Arts & Galleries

Photo Gallery: Artist Spotlight: Duncan Simcoe

"There are things and then there are things in relation to other things."

That simple statement on Duncan Simcoe's Web site has provided fertile investigative territory for his art for decades. It is the core concept connecting his diverse themes of conflict, violence and social injustice.

Simcoe is a thinking person's artist, a creative idealist whose work tries to make sense of growing up in Southern California suburbia and the history and myth of contemporary experience.

Story continues below

Special to The Press-Enterprise

"What If Kathi Was Mary" is the theme of Duncan Simcoe's most current series of works.

"Duncan Simcoe's work uses strong metaphors and symbols to communicate the tension and reality between humanity and transcendence," said Kent Butler, one of Simcoe's past students and now an art professor at Azusa Pacific University.

Simcoe isn't afraid to ask us to contemplate complex subjects and engage in reflective rigor to appreciate his work. We do not wade through pretentious references, but rather the artist takes us on a journey of layers and links, past his personal landmarks which have energized his internal dialogue.

"I think what makes my images unusual is that most folks working this turf tend to want to tell you what to think about it, to take a very didactic approach. I come to grips with making of things more as a kind of epistemological effort, a way for figuring out things that are fundamentally mysterious or incomprehensible to me," he said.

Simcoe may not tell us exactly what our responses and thoughts should be, but we definitely experience a call to thought. We are invited to search beyond the obvious to follow metaphors rather than consider a literal translation, and the work piques our interest to return repeatedly to peruse and contemplate.

Story continues below

"I have followed Duncan Simcoe's work with keen interest for some time. It combines insightful commentary and keen observation of the world with a deep concern for craft and attention to aesthetic details that offers a rich and evocative experience that only deepens over time," said Dan Siedell, art critic, curator and modern and contemporary art history instructor at the University of Nebraska-Omaha.

Simcoe's drawings and paintings place symbolic images and characters in varied contexts including overlaying myths, historical events and contemporary settings.

Simcoe is Program Director for Visual Art at California Baptist University, a position he has held since 2000.

He and others on the art faculty of Cal Baptist have works on display at the Riverside Plaza, 3545 Central Ave., Suite 508, near the El Torito, titled "Tranquility of Manipulation."

The opening reception is from 6-9 p.m. Saturday, and the show continues until the end of February.

For more information about the Artist Spotlight, contact Daniel Foster, president/CEO at The Community Foundation at 951-684-4194 or DFoster@thecommunityfoundation .net.