In Gallery 25 show, Kathryn Jacobi returns to Fresno, a fertile land for her art

BY DONALD MUNRO
The Fresno Bee January 7, 2015

Los Angeles-based artist Kathryn Jacobi is no stranger to Fresno. She has exhibited five times at the Fresno Art Museum, the latest in 2010 when she was the museum’s Distinguished Woman Artist. And she is no stranger to Gallery 25, where she exhibited 25 years ago.
But her new show at the gallery is notable. For the first time in its 40-year history, Gallery 25 will double the run for a visiting guest artist, from one month to two Barbara Van Arnam prepares for Kathryn Jacobi’s 2-month show at Gallery
25 starting Thursday, Jan. 8 in downtown Fresno. Jacobi’s show opens in time for this week’s ArtHop and runs through March 1, 2015.
ERIC PAUL ZAMORA — THE FRESNO BEE
“She’s so special — we wanted to make sure we did her justice,” says curator Barbara Van Arnam.
“Kathryn Jacobi at Gallery 25” opens Thursday, Jan. 8, with a reception for ArtHop, the monthly open house of galleries and studios in the downtown and Tower District neighborhoods.
Known for her painting, printmaking and digital photography over a 50-year career, Jacobi keeps busy. In 2014 she exhibited near and far, from the Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles to the Artrom Gallery in Rome. The prestigious Alan Avery Art Company in Atlanta is among the galleries representing her work.
In a 2010 review of her last Fresno Art Museum exhibition, a dark and moody group of dream-themed works titled “Sleepwalking Through the Apocalypse,” I wrote: “The show is steeped in a gripping sense of forward momentum. I can’t guarantee you’ll walk out of it with a smile. But you just might feel you’ve awakened from a long, deep — and fascinating — sleep.”
Her new Gallery 25 show consists of 36 figurative pieces, mostly large-scale paintings on heavyweight paper, from the past 25 years. In her artist’s statement, Jacobi says the same themes still rivet her: how people, individually and in families, transmute over the course of a lifetime and through generations; and the nature of memory, mortality and loss.
Some of the work is drawn from her “Between the Wars” series that has been exhibited internationally.
Jacobi in her statement also notes her close connection with Fresno.
“My attachments and friendships made in Fresno comprise a rich and important part of my life, which I hope will continue over the course of my life,” she says.
More ArtHop picks:

Read more here: http://www.fresnobee.com/2015/01/07/4318628_in-a-new-show-at-gallery-25-kathryn.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy