Don Soker Contemporary Art is a San Francisco-based art gallery, established in 1971. It is one of the longest continuously operating contemporary art galleries in San Francisco Bay Area. The gallery exhibits contemporary international art with an emphasis on conceptual, reductive and minimal work in a variety of mediums. It was one of the first to show contemporary modern Japanese art in the 1970s. As of 2017 the gallery is located in San Francisco's Potrero Hill district.
Video Don Soker Contemporary Art
History
The gallery was founded in 1971 by Don and Carol Kaseman Soker as "Upstairs Gallery" in a Victorian-era flat in San Francisco's North Beach at 1457 Grant Avenue. Working with the Kyoto-based art venue Gallery Coco and later directly with the artists, the early shows' focus was on contemporary modern Japanese art, largely unknown in this country. These artists included the new conceptual group, as well as Mono-ha and Gutai artists. Their aesthetic was a hybrid of past and present and very experimental. Works on paper, particularly printmaking, the dominant medium and easiest exportable, prevailed. Among the artists were Tetsuya Noda, Ay-O, Shoichi Ida, Akira Kurosaki, Nobuo Sekine, Lee U-Fan, Ushio Shinohara, Masuo Ikeda, and Takesada Matsutani.
In 1978 the gallery name became that of the owners, Soker-Kaseman Gallery,[5]and later in that decade in addition to the Japanese, the gallery began to exhibit prominent local and international artists including Bruce and Norman Yonemoto, Michi Itami, Yoong Bae, Stanley William Hayter, Paul Wunderlich, Jorg Schmeisser, Peter Van Riper, Jeffrey Vallance, Mary Woronov, Mike Kelley (artist), Ronald Chase, Karolyi Zsigmond and Geza Samu.
From 1983 to 1985 the gallery also developed and operated an alternative exhibition/performance space in the basement of the Grant Avenue location. As the entrance was on the small alley behind the building, Bannam Place, it was called Bannam Place Exhibition Space. It was modeled on what became New Langton Arts, initially run by the San Francisco Art Dealer's Association of which Don Soker was a founder.[6][7] The original curator was Rolando Castellon who had just left his post as Curator at SFMOMA.[7] More than 80 exhibitions and numerous readings and performances were held there by SFAI students, artists from Japan who frequently lived there, North Beach artists, and those who would later become more well known. Bannam Place artists included: Koichi Tamano, Mark Bulwinkle, Takehisa Kosugi, Corwin Clairmont, Ray Beldner, DeWitt Cheng, Mark Van Proyen, Bob Kaufman, Howard Hart, Stan Rice, Julia Vinograd and Jack Meuller.[8]
The gallery moved to a new location at 871 Folsom Street in 1987 and changed to its present name. The earthquake of 1989 damaged the building and the gallery and fellow tenants 871 Fine Arts and Crown Point Press moved to other locations.[9]. Subsequent locations of the gallery were: (1990-1998) 251 Post Street, (1998-2009) 49 Geary Street, (2009-2015) 100 Montgomery Street/80 Sutter Street, 2015- 2180 Bryant Street.
Maps Don Soker Contemporary Art
Current Activity
In 2015 the gallery moved from the downtown area to the Potrero Hill/Dogpatch Area of the San Francisco [10]. The gallery has held nearly 300 exhibitions at its various locations aside from those at Bannam Place. The gallery continues to represent established and emerging artists in an annual series of 6 week exhibitions.[11]
Represented artists
Julie Alland, Elisabeth Ajtay Tom Bills, Peter Boyer, Van Chang, Christel Dillbohner, Veronika Dobers, Jesse Gottesman, Robin Hill, Carole Jeung, Theodora Varnay Jones, Judith Maloney, Tetsuya Noda, Susanne Schossig, Shoichi Seino, Dimitri Skandali, Gordon Senior, Karin Wikstrom, Eleanor Wood, Yutaka Yoshinaga
Unformatted References
3. 4. Shapiro, Michael, "Japanese Art Finds Itself in a Meeting of Past and Present", The New York Times, May 19, 1985 5. Kohrer, Judith "A Graphic Diary", Artweek, May 1, 1982 6. sfada.com 7. "Art Dealers Here Form an Association", The San Francisco Chronicle, Nov. 28, 1973 8. http://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/roho/ucb/text/castellon_rolando.pdf 9. Bannam Place Archive, Don Soker Contemporary Art 10. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathan_Brown 11. http://www.sfchronicle.com/news/article/Minnesota-Street-Project-a-new-home-for-art-6917237.php 12. donsokergallery.com
External links
- Theodora Varnay Jones "fugue" review and gallery history
- Don Soker gallery talk 2/4/17 gallery history and Japanese art of 1970s-80s
- Bruce & Norman Yonemoto "Garage Sale" 1976 with DS at Upstairs Gallery
- Noda Exhibition Asian Art Museum 10/22/04-1/16/050
- theodora varnay jones san jose institute of contemporary art
- Reflections
- S F art galleries forge into new territories
Notes
Source of article : Wikipedia
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