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MONTEREY, CA (JULY 12, 2024) - Celebrating creative partnerships that result in potent artistic legacies, Monterey Museum of Art's (MMA) fall 2024 exhibition season features four thematically related exhibitions including: Under the Guard Tower: The Watercolors of Chikaji Kawakami; Yū-gen | The Language of Sea, photographs by Chuck Davis and Ryuijie, and Double Vision, featuring paired works from its permanent collection by Edward Weston and Henrietta Shore as well as Francis and Eugenia McComas. Rounding out the fall season and celebrating a significant new addition to the Museum's permanent collection is Imagining China: The Art of Belle Yang and Joseph Yang. Collectively, the Museum's fall 2024 exhibitions illustrate how friendships, family, and communities influence individual artistry, contributing to a rich array of art that speaks poignantly to historical, personal, and philosophical concerns. Visitors will also experience how Monterey Bay's ecology and geography influence regional artistry and discover common themes across the four exhibitions, particularly the power of art to inspire, communicate, and heal.

In an exceptional gesture of generosity, The Jim and Diane Coward Family Trust has donated 87 watercolor paintings by Chikaji Kawakami to the Museum's permanent collection, as well as a fund to ensure the art is catalogued and preserved in perpetuity. Diane (Kawakami) Coward, granddaughter of Chikaji Kawakami, states, "Creating art and teaching painting at Topaz were simultaneous acts of resilience and creativity. My family and I are thrilled that his work will be seen, shared, and understood as an important part of the American experience for generations to come." In addition, major support for the exhibition, catalogue, and educational programming was provided by the Tanimura Family Foundation and Barbara Schilling and Richard Carr.

Under the Guard Tower: The Watercolors of Chikaji Kawakami (August 22 – December 15, 2024)
Chikaji Kawakami (a.k.a. Nanpo), trained as a painter and musician in Japan, and immigrated to the US in 1904 at age 22. In 1942 after Pearl Harbor and under US Federal Executive Order 9066, Kawakami was sent to an internment camp located in Topaz, Utah, where he was unlawfully imprisoned alongside artist and scholar Chiura Obata and more than 8,000 other Japanese Americans. Kawakami joined Obata (and his associate George Hibi) who founded an art school within the prison camp, teaching more than 600 internees between 1942 and 1945. Guest Curator Lydia Nakashima Degarrod's exhibition illustrates how under the influence of Obata, Kawakami expressed calm and beauty in his paintings of camp buildings and the surrounding landscape despite his three-year long imprisonment.

A full-color catalogue highlights the artworks in the exhibition, featuring both an essay by Guest Curator Lydia Nakashima Degarrod and a foreword by MMA Executive Director Corey Madden. Catalogues will be available for purchase throughout the fall season and be distributed to museums and schools across California.

Chikaji Kawakami (a.k.a. Nanpo) (1882-1949), Untitled, 1944, watercolor on paper, 12 x 18 in. Gift of the Jim and Diane Coward Family Trust, 2023.012.024. (C) Chikaji Kawakami.

Yū-gen | The Language of the Sea, Photographs by Chuck Davis and Ryuijie (August 30 – December 8, 2024)
Local photography legends Chuck Davis, a former Jacques Cousteau camera operator and Ryuijie are experienced divers and best friends who free-dive daily in Monterey Bay to capture transcendent images of the ocean on a single breath. Richard Murai, also a well-known, local photographer, educator, and former Assistant Director at the Center for Photographic Art (CPA) guest curates MMA's exhibition, sharing that he organized the exhibition around yu-gen, a concept deeply rooted in traditional Japanese arts, that "recognizes our emotional response to the unseen, the unspoken and the sublime. It's beauty that's felt and implied rather than explained. Yū-gen serves as a portal for appreciating the lush and intimate underwater imagery of Chuck Davis and Ryuijie." Yū-gen | The Language of the Sea celebrates remarkable artistry born from an adventurous collaboration by best friends.

MMA is grateful to an Anonymous Patron for supporting Yū-gen.

Ryuijie, (b. 1950) Giant Kelp, 2023, platinum/palladium print, 20 x 16 in. Courtesy of the artist © Ryuijie

Double Vision: Edward Weston and Henrietta Shore | Francis and Eugenia McComas (August 1 - December 22, 2024)
Double Vision features a thoughtful selection from MMA's permanent collection highlighting artistic innovation between equal creative partners working in the Monterey area. Edward Weston and Henrietta Shore spent many hours exploring Point Lobos and the California Coast together. From Weston's iconic seashell imagery to Shore's critically acclaimed and distinctive style, this exhibition demonstrates a strong resonance between the two artists, bonded by their shared reverence for Nature and their commitment to pushing the boundaries of artistic expression. Similarly, artists Eugenia Frances McComas and Francis McComas who met, married, and settled on the Monterey Peninsula, have styles that appear to evolve in parallel, growing progressively more colorful and expressive. Double Vision celebrates Monterey's rich artistic history and the personal connections that fueled and strengthened these artists' creative legacies.

MMA is grateful to Susan DuCoeur for her support as the Patron for Double Vision.

(Left): Francis McComas (1874-1938), Cypress, Monterey, n.d., oil on canvas, 41 x 60 in. Gift of Jane and Justin Dart. 2009.039. Photo: Monterey Museum of Art. (Right): Henrietta Shore (1880-1963), Two Nudes, 1928-1930, lithograph on paper, 19.06 x 14.88 in. MPMA Purchase, 1986.023.004. (C) Estate of Henrietta Shore.

Imagining China: The Art of Belle Yang and Joseph Yang rounds out the fall 2024 exhibition season and celebrates another significant new addition to the Museum's permanent collection. MMA's season showcases creative partnerships that span generations and diverse cultures and encourages the community to consider how creative partnerships influence their own lives and artistic expression.

ArtWorlds: Illuminating Global Creativity
MMA will host a fascinating conversation among artists and curators featured in MMA's fall 2024 exhibition season. The event will begin with a keynote by Lydia Nakashima Degarrod, followed by a lively discussion with Chuck Davis, Rick Murai, Ryuijie, and Belle Yang that will be moderated by Lydia Nakashima Degarrod and MMA Director Corey Madden.

Saturday, September 14, 2024
3:00 - 5:00 pm, including a pre-event reception
Middlebury Institute of International Studies
Irvine Auditorium in the McCone Building
499 Pierce Street, Monterey

$35 General Admission. Includes an admission pass to MMA - Pacific Street
$20 for MMA Members, MIIS Faculty, all Students, Military, Under 19, and SNAP Participants with an EBT Card

For more information, please visit ArtWorlds.

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