Connecting in Bogota – Tyler Stallings, Adriana Salazar and Naida Osline

(Tyler Stallings, Adriana Salazar, Naida Osline)

We at Grand Central Art Center love when connections like this are made! You may ask – what does the above picture have to do with GCAC?

Here is how the magic of GCAC connecting works€ ¦

In late fall of 2011 through early 2012, Naida Osline was Artist in Residence at GCAC. During her first day in residence, GCAC Director John Spiak took her on a walking tour of downtown Santa Ana. On the tour, they stopped at a local costume store where John introduced Naida to the owner, Archer Aistaetter. Archer is involved and fully connected to the local drag community, who Naida ended up collaborating with during her time in residency at GCAC. Archer is also involved in a major ecological project in Colombia and invited Naida down for a visit. That visit turned into a series of residences in Colombia for Naida, working with a drag community there, as well as documenting insect and plant life. Her time there included three major solo exhibitions of the work created in Bogota, as well as work from her All the Queen’s Men series she created during her residence at GCAC.

(Danny with artist Naida Osline)

In spring of 2013, Bogota, Colombia artist Adriana Salazar was Artist in Residence at Grand Central Art Center – a collaboration between GCAC and the Orange County Museum of Art for the California-Pacific Triennial curated by Dan Cameron. During her time in residency, she created two major installation-based works; one that was on exhibition in the GCAC main gallery titled Nothing Else Left and a second at the Orange County Museum of Art titled Moving Plant #30.

(Adriana Salazar installation Nothing Else Left at GCAC)

(Adriana Salazar installation Moving Plant #30 at OCMA)

This is where Tyler Stallings comes into the picture. As Adriana’s exhibition was getting ready to close, Spiak receives a call from Stallings. Through Tyler’s position as Artistic Director at the University of California, Riverside’s Culver Center of the Arts and Director at UCR’s Sweeney Art Gallery, he is involved with the programing for the upcoming Immortality Project, a year long (2014-15) series of events focused upon philosophic and religious study on ideas of either immortality and/or the afterlife. UCR philosophy professor John Martin Fischer is organizing The Immortality Project. Tyler’s inquiry was about the possibility of exhibiting both of Adriana’s works together beginning in fall of 2014 as part of The Immortality Project official programs. Of course, we were delighted about the possibility! Working with Adriana, Dan, OCMA curatorial associate  Johnny Sampson and the Orange County Museum of Art team, GCAC helped make this possibility a reality. So great news for those who may have missed her work the first time, you get a second chance to see both of Adriana Salazar’s works together at UCR beginning in the fall of 2014 thanks to Tyler!

But back to the original image€ ¦ So Naida is concluding her time in Colombia and her partner, Tyler, travels down there to spend the last two weeks together. Prior to his travels, he makes arrangements to connect with Adriana in Bogota during his visit. They meet for the very first time at Adriana’s current show and the full connection is complete.

It’s the magic of Grand Central Art Center!