“Nurturing Masculinities” — Part of FotoSoCal by CuratorLove — on Display Through Nov. 7
The following is a submission from SMC. Photo Caption: “Planes pa’ los pollos hacen gallos finos No. 10” is one of the visual works in photographer Juan Manuel Valenzuela’s “Nurturing Masculinities” exhibition in the Emeritus Art Gallery at 1227 Second St., Santa Monica.
The Santa Monica College (SMC) Emeritus Art Gallery will present “Nurturing Masculinities,” a free exhibition of works byartist/photographer Juan Manuel Valenzuela. The exhibition — a part of the FotoSoCal constellation of art exhibits — opens on Sept. 18 and runs through Nov. 7 in the Emeritus Art Gallery at 1227 Second St., Santa Monica.
The opening reception for the exhibit will be held on Thursday, Sept. 18, from 5 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. in the gallery, located on the first floor of the SMC Emeritus Campus, 1227 Second St., in downtown Santa Monica. Parking is available next door in Santa Monica Public Parking Structure No. 2. Gallery hours are 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. The exhibition and opening reception are free.
The opening reception will be hosted by Emeritus Gallery Director Jesse Benson and Exhibition Curator Erika Hirugami, who also teachescourses that specialize in the history of photographyfor the SMC Art Department.
Artist Valenzuela uses his powerful photographs to document generational shifts in cultural and familial identifiers of “masculinity.” Exhibition Curator Hirugami describes “Nurturing Masculinities” as the artist’s “blueprint and aesthetic exploration of the soft margins of intergenerationally inherited masculinity, visually juxtaposing what Valenzuela learned from his elders with the type of nurturing he aims to bestow upon his son.”
Hirugami, a first-generation Mexican Japanese immigrant, is the founder of CuratorLove and co-founder of UNDOC+Collective. She is Curatorial Director of the expansive FotoSoCal project, a “constellation of exhibitions” presented in galleries at more than 20 community colleges and affiliated spaces across Southern California.
“Valenzuela’s work is compelling conceptually and in materiality,” noted Curator Hirugami. “The work is equal parts aesthetically challenging to a larger conversation about Latino masculinities, while also being methodically produced in ways rarely seen in the photography canon at major museums.”
Gallery Director Benson said, “This exhibition presents an amazing opportunity for viewers to consider the fascinating work of Juan Manuel Valenzuela, both within a powerful standalone gesture and within the context of Erika Hirugami’s expansive and layered Foto SoCal. We’re grateful to Erika for her work bridging spaces and ideas, and thank her for selecting Emeritus Gallery to play a role in this important collaboration.”
SMC’s widely praised Emeritus program — founded by Santa Monica College in 1975 as a noncredit program to serve the lifelong learning interests of older adults — offers more than 120 noncredit adult education classes and special programs that serve more than 3,000 students each year.
More information is available by visiting smc.edu/emeritusgallery or calling 310-434-4306. Exhibition and reception subject to change or cancellation without notice.
