June: The Architecturally Macabre Book Club

June: The Architecturally Macabre Book Club

WHERE ARCHITECTURE IS ALWAYS THE MAIN CHARACTER.

Hosted by AFSB Vice President, Selinda Tuttle.

“Personally, I prefer to read books—fiction or non-fiction—that feature the city as a character,” says the book club’s curator, AFSB Vice President Selinda Tuttle. “The only thing cooler than reading a book that reckons with a city is being able to talk about that book with people who find it just as worthy of conversation.”
 
June’s Book:
Loving Frank
by Nancy Horan
 

Register through Eventbrite below to automatically get the ZOOM link for June’s book club meeting. 

 
Join the private Facebook group (same name) to interact with more book lovers!

Happy Reading!

Impossible Objects: Screen Prints by Ed Lister

MM Rainbow by Ed Lister

Impossible Objects: Screen Prints by Ed Lister March 13 – May 8, 2021 Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara Gallery

The AFSB Art Gallery at the Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara is pleased to announce the opening of Impossible Objects, an exhibition of vibrant, abstract silkscreen prints, or serigraphs, by Ed Lister.  

Ed Lister, known in Los Angeles and Santa Barbara as a skilled scenic artist, created this series of “impossible objects” in the early 1970s while teaching printmaking at the Chelsea School of Art in London.  After teaching art for twelve years, Lister moved to California.  Starting in the mid-70s he worked for ten years as the lead scenic artist for the Center Theatre Group at the Taper and Ahmanson Theaters in Los Angeles. Subsequently, he painted backdrops and installations as wide as 400 feet for TV, movies, and destination resorts, hotels, and casinos.  

More recently Lister was commissioned to paint a 60 feet-wide mural encircling the Bisno Schall Clock Gallery of the Santa Barbara Courthouse that depicts our perception of time and various ways of recording it (http://www.bisnoschallgallery.com).  Although he loved working on such a large scale, Lister now paints more modest-sized images concerned with iridescent and reflective seascapes and skies. 

Created fifty years ago, these striking, hand-pulled prints play with our contemporary sensibilities and logical brains in their resemblances to imaginative digital images. Of all the printing techniques, Lister most relished executing screened images with areas of pure color put down in a clean and direct manner.  In this series, he created improbable, mind-bending objects that cannot exist other than on a flat surface.  Intrigued by their bold colors and shapes, our eyes are lured in, then our assumptions of reality are challenged.

The Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara has been dedicated to expanding our community’s appreciation of the built environment since 1983. The AFSB Gallery is located in the historic Acheson House at the corner of Garden and East Victoria Streets in Santa Barbara. Regular gallery hours are Saturdays from 1:00 to 4:00 pm and weekdays by appointment.

A Summer Lecture Series: The Architecture of India

A Summer Lecture Series: The Architecture of India

By Dr. Allan Langdale

Thursdays, Via Zoom.
June 17 - August 19, from 6:45 - 8:00 PM

$10/lecture or $80 for all

Tickets on Eventbrite

This lecture series focuses on several monuments and architectural complexes in India, surveying the Buddhist, Hindu, and Islamic traditions of the sub-continent. The material will be presented in chronological order, spanning dates from the 2nd century BCE to the sixteenth century.

Read more about each individual lecture on our Events Page.

 

Allan Langdale has had seasons of powerful lectures with the Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara, including several sold-out lectures. He has his PhD in art history from UCSB and currently teaches at UC Santa Cruz. He also works in the tourism industry for Smithsonian Journeys and Zegrahm Expeditions, doing about a dozen trips a year. Allan is the author of several articles and books, including Palermo: Travels in the City of Happiness (2014) and The Hippodrome of Istanbul / Constantinople (2020). His travel blog can be found at ‘Allan’s Art and Architecture Worlds’: https://allansartworlds.sites.ucsc.edu/

May: The Architecturally Macabre Book Club

May: The Architecturally Macabre Book Club

WHERE ARCHITECTURE IS ALWAYS THE MAIN CHARACTER.

Hosted by AFSB Vice President, Selinda Tuttle.

“Personally, I prefer to read books—fiction or non-fiction—that feature the city as a character,” says the book club’s curator, AFSB Vice President Selinda Tuttle. “The only thing cooler than reading a book that reckons with a city is being able to talk about that book with people who find it just as worthy of conversation.”
 
May’s Book:
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
by John Berendt
 
Register through Eventbrite below to automatically get the ZOOM link for May’s book club meeting. 
 
Join the private Facebook group (same name) to interact with more book lovers!

Happy Reading!

The Architecturally Macabre Book Club

NEW EVENT: The Architecturally Macabre Book Club

WHERE ARCHITECTURE IS ALWAYS THE MAIN CHARACTER.

Hosted by AFSB Vice President, Selinda Tuttle.

“Personally, I prefer to read books—fiction or non-fiction—that feature the city as a character,” says the book club’s curator, AFSB Vice President Selinda Tuttle. “The only thing cooler than reading a book that reckons with a city is being able to talk about that book with people who find it just as worthy of conversation.”

HSDC Winners for 2021!

We are proud to announce the winners of this year’s competition!

* names match from left to right*

Jack Van Thyne, a junior at San Marcos High, won first place.

Susy Lopez, a freshman at Dos Pueblos High, won second place.

Olivia Doman, a junior from Santa Ynez Valley High, won third place.

Ellie Gleason, a sophomore at Dos Pueblos High, was awarded Honorable Mention.

Rachel Lin, a senior at Dos Pueblos High, was awarded Honorable Mention.

Congratulations on all who participated! It was a joy to have this competition despite the complications due to Covid-19 and we look forward to another year of the High School Design Competition!

For more details, visit our High School Design Competition Page through the Education tab to read a featured article on EdHat.

Story Time: Ellwood Station

Last chance of the year to see Patrick McGinnis' Exhibition!

Saturday, December 19, from 1 – 4 PM at the AFSB Art Gallery

Hear him tell stories about the locations of his photo series like this one about …

Ellwood Station

http://www.patmcginnisart.com/

 Over the past several years, I noticed old industrial structures off the right side of the southbound 101 freeway. It was fenced off and shrouded by trees, obviously non-operational. No one at the end of Ellwood Station Road seemed to have contact or know much about the fenced off structures. Though I knew it would prove a challenge to photograph, I was intrigued all the same.


     A few years later, driving the same route on the 101 South, I glanced over and was delighted to see that many of the trees were gone! Making a split-second decision, I exited the freeway and circled back to the end of the road. This time, there was someone on the property. Much to my delight, this person turned out to be the owner! We discussed the structures and his plans to demolish them and clear the site in preparation for future projects. He graciously granted me access to the property and permission to photograph the facilities until they were gone.

     Ellwood Station was a large concrete plant owned by Vulcan Materials. Located on the rail line, it provided large quantities of concrete for much of the Santa Barbara and Goleta area construction projects. The “Ellwood Station Series” photography project took several months. But eventually, the structures were torn down, vanishing one by one, cut apart by large metal shears. Reduced to pieces of scrap steel, they were loaded onto large trucks and taken to a recycling facility in Los Angeles.

     The once fenced-off site along the railroad line was cleaned up and made ready for the next project, yet to be determined. Ellwood station no more than a memory is now preserved through my photographs, presented to you in this exhibition, “Historic Preservation Series.”

Aia Santa Barbara Announces 2020 Recipient of the Lutah Maria Riggs Presidents Award

AIA Santa Barbara Announces 2020 Recipient of the Lutah Maria Riggs Presidents Award

Ensberg Jacobs Design Inc

The American Institute of Architects Santa Barbara (AIASB) is proud to award the honor of the Lutah Maria Riggs 2020 Presidents Award to Santa Barbara architect and AIA Fellow, Cassandra Ensberg, FAIA.

Cassandra has been a resident and leader in the Santa Barbara design, art, and architectural community for over 30 years.  She and her architect husband Tom Jacobs,  AIA,  work together at their firm Ensberg Jacobs Design Inc with a focus on art, design, sustainability, the environment, and our community.  In 1987 she founded the Kids Draw Architecture Program during formation of the Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara (AFSB) and to fulfill the Foundation’s mission of increasing public awareness about the built environment and the importance of design, art, and architecture. 

In 2016 Cassandra was recognized by AIA nationally and elevated to Fellow of the American Institute of Architects for her work focused on the art of architecture.   She is a board member of AFSB and AIASB and serves as AIASB advocacy co-chair to promote excellence in the built environment through improved regulations, particularly governing housing.  

Cass’ recognition as a recipient of the LMR Award is a fitting tribute for this unprecedented year.  Her extraordinary contributions and commitment have highlighted the importance of design, architecture and art in our built environment and the importance of AIA involvement, inclusivity, communication, and working together as a community to result in positive outcomes.

About the Award 

The Lutah Maria Riggs Presidents Award recognizes an AIA Santa Barbara member or firm whose work, community service and civic engagement have had a lasting influence for the betterment of Santa Barbara’s built environment. Recipients must have both a body of distinguished architectural design and a history of advocacy for community architectural engagement in the area.  The award is sponsored by the American Riviera Bank.  

Historic Preservation Series by Patrick McGinnis

Vanishing Behemoths of Industry Star in Bold New Photographs by Patrick McGinnis

November 7 – December 19, 2020
Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara Gallery

Detail of Sloss Iron Works #45, 16×16

patmcginnisart.com

patmcginnisart.com

The Architectural Foundation of Santa Barbara is pleased to announce Historic Preservation Series, an exhibition of industrial photographs by Pat McGinnis. Visitors are invited to view the exhibition on Saturdays, from 1:00 to 4:00 pm, November 7 through December 19. The artist will be present on November 7 & December 19. (Self-screening, masks, and social distancing are required.)

Following a career in engineering, Patrick McGinnis turned to creating semi-abstract, biomorphic sculptures in marble, bronze, and metal, inspired by natural forms. Then, during a family trip across the country, he visited a rusty old factory, the Sloss Iron Works in Birmingham, Alabama, and his interest in photography was piqued. Attracted by the dramatic interplay of light on the tall, solid forms of these massive, industrial structures—vanishing monuments to America’s once vibrant iron and steel industry—McGinnis felt compelled to photograph them.

Most blast furnaces built in the United States are now dormant or on their way to demolition and becoming scrap metal—only a few, like the Sloss Iron Works, survive as historical landmarks. Energized by studying the photographs of Bernd & Hilla Becker and paintings by Charles Sheeler, McGinnis discovered new subjects closer at hand, notably the large Vulcan plant at Ellwood Station in Goleta, which he was able to photograph just before it was torn down. He has also made photographs of an obsolete, wood-waste burning electric power plant, Soledad Renewable Energy, whose future is uncertain.

McGinnis’s transition into making art is a continuation of being a design engineer in the nuclear, aerospace and semiconductor industries and his own business, Prime Technology. Aesthetics played a vital role throughout that work, whether creating an aerospace component or an analytical instrument. He is currently a member of Santa Barbara Art Association, Abstract Art Collective, Gallery 10 West (board member), and the LA Art Association. He has exhibited his work at 10 West Gallery, Elverhoj Museum of Art & History, Gallery 113 (Santa Barbara), Gallery 825 (LA), Westmont Ridley-Tree Museum of Art, and San Luis Obispo Museum of Art.