ranch
land as a site of many experiments, the art community converged, new galleries
opened, and new models of artist-run, alternative spaces were created—all before
the City of Irvine’s incorporation into Orange County.
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Through first-hand interviews with the artists, collected ephemeral materials, early
works from the artists of this time-period, the production of a short documentary,
and the publication of a book, the overlooked activities that took place will be
recognized as an important moment in the emergence of contemporary art in
Southern California. Before the ISMs of art movements became solidified in the
ways we view them today, UCI nurtured the roots of various movements of art
practice—Finish Fetish, Light and Space, performance, video, conceptualism,
feminism, and installation. Because of or in spite of the underdeveloped
landscape surrounding UCI and the greater Orange County area at the time, the
wealth of artists and activities have been overlooked and under-recognized in the
discourse of Southern California art history.
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Tony DeLap, a pioneer artist of Minimalism and Op Art on the West Coast, is
serving as the project consultant and Grace Kook-Anderson is the curator. Peter
Frank is the main essayist for the book, and Cole Akers and Kook-Anderson are
contributing writers.
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Artists Include:
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Marsha Red Adams Ned Evans John McCracken
Michael Asher Joe Goode Ed Moses
Jack Barth Marcia Hafif Richard Newton
Gary Beydler Charles Christopher Hill Bruce Richards
Larry Bell Ron Hock Tony Rouff
Ed Bereal Robert Irwin Alexis Smith
Nancy Buchanan John Paul Jones Barbara T. Smith
Chris Burden Donald Karwelis Paula Sweet
Jerry Byrd Craig Kauffman Ann Titus
Vija Celmins John Mason James Turrell
Ron Davis Jay McCafferty Robert Walker
Tony DeLap Colleen McCallion Robert Wilhite
Laddie John Dill Walter Wittel

This exhibition will take place in conjunction with Pacific Standard Time: Art in LA
1945-1980. Pacific Standard Time is a collaboration of more than sixty cultural
institutions across Southern California, which are coming together for six months
beginning October 2011 to tell the story of the birth of the Los Angeles art scene
and how it became a major new force in the art world. Each institution will make its
own contribution to this grand-scale story of artistic innovation and social change,
told through a multitude of simultaneous exhibitions and programs. Exploring and
celebrating the significance of the crucial post-World War II years and beyond,
Pacific Standard Time encompasses developments from modernist architecture
and design to multi-media installations; from L.A. Pop to post-minimalism; from
the films of the African-American L.A. Rebellion to the feminist happenings of the
Woman’s Building; from ceramics to Chicano performance art, and from
Japanese-American design to the pioneering work of artists’ collectives.