Author: The Art Lady

By Ed Goldman Sometimes the most serious artists are the ones who never forget the importance of nostalgia, whimsy and humor.  Northern California artists Michael Dunlavey and Debra Kreck-Harnish bring a combination of looking back, looking ahead and just plain looking around to Archival Gallery May 30-June 29, with a Second Saturday reception June 14…

By Ed Goldman On my 69th birthday in 2019, I began writing a free online column, The Goldman State, which posts three times a week. Most of the columns are accompanied by a cartoon roughly suggested by that day column’s content and signed by an artist named Edgy. Well, I am he, and he is…

By Ed Goldman Southern Georgia-born Davy Fiveash has an MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute and a current fascination with what he calls “queer mythology” (we’re talking Hadrian, Alexander the Great and Achilles). But what he mainly has is talent. Currently represented by Archival Gallery in Sacramento, Fiveash will have a solo show opening…

By Ed Goldman AL FARROW’S HALF-CENTURY RE-LINK TO INK “When you love your work you don’t get old in the way other people get old,” Al Farrow is telling me a few days before his newest show opens. At 80 years old, the prolific Farrow’s enthusiastic voice complements the outright vigor he’s brought to an…

By Ed Goldman It’s been six years since I wrote about Kira Stewart, artist and art consultant, for my column in the Sacramento Business Journal. It had been one of my more joyous journalistic efforts because it turned out to be both instructive and moving. Stewart’s business Art Consulting Services, or just ACS, helps hospitals,…

By Ed Goldman A SCULPTURAL ALPHABET—FEATURING SOME REAL CHARACTERS  It would be misguided to call the work of Fletcher Benton as simple as ABC.  What Benton did was consider whether the letters of the English alphabet had personalities, postures and maybe even secret lives by creating steel sculptures of everything from A to Z. And,…

By Ed Goldman SOMEDAY YOUR PRINTS WILL COME (ACTUALLY, VERY SOON) Being framed may not sound desirable, but if you’re an artist, art collector or hotel owner who needs 1,400 prints, original art and mirrors professionally mounted, you can do no better than to contact D Oldham Neath, owner and founder of Archival Gallery and…

ArtBeat/June 2023 By Ed Goldman While the word “triptych” is usually a descriptor for paintings, panels or carvings, the luminous, already-iconic sculpture “Tributary” is a triptych.  A Fiberglas, resin and steel piece that stands 14 feet high with a 10×10′ footprint, this “pro-am” artwork—which looks like three dolphins, three teardrops or three symbols denoting the…

By Ed Goldman AT 87, MARCY FRIEDMAN PRESENTS A STUNNING SHOW OF NEW WORKS AT B. SAKATA GARO GALLERY  We’re standing in Marcy Friedman’s backyard, above the American River. The water is flowing this afternoon at 30,000 feet per second, she says, wondering how much fiercer it will be when the winter snow melt really…

By Ed Goldman WHEN A BIG “MACC” MEANS BIG ART History and art make companionable bedfellows for the next few weeks at the Mills Station Arts & Culture Center  (MACC) in Rancho Cordova, about 15 minutes from downtown Sacramento. Curated by Cheryl Gleason, two shows are on separate floors of the long-ago grocery store, which was…