Art Museum Shines with 'Continua in Light'

Two Bay Area artists explore illumination and movement in a new video installation, “Continua in Light,” at the Westmont Ridley-Tree Museum of Art Jan. 12 through Feb. 18. Cheryl Calleri and Thekla Hammond will be at the free, public reception Thursday, Jan. 12, 4-6 p.m., which includes an original, dance performance. The site-specific dance is choreographed by associate professor Erlyne Whiteman and her students.

The installation, Hammond and Calleri’s second video collaboration, consists of two tandem video projectors illuminating nine translucent suspended scrims. During the reception, dancers will move between the scrims in a performance that interacts with the visual art. A recording of the performance will be on view throughout the run of the exhibition.

Primarily a painter, Hammond completed a Master of Fine Arts degree at UC Santa Barbara and has worked at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, Santa Barbara City College and the Santa Barbara Museum of Art before moving to Berkeley. She is represented by galleries in San Francisco and in Oaxaca, Mexico.

Calleri, who earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from San Jose State University, uses video and paintings in many media to explore the way things work and how science and technology reveal what is hidden from the naked eye. She exhibits actively throughout California and has work in several public and private collections.

Whiteman is one of the founders of the dance and theater arts program at Westmont, where she has been teaching since 1974. Whiteman holds a master’s and doctoral degrees from the USC.

The Westmont Ridley-Tree Museum of Art is open weekdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Saturdays 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information, please call (805) 565-6162 or e-mail museum@westmont.edu.