The Pence Gallery’s “portraits of things” celebrates diverse perspective
The exhibition, featuring Sacramento-based artist Gioia Fonda’s photograph-based paintings, invites viewers to display their own takes on her work
By TALAR KESHISHIAN — arts@theaggie.org
Through Nov. 29, the Pence Gallery is displaying “portraits of things,” an exhibition showcasing the combined works of Sacramento-based artist Gioia Fonda and her former art school instructor, Charlie Gill.
The exhibition’s beginning stages date all the way back to Fonda’s time as a student at California College of the Arts (CCA).
“Back in the day, I had this little toy spy camera that I was taking pictures with,” Fonda said. “It didn’t even have a viewfinder. You just kind of held it up in front of what you wanted to take a picture of and hoped for the best. So, I took these weird photos and had them printed at a drugstore. I wasn't taking myself seriously.”
Plastic soldiers, dolls and food items were among the toys Fonda discovered in a thrift store and used as the subjects for her original photos. Her senior adviser at CCA, Charlie Gill, encouraged her to paint her photographs, but Fonda declined, instead playfully saying that Gill should paint them himself.
“He made paintings of my photographs and the paintings he did are quite true to the photos,” Fonda said. “I'm not a photographer. I’m just a person who uses a camera as part of the process.”
10 years after purchasing her original photos, Gill reached out to Fonda to say that he had followed her suggestion to paint them.
“I was totally surprised when he painted them,” Fonda said. “He did beautiful paintings. Charlie really captured the awkwardness of the photos, and that was part of what he liked about them. What was interesting to me was that he took my awkwardness so seriously.”
When the Pence Gallery reached out to collaborate with Fonda, it motivated her to fulfill Charlie’s request to paint her own photos.
“I showed [the curator] Charlie's paintings and explained how I could make a new body of work that would relate to them, leaving breadcrumbs between what Charlie had done and what I do,” Fonda said. “That brought on a whole new opportunity for me to paint again in a way that I haven't painted recently, and also an opportunity to take his advice”
Although Fonda no longer has the photographs she took during art school, she took new photos, which she then transformed into paintings for this exhibition. Three of the paintings carry her toy theme, but the subjects of the other two works, titled “Lightweights” and “Heavyweights,” focus on a pile of fishing weights Fonda purchased at a flea market.
“[‘Heavyweights’] is a more fantasy situation with the weights and [‘Lightweights’] is just dark and real,” Fonda said. “I think that people know me for my bright colors and patterns, but ‘Lightweights’ is brown and gray. It's beautiful to me, but it's heavy.”
Whether they’re toys or fishing weights, Fonda finds inspiration in unconventional objects she encounters in the world. She delivers this same advice to the students in her drawing and painting classes at Sacramento City College.
“Inspiration can come from anywhere and anything,” Fonda said. “It's not in the thing; it’s in your mind and what you can turn that into through your own special lens. That is, I think the power that you hold. It's not what you paint, but how and why you paint it.”
A major component of the exhibition is a wall filled with various people's interpretations of her images.
“I took five photographs specifically for this project of toys, and I'm putting them out there for other people to paint, like how Charlie painted my original photographs,” Fonda said. “You can pick whichever one you want and do your thing. Then we can put it on the wall with everyone else's version of it and understand the images better by seeing it through everyone else's eyes.”
Throughout her career, Fonda has placed great value in inviting community members to collaborate on her projects, asserting that it allows them to form a deeper, more personal connection to the art.
“I have a habit of involving other people in my projects,” Fonda said. “I think when you have a community component, it makes art more accessible to people and I'm all for that.”
Fonda encourages anyone to submit their own art piece for display in the exhibition, regardless of their skill level. People may bring their drawings or paintings on paper to the Pence Gallery at any time throughout the exhibition’s duration.
The Pence Gallery offers free admission to visitors who wish to see “portraits of things” and other current exhibitions. An artist talk with Fonda will be held at the Pence Gallery on Nov. 9.
Written by: Talar Keshishian — arts@theaggie.org