There’s now a pop-up art exhibit with a surfing theme in an empty storefront of Malibu Village by the “Depart Foundation” — a nonprofit most residents haven’t heard of. It’s an Italian arts organization that first launched in 2008 with the mission of contributing to the contemporary art scene and sparking an international art dialogue. Their exhibits of emerging and mid-career artists from around the world started in Rome, but now include nearly 20 cities on several continents. They first came to the LA area in 2014 with an exhibit space in West Hollywood.
The surf art exhibit featuring 46 artists marks Depart’s first exhibit in Malibu, which was curated by Amy Yao, a contemporary artist and LA native. The exhibit opened July 8 and will run until September 30 at 3822 Cross Creek Road, open daily 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. It’s co-sponsored by the city and Cultural Arts Commission. Originally titled “Blue Crush,” the exhibit’s title was apparently changed to “Sea Sick in Paradise” before the show opened.
Pierpaolo Barzan and Valeria Sorci are the husband and wife art patrons from Italy who head up the Depart Foundation. The two moved to the Hollywood Hills from Rome in 2015, and are involved in Hammer Museum and LACMA patron circles, according to the New York Times. Barzan is a surfer who loves Surfrider Beach, so it’s not hard to figure out why he approached the Cultural Arts Commission in May with a request for the city to co-sponsor an exhibit with a surf theme.
Several events with the surf and coastal theme are being planned concurrent with the art exhibit, and the first of those happened last week with “The New Lineup” — a free panel discussion on “surfing, sea level rise and beach access” at city hall. Jon Christensen, UCLA professor at the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability and a founder of the Laboratory for Environmental Narrative Strategies (LENS) at UCLA was the moderator. The panelists were artist Alexandra Cassaniti; adjunct professor at USC Keith Plocek, who teaches the first-ever surf journalism class; Brown Girl Surf organization member and artist Christine Blanco; and Surfrider Foundation West LA/Malibu Co-Chair and City of Santa Monica Sustainable Building Manager Joel Cesare.
“The art exhibit creates a starting point for discussion,” Christensen said.
Very little time was spent discussing sea level rise, other than the mention that sea levels are expected to increase by three to six feet in the next hundred years. “The real coast of all our memories will be underwater,” one said.
Artist Blanco, who has art in the show and is also a surfer belonging to Brown Girl Surf (headquartered in Oakland), talked about her piece and what it means. “It shows a group of badass women of color getting ready to surf. I wanted to create art that brings more representation to women of color; and the car was an ode to my dad,” she explained.
“As I was making the art,” she continued, “I thought of the girls we teach to surf in our program — it really opens their eyes and helps them to see themselves as belonging there. It’s shocking to me the number of girls in the Bay Area who live within five miles of the beach and have never been to the ocean. And body image is an issue in our program and getting into a wetsuit; so we get them feeling comfortable about that.” Blanco learned to surf when she attended UCSD.
Plocek discussed the “bro culture” of surfing, but thinks the number of females participating in the sport is improving. He feels “a lot of surfers tried to emulate the carefree life depicted in the ‘Endless Summer’” movie.
“We acknowledge that the West LA chapter of Surfrider is too white and too male,” said Cesare. The organization has been making an effort to take inner city kids out to the coast and teach them to surf. “To see a kid discover his stoke is the best thing you can do,” he said.
Cesare raised the issue of plastic trash in the ocean, which hit a nerve with nearly everyone; and the rest of the discussion and audience Q&A tended to focus on that.
Malibu Mayor Skylar Peak, who was in the audience, indicated that he may introducing the idea of banning plastic straws in the city.
