Art, like language, morphs words and tones to describe the world. It can be a reflective, interpretive, literal, and/or emotional. Important art passes the litmus test of time. It remains in the pop culture lingo to mark the space from whence it came.
Postmodern art thumbs its nose at the world, it creates new meaning moving boundaries as time moves stoically by. Art is a barometer of who we are as a society. Since the sixties, art music, film -- have changed our perspective and our view of the status quo. Warhol, Rauschenberg, and John Fekner, beg us to think outside the box, and they demand we make our own conclusions, as abstract as they might be.
Southern California artist Dave Tourje creates colorful work that screams Santa Ana winds, dry lakebeds, the barrio, surf, sand and pop culture. His is a world post-Janis Joplin, still looking for sense while baring his soul.
In this brief film, we meet Tourje and see his world, the LA of today -- steeped in ethnicity, tradition, color and soul. His work is clean, but has elements both disturbing and whimsical -- just like the city itself.
Check out the video. Sit with Tourje's work. Find some color, see the past, you'll ask, "just where the heck we are heading?" Make your own abstract conclusions then a make colorful impression on our remarkably nonobjective world.
His work will be continuing at the GREGORY WAY GALLERY at 245 S Beverly Dr Beverly Hills Through 20 August.