Jane Chafin's Offramp Gallery Blog

After a two-year absence I'm happy to announce I've launched a new blog, Jane Chafin: Offramp.  The content is much the same as this blog. I hope you'll check it out! Thanks, Jane

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2016/07/announcing-janes-new-blog.html

There's a phenomenon in the art world I like to call the "metamorphosis of crap." It happens in that instant when, after having been initially bored, confused or repelled by a completely artless ...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2014/04/artists-statements-cant-live-with-them.html

All anyone is talking about here in Southern California is the forecast for much needed drought-busting rain. Sandbags are in place for mudslides, newsrooms are on storm watch, gardeners are cros...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2014/02/videos-let-it-rain.html

You may have noticed I haven’t been blogging much recently. Let’s call it a case of writer’s block that took being sent into apoplectic shock by a recent outbreak of artspeak to cure. A...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2014/02/two-art-world-pet-peeves-collide-and.html

The sun begins to set after a long day in the studio. The colors of the sky and water soften as the panoramic view of the ocean begins to dissolve into night. Once again you hear the primitive dr...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2013/08/watch-out-for-falling-coconuts-sacatar.html

It should come as no surprise to anyone who regularly reads this blog that I love popup books. While researching them recently, I stumbled onto a new genre, animated popup books. I've selected ...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2013/03/popup-books-meet-animation-magic-ensues.html

I am the proverbial kid at Christmas every time a shipment of art books arrives here at Offramp. Writing about art books and stocking them for the bookstore makes it seem like the holidays year r...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/12/2012-holiday-gift-guide-for-art-lover.html

Before I tell you about an amazing new Joseph Cornell box/book, I want to talk briefly about art fairs again. In my ongoing quest to get to the bottom line about whether or not participating in f...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/11/joseph-cornells-amazing-manual-of_28.html

If your need for the macabre this Halloween goes beyond cute kids in costumes and Hallmark notions of creepy, this animated look at two giants of art history, Hieronymus Bosch and Pieter Bruegel ...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/videos-bosch-and-brueghel-get-animated.html

  Click here to buy from Amazon.com Art. Books. Art books. Book art. I have lived most of my adult life near the intersection of these two worlds, as an artist, diarist,  voracious reade...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/art-books-art-books-book-art.html

Click here to purchase The Innocence of Objects from Amazon.com In a week that has strongly reinforced my belief that large international art fairs, however else you want to defend them,...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/orhan-pamuks-innocence-of-objects.html

According to Wikipedia, the term "kaleidoscope" was coined in 1817 by its Scottish inventor, Sir David Brewster, while he was performing experiments on light polarization. Brewster arranged for m...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/09/short-takes-kaleidoscopic-wonders.html

Click here to purchase The Woodmans from Amazon.com We see a naked young woman lying on the floor in the corner of a sparsely furnished room. Generously sprinkled on the floor all around ...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/09/a-film-and-book-shed-light-on-enigmatic.html

Patssi Valdez, Sunday, 2011, acrylic on canvas, 72" x 30"   Los Angeles artist Patssi Valdez has gained international attention in the last few years, primarily from her early performanc...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/09/an-interview-with-patssi-valdez.html

Summer is winding to a close and Offramp Gallery is ramping up for its fall season. I'll be back blogging full time next week. In the mean time I want to get the ball rolling by re-posting a popu...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/self-portraits-when-artists-turn-their_28.html

Ever since our prehistoric ancestors first picked up chunks of limestone and carved crude female figurines some 20,000 years ago, we humans have been trying to depict the human form in three dim...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/07/hyperrealistic-sculpture-from-death.html

How to Read Erotic Art By Flavio Febbraro and Alexandra Wetzel © Abrams Books, 2011 Click here to purchase from Amazon.com I was skeptical when I saw the title of Flavio Febbraro's...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/fun-informative-and-oh-so-sexy-book-on.html

For this week's videos I went to various video sites and typed in "paint." A theme quickly emerged: paint in motion. This first video, Tall Painting, shows a painting by Holton Rower in progress ...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/short-takes-paint-in-motion.html

Click here to purchase from Amazon.com Taschen has had its way with me again. This time it's Paris: Portrait of a City , a voluptuous oversized volume of photographs of the city of my dre...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/book-about-paris-has-its-way-with-me.html

I was a practicing artist for 15 years. During 10 of those years I worked at the LA Municipal Art Gallery, a 10,000 square foot venue that exhibited a never-ending parade of contemporary art. I w...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/more-on-questionable-authorship-of.html

Fountain by R. Mutt Photo: Alfred Stieglitz I recently read an LA Times article about a public feud between artist Damien Hirst and British art critic Julian Spalding, the latter of whom ...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/05/duchamps-urinal-maybe-not.html

Click here to buy from Amazon.com I don't know whether to love or hate this book for being so inspiring. Many times while reading it, I had the impulse to close my gallery, stop writing this bl...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/david-hockneys-bigger-message.html

Click here to buy from Amazon.com If I had to define my mission as a gallery director and blogger about all things art-related, it would be to put the visual back into Visual Art. Rarely ...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/in-praise-of-intensely-visual-fishes.html

Click here to purchase from Amazon.com Creative Block. We've all had it. I'm trying to work through it as I write this sentence -- negative thoughts, distractions, rationalizations, avoidanc...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/how-to-conquer-your-creative-demons.html

Click here to purchase from Amazon.com It was the era of the parisienne, the professional French beauty, famous world-wide for her looks. Whole lives were devoted to it. Some went so far as...

http://janechafinsofframpgalleryblog.blogspot.com/2012/03/strapless-scandal-that-rocked.html