Press Release: Lewis deSoto
05.15.96
THE INTERNATIONAL ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE PROGRAM
NEW WORKS: 96.2
Dorothy Cross - DUBLIN, IRELAND
Lewis deSoto - SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA
Alex de Leon - SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS
Exhibition: June 7 - July 14
The International Artist-in-Residence Program sponsored by ArtPace, A Foundation
for Contemporary Art | San Antonio presents the sixth in a series of New Works projects
realized by artists living and working at ArtPace. Dorothy Cross, Lewis deSoto and Alex
de Leon were selected to participate in the program by a renowned panel of arts
professionals brought together by The Foundation in October of 1994. Members of the
panel were: Mary Beebe, Director of the Stuart Collection, The University of California,
San Diego; Benito Huerta, Artist, Houston, Texas; Anthony Jones, Rector and Vice
Provost, Royal College of Art, London; Richard Koshalek, Director, Museum of
Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Lowery Sims, Curator 20th Century Art, New York;
and Dianne Vanderlip, Curator of 20th Century Art, Denver Art Museum.
Lewis deSoto
Lewis deSoto's installations often vary from site to site, inspired by their historical and
geographic locations. Without a signature style or affinity for particular materials, deSoto
transforms the gallery space to create a totality of sensual stimulation. At ArtPace,
The Sound of the Trumpet was inspired by the building's former function as an
automobile showroom and service agency. The title of the installation is derived from
A Philosophical Inquiry Into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and
Beautiful, a text by the eighteenth century Irish political theorist Edmund Burke. In
contrast to beauty, the sublime evokes feelings of awe and terror, with, however, the
same magnitude of attraction as the beautiful. The Sound of the Trumpet includes
a powerful automobile V-8 engine--427 cubic inches, 520 horsepower--controlled by a
computer and photo-eye sensitive to viewers entering the space. A red skylight casts a
fiery glow on the gallery floor. Bright quartz lights gradually illuminate the engine,
whose deafening roar and palpable heat will heighten viewers' bodily sensations to a
terrifying level, at the expense of the primacy of the optical typically associated with art
experiences.
DeSoto was born in 1954 and currently lives in San Francisco. He received his B.A.
in Studio Art and Religious Studies at the University of California, Riverside, and his
M.F.A. from Claremont Graduate School in California. Among his many solo exhibitions
are Four Interventions at the Des Moines Art Center, Tahualtapa Project and
Video Room at the Moderna Museet in Stockholm, Sweden, Observatory at the
California Museum of Photography in Riverside, and PŽ Tœkmiyat, PŽ Tœkmiyat
(Darkness, Darkness) at the San Jose Museum of Art. DeSoto is represented by
Christopher Grimes Gallery in Santa Monica and Cheryl Haines Gallery in San
Francisco. He is Professor of Art in the Art Department, College of Creative Arts at San
Francisco State University.
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