Perspectives: Artwork by San José State University Alumni
November 18, 2024 – March 9, 2025
The Hammer2 Gallery features a rotating display of artwork by San José State University alumni. The current exhibition brings together the work of five alumni artists: Carlo Ricafort, Dani Torvik, Peter Moen, Josie Lepe, Tovah Cheng, and Ian Fabre. These artists explore work in a variety of media, including watercolor, oil paint and mixed media, and diverse subject matter, including personal identities, cultural symbols, family history and abstract forms.
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About the Artists:
CARLO RICAFORT
Ricafort’s work attempts to explore and parallel the conundrums and travails of human existence by blurring representation with abstraction. He excavates history, music, philosophy and current events as an impetus to make free-associative commentaries through painting, drawing and printmaking. Thus, his artistic process can gain the appearance of being chaotic, eclectic, open-ended, and even “hacked” from multiple sources. It is in the arbitrariness where Ricafort looks to decipher cryptic codes stating, “picture-making is one way to interweave all these contexts allowing me to explore and play with both content and form.”
Ricafort immigrated to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1985 where his family invested in a printing business. Self-taught in the graphic arts and offset printing, he pursued his B.F.A. in Pictorial Arts from San José State University in 2000. He has since exhibited at museums, numerous galleries and cultural spaces in San Francisco (US), Los Angeles (US), New York (US), San Cristóbal de las Casas (MX), Bangkok (TH), Sète (FR), Hamburg (DE), Manila (PH) and participated in the collateral exhibitions of the XII Havana Biennial (CU). He currently works out of San Francisco and is co-founder of the artist-run gallery, Random Parts in Oakland, California.
DANI TORVIK
Dani Torvik’s paintings create microcosms that integrate visuals gathered from her immediate surroundings, memories of lived-in environments, impressions of architecture, and indications of her flesh and body. Her work includes references to familiar and pervasive Western folklore, often deeply ingrained in the psyche from childhood. Torvik examines the alluring aesthetic qualities of these stories while critiquing their more harmful properties. One recurring theme is the misogyny reflected in the willful romanticism and idealization of gender roles and female bodies, set against intoxicating and mystical landscapes and architecture. She acknowledges the influence of these depictions in many aspects of her life and seeks to evaluate their lingering effects while repurposing their aesthetics and contexts.
Through her art, Torvik explores the theme of lost innocence, particularly as it relates to grappling with the dangers of internalizing these stories. She fuses contrasting personal images to represent her unique pre- and post-innocence stages, with parades of confetti commingling and contending with deep, water-colored, foreboding orbs. By incorporating architectural motifs from environments she has experienced—both real and fictional—Torvik delves into notions of home, belonging, and permanence as they relate to her own body and the physical spaces it inhabits.
PETE MOEN
Peter Moen is best known for his colorful portraits and his witty political art; although, he creates accurate portraits, abstraction plays an important part in most of his work. He has recently been in several galleries in San Jose, Walnut Creek, Monterey, and Redwood City, California. He grew up in San Jose during the 60’s and 70’s. His favorite medium is oil paint on large wood panels or canvas, but he also does installation. He has received a MFA in Pictorial Art at San Jose State University and an AS degree in Fine Arts at San Jose City College. During his life he has had the opportunity to travel and to do some interesting things: the most interesting was relief work in Beirut Lebanon in 1982 and 1983. He is most influenced by Robert Beverly Hale and Rembrandt.
JOSIE LEPE
Josie Lepe, Mexican American, completed her MFA in Photography at San Jose State University in December 2022.
Lepe is an award winning independent photojournalist who has been working in the industry of newspapers for the past 22 years. She worked for the San Jose Mercury News as a Photojournalist, Photo Lab Manager, Assignment Editor, Photo Editor, and MultiMedia Producer from 1999-2018. Lepe was part of the Bay Area News Group (East Bay Times) team that won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News for coverage of the Ghost Ship fire in Oakland, California. Lepe has images in the winning team entry.
IAN FABRE
From graffiti artist to graphic designer, Ian Gerard Fabre pulls from every experience thus far. Graduating from the California College of the Arts with an interdisciplinary degree he employs anything and everything. From neon signage to screen printing Ian pokes at the underlying issues within contemporary consumer culture. As of late his work is installation based and in it one can find sculpture, two-dimensional work, and video. His practice is his way of slowing down and reflecting as he encourages the viewer to do the same.