Save the Date: LAM’s 10th Annual Art & Nature is scheduled for November 3
Laguna Art Museum (LAM) will present its 10th Annual Art & Nature, a multidisciplinary exploration and celebration of art’s various engagements with the natural world, beginning Thursday, Nov. 3. The multi-faceted event is the museum’s largest public program of the year, bringing together thousands of participants to foster a love of nature, raise environmental awareness, and discover cross-sections between science and the arts.
“This year’s 10th Annual Art & Nature Festival will once again bring the community together to appreciate the intimate connection between art and nature,” said Julie Perlin Lee, executive director of LAM. “The festival celebrates the museum’s long-standing history as a cultural center, offering in-depth programming and impactful exhibitions that honor the rich history of California art.”
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Courtesy of LAM
“The Sea Around Us” by Rebeca Méndez which will make its debut in LAM’s historic Steele Gallery on Saturday, Nov. 5
Rebeca Méndez returns to Art & Nature as the featured artist with her newest project The Sea Around Us, which will make its debut in the museum’s historic Steele Gallery on Saturday, Nov. 5. Creating an immersive 360-degree video art installation, The Sea Around Us will transport viewers to an area of the Pacific Ocean located 30 miles from the Laguna Beach coast, portraying the ocean as a fully animated body as well as a place of deep interconnectedness for all living things. Using scientific footage, the video shifts to thousands of oozing barrels of DDT on the seafloor being sampled by robotic arms. This hidden ecological calamity is revealed in conjunction with imagery that inspires awe and strengthens the bond between sea and viewer, inspiring the courage to face environmental wrongdoing, to take restorative action and to avoid repeating transgressions against our natural resources.
Presenting the first outdoor exhibition since 2020, LAM will bring Kelly Berg’s Pyramidion to the City of Laguna Beach on November 3-6. Pyramidion is an interactive sculptural experience inviting contemplation of the layered history and unique geology of Laguna Beach. Beginning at the museum, participants will journey to several sites through the local park and beaches, encountering pyramids of various sizes and colors that reflect the ever-shifting nature of the landscape. The temporality of the installation parallels much of the earth’s landscapes that shift and change due to weather, geology and the effects of climate change.
On display in the California Gallery starting Thursday, Nov. 3 will be Robert Young’s The Big One, which is thought to still hold the record as the largest painting ever created in Laguna Beach. As a resident of Laguna Beach, Young began his 9-by-15-foot painting in 1971 and continued to work on the piece throughout his life.
Additional Art & Nature festival programming includes the First Thursdays Art Walk, a keynote lecture from National Geographic Society Explorer in Residence Dr. Sylvia Earl and the annual free Family Festival.
Continuing Laguna Beach’s legacy as a center for the arts, Art & Nature provides a unique opportunity for the Southern California community to come together for a festival of art and ideas, to inspire artists, and enhance the appreciation of nature as a place that inspires awareness about the environment we share.
Laguna Art Museum is located at 307 Cliff Drive, Laguna Beach. For more information, visit www.lagunaartmuseum.org.