Intimate and Intense: Cathy Immordino

Posted on by Diversions LA

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Above, “Reflection” by Cathy Immordino.

A powerful and intimate photographic artist, Cathy Immordino tackles subjects that are profoundly global, relatable and moving. Her subjects are carefully and beautifully rendered in highly emotional works that touch on the environment, immigration, feminism, motherhood. In each of her series of works, Immordino’s message is passionately personal. And it is that deeply personal approach that creates work that feels so universal: if it matters to her, it matters to the viewer.

Whether it is a touching image of a young boy, sepia toned, with a downward gaze or the magical image of “The Portal,” in which a tabby cat is strolling toward what could be the entrance to another world – or the stairs to a busy outdoor space – Immordino’s gift is to capture the ordinary and give it an extraordinary spin.

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Her series Pilgrimage of Heritage delves into heritage, myth, family, story telling. Many of the pieces here have a dreamy, otherworldly quality, an element of magic as in the twinned images of “The Spirit Guide,” where a young boy points by a rocky arch on the left side of the work; on the right is an image of a grave. Many images here are digitally manipulated, some are photo montages. There is a sense of visual alchemy here.
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Above, “Spirit Guide”; below, “A Cry for Help.”
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A Cry for Help is an intensely moving black and white series about Immordino’s own experience with the fraught complications of her pregnancy. While images here may also be digitally enhanced, there is a raw, deep-seated emotion that is the core of this work.
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Her Festival of Lights series documents raves in a vibrant and abstract take that evokes the full, frenzied experience; while all the charm, poignancy, and vulnerability of childhood is on display in her beautiful, dusky series on her growing child, Tom Volume 1. The series is mostly sepia images, rich, timeless. 
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L.A. River goes blue and grey as it tackles the respect or lack of it for nature, the containment of the Los Angeles River, and the power of nature itself. This series of landscapes is infused with loneliness and limitation, and straining at the edges, the power and regeneration of a natural resource that could serve as a stand in for life itself.
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Below, right, the artist’s work at Photo LA.
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The artist is originally from Minneapolis, and her desire to create began with a gift of a Polaroid camera which she received when she was just five years old. The circumstances of the gift may have influenced her eye. She was recovering from a severe car accident – and today there is a certain aspect of healing and tenderness that is a marked part of her work. Whether that is a stretch or not, Immordino’s eye for the personal and compassionate developed early and remained with her through the realization of another creative aspiration, acting.
Having now moved from being in front of the camera to behind it in her professional life, Immordino has tackled a variety of subjects. Her first professional photo work documented the party scene and raves; today her focus is fine art photography.

 

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Now based in Los Angeles, Immordino’s work is exhibited nationally, with a current exhibition at the Hilyer Art Space in Washington, D.C.. Locally, in September, she’ll be exhibited at the Los Angeles Center for Photography; in October her work will be seen at the Long Beach Museum of Art.

“I started photographing to remember the world that exists at that particular time in my life…  Every picture I take I want the viewers to be moved to change the way they perceive the world around them,” she says. Working to capture her own unique point of view in every image, Immordino adds “Some images are photomontages, while others become prints made with alternative processes.”

However she shapes her images, both fierceness and devotion shine through her work. Viewers can see for themselves:

August 18-19 – Chocolate & Art Show at The Vortex, 2341 E. Olympic Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90021.

September 30 – “Fresh” exhibition at the Los Angeles Center of Photography.

October 6 – Port of Long Beach exhibition at the Long Beach Museum of Art.

  • Genie Davis; Photos provided by the artist

When Line Becomes Form: Brand Library Gallery Liberates

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A soaring show filled with powerful figures and shapes, When Line Becomes Form is an elegant, measured spiritual odyssey. Featuring the art work of Mark Acetelli, Dirk Hagner, Cindy Jackson, Grey James, Joanna Kidd and Miles Lewis, the expressionistic exhibition roams from sculpture to painting and drawing, touching all points between them.

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Pasadena based painter Mark Acetelli works in oils and encaustics, layering his canvasses in a kind of emotional abstraction.  His figures are ghost-like, souls in migration, images to which the viewer imparts the more concrete elements. Lush and dreamy, these works wander through the mind and take root there, wavering in an emotional wind.

Brand line 2Dirk Hagner uses traditional mediums to create uniquely modern portraits of literary and political subjects. Iconic figures and those whose images just appear familiar are portrayed through a series of large-scale woodblock portraiture. Hagner’s highly stylized works are seemingly elegaic, poignant and cool, involving yet carefully nuanced.

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The late Cindy Jackson’s large scale and absolutely magnificent sculptures here are brimming with life. The artist noted that viewers should “Look deeply into my work and you’ll see that it is not about the figure itself, but about the internal emotional worlds that sit within those boundaries.” The entwined and exaggerated shapes of her very-much-alive figures soar through the space they inhabit. It would be impossible for a viewer to not stand beside these figures in awe of their spiritual depth. These are souls frozen in sculpted bodies, to which Jackson pays tribute. The internationally recognized and award-winning artist has created sublime works that serve as a legacy for her own indomitable spirit. To a large extent, these pieces are the center of the exhibit, from which other works spiral out and in, line having fully become form in her works.

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Glendale-based artist Grey James’ offers paintings and mixed media, personal, involving accounts of transition both physical and emotional. James creates moving transgender icons, intimate and appealing; a universal sense of beauty and change in these images going far beyond the borders of sexual definition. The works have the quality of religious paintings, a reverence that the viewer finds palpable.

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Joanna Kidd’s work forms a different sort of transition: that between the sculptural and painting. Her bas relief portraits are raised in high relief, shaping a highly dimensional, caught-in-motion quality to each portrait.  The faces she depicts are detailed and alive, shifting in light and in the viewers relationship to the images, so that they seem to be watching and watchful. Her art contains something quite intensely, universally human, the capture of a living being for a fraught moment in time.

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Miles Lewis considers himself a life-drawing artist. Drawing is the medium he uses to shape figures that are fluid and resonant; delicately textured, these works on paper seem ready to shape-shift into something more dimensional. These are carefully wrought creations, studies that make it seem possible they may morph into flesh and blood.

Over all, this exhibit is all about life: the lines that become form are the strands of DNA that create existence. The art is a part of the wonder and artistry of a spiritual universe, a new way of creating the real; expressionist art that expresses the most powerful and graceful embodiment of art itself – the human form, the human spirit.

The show runs through September 1st. The Brand Art Gallery is located at 1601 W. Mountain Street in Glendale.

  • Genie Davis; photos: Genie Davis

 

Primo is Prime Italian South Bay Style

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The beach cities south of LAX have too-long languished without a wide choice of fine dining experiences. But that’s all changed now, with a bevy of epicurean delights springing up all over the South Bay.

Among them is Primo, a homey, welcoming, yet upscale setting with warm staff and authentic Italian cuisine. Proud of it’s many imported Italian ingredients, the restaurant offers something for everyone, from delicate pizzas to hearty fish and meat dishes.

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Innovative chef Michelangelo Aliaga decided to move to the beach cities with his wife and family after the birth of his twins. “In the process – some may say it was fate, that the opportunity to be a part of Primo’s start and growth presented itself and it was too good to pass up. What we do every day is more than just cooking. Each dish has our passion, our energy, and our love for Italian food,” he asserts. “We’re passionate about each product that we bring from Italy.  Many of the ingredients that we use in our dishes, such as our olive oil,  prosciutto, cheeses in all their varieties, and salamis, take months or even years to produce. That kind of devotion to food and its history is an experience told not by the chef but by all the people that make the ingredients are the best of the world, ‘the artisan producers.'”
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So with these ingredients in mind, how was the kitchen? Our meal began with craft cocktails that were light and refreshing, a great accompaniment to the fresh, hot bread and imported olive tapenade.
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A starter of octopus served over sliced tomatoes and potatoes provided a terrific contrast in textures, the cold cooked potatoes and thinly sliced tomatoes offering an excellent base for the tender yet chewy fish.
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The Cesare Salad featured whole, fresh anchovies along with a lovely, savory dressing. The quality of the cheese shavings was also excellent.
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Our first course was a thin crust pizza with goat cheese and imported Pecorino, salty and yet refined, with a crust that had the slightly chewy yet light texture of the dough, which had a hint of sweetness.
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Our secondi focused once again on the sea. My salmon with pistachio crust came with broccolini and fingerling potatoes; it was juicy and ample, a superior cut of fish that was fresh and flavorful.
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The signature Brodo di Pesce had a rich and spicy broth, tomato based, that served as a richly nuanced contrast to generously portioned chunks of tender fish, crab legs, and mussels. Again, a generous portion with plenty of texture and flavor. The crisp bread accompanying the dish was just right to soak up the last of the broth.
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Dessert was a highlight: house made, fresh spumoni gelato – gelato flavors change nightly. Along with chocolate, strawberry, and pistachio, vanilla was added to the traditional spumoni flavors.
The personable staff made the meal feel well-attended, but not rushed. Come for the food with its fresh, carefully curated ingredients, for the convivial atmosphere, and the dedication to innovative renderings of classic dishes in the kitchen. Primo is primed for success in the beach cities.
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Primo is located at 24590 Hawthorne Boulevard in Torrance.

Durden and Ray Collaborate

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Just closed at Durden and Ray, Simultaneous Contrast offered a fresh and provocative look at texture and line, with works positioned in a perfectly balanced counterpoint of color and pattern from one another. Indeed, the exhibition served as an inclusive, vibrant installation as much as a display of singularly cool works of art.

The exhibition, an exchange show with Chicago’s LVL3 gallery, features three Los Angeles artists and two Chicago artists in a show of abstract paintings that were created and curated to “symbolize the current violent swings of thought across the country regarding America’s simultaneous utopia and dystopia,” according to the exhibition’s notes.

However, visually, the show compelled on a level that goes beyond politics or symbolism. The colors and textures, the rich and the absorbing designs, all served as a kind of kaleidoscope of palette and pattern.

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Above, Curtis Stage, left

Curated by Durden and Ray member Curtis Stage and LVL3 member Adam Scott, LA artists Roberta Gentry, Nano Rubio, and Chris Trueman are joined by Zoe Nelson and Adam Scott from Chicago. The counterpart of this show in Chicago is scheduled for October.

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From Chris Trueman’s lush, almost watery abstract splashes, swatches, and hypnotic swipes of color…

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…to Adam Scott’s prismatic, deeply grooved and textured works, Simultaneous Contrast did just that, offering a sense of immediacy and a vibrant counterpoint.

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Nano Rubio’s incredible, precise lines and patterns support what Rubio calls “the idea of trickery, that things can change your perception.”Durden July 15 nelson

Zoe Nelson’s amorphous forms and shapes are edged with surrealism, a balancing act of floating rhythms of color.

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Roberta Gentry’s intense, almost psychedelic prismatic works were in short, fascinatingly different and yet intertwined. They’re dreamscapes in a way, and the viewer nearly falls into a rabbit hole just watching them.

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The pairings of paintings and positioning of works across the gallery from each other, created a dialog of sorts, one that set the eye and mind buzzing.

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Like puzzle pieces, the artworks fit together and danced alone, interwoven and dazzling, each and together.

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As always, Durden and Ray‘s dedication to the different did not disappoint.

  • Genie Davis; Photos: Genie Davis and Curtis Stage