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< Back Nathan Oliveira JAN 11 - APR 19 Nathan Oliveira: Variations on Form Born in Oakland, California, Nathan Oliveira was a leading artist in the Bay Area Figurative Movement. Oliveira earned his bachelor's and master's degrees in fine art from the California College of Arts and Crafts (now California College of the Arts) in San Francisco. He was a professor of art at Stanford University for 32 years. Collaborations: In tandem with this exhibition, Pacific Art League of Palo Alto will also be showcasing another exhibition of Nathan Oliveira’s work - Origins of Flight: The Windhover Studies by Nathan Oliveira (February 7 - March 25, 2025). Artist Statement: Oliveira’s invented forms live just outside the realm of possibility. The artist Nathan Oliveira (1928-2010) liked to say that he thought of himself as an abstract artist whose work “had to be about something.” That “something,”—most often a human figure, but sometimes an animal, wing, head or mask—was the physical manifestation of Oliveira’s poetic imagination; an invented form that lives just outside the realm of possibility. Over the long span of his career Oliveira worked in a variety of media including painting, drawing, lithography monotype and sculpture, challenging himself to create forms with an air of mystery that allowed room for his viewers to find their own meanings. “I set it up to the degree that it gives you something recognizable to interact with,” he once offered, "and if you’re creative, you create your own metaphor.” The works on view at the Triton, selected from the artist’s estate by him son Joseph, will present examples of Oliveira’s evocations of form in both two and three dimensions. In the Cowell Room Gallery oil paintings ranging from small studies of faces to a monumental canvas from the "Windhover" series will demonstrate the artist’s engagement with the flexibility of the oil medium. A selection of bronzes—including masks and figures—will show how Oliveira’s painterly sensibility remained tangible in the sensitive surfaces of his three dimensional works. In the Triton’s Rotunda, where works on paper will be featured, examples of the artist’s "Imi" and "Santa Fe" watercolors of female figures will join a series of lithographs from the 1960s. Olivera’s fluid watercolors, in which he allowed the paint to form rivers and pools that soak into the paper then coalesce into figures, are among his most distinctive inventions. Committed to the idea that making art involved finding unique forms Nathan Oliveira: Variations of Form will offer a fresh opportunity for viewers to encounter the myriad forms of his personal universe and appreciate them on their own terms. Previous Next

Warburton Gallery EXHIBITION Palace of Leaves Michelle Gregor DATES: APR 27 - SEP 15 YEAR: 2024 Previously on view in the Warburton Gallery < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us. While working on this exhibition, I was thinking about trees. Because they often experience life in a longer time scale than humans, trees can be felt as witnesses to our human achievement and our folly, our appreciation and our exploitation. With this new body of work, my abstracted human figures have taken on evolving shapes referencing arboreal forms. Before the silicon age, the Santa Clara Valley was blanketed with some of the most fertile orchards in the world and dubbed “the Valley of Heart’s Delight.” Before that, it was home to ancient native oaks and redwoods. Trees have accompanied us, and I have taken inspiration from our bonds with them. Beyond our tangible relationship with trees, I also think of my artistic practice itself as a ‘palace of leaves.’ For me it is a canopy of focus, rooted in purpose. The phrase is from a poem by Mary Oliver, “Crossing The Swamp” which emphasizes resilience and creative potential. My approach is improvisational. The materials/processes (clay, pigments, kiln firings, etc.) are partners in dialogue with me, rather than merely subject to my preconceived ideas. With each round of decisions I make during the forming, surface coloration, firings, I am responding to the changes the material presents. I highly value the geological impressions and subtle tonal changes as the clay body matures with each firing. The seasons pass very quickly and it’s important to enjoy what is there in front of you. You have to have a certain amount of faith that your process will reveal a path or a direction, even if you don’t know what the end point will be. You have to have faith that the water will be deep enough when you jump into it. Michelle Gregor, 2024 Out of gallery Michelle Gregor, Paloma , ceramic, 2023 (photo by J. Jones). Previous Next

Rotunda Gallery EXHIBITION The Same Streets Everyday Lost San Jose DATES: JAN 20 - MAY 12 YEAR: 2024 Previously on view in the Rotunda Gallery < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us. Lost San Jose is an ongoing series of photos and stories, a collection of fragments that make up the landscape of my life in Silicon Valley. It’s a tribute to the four generations of my family that haunt these streets, a eulogy for an endlessly erased city that always pushes away what was or could have been. About the Collection The Same Streets Everyday explores the ever-shifting landscapes of the places that have become home, the mysteries that hide in the everyday, and the patterns and constants that emerge when you walk the same streets for years. It’s purposely taken wrong turns, worn out shoes, quiet hours, and cloudy days. It’s insomnia, trespassing, and a camera. The photos on the walls, presented in no particular order, were taken with over a dozen different cameras, span over a decade of time, and were all taken while walking the streets of San Jose. Out of gallery Lost San Jose, Living in the Flight Path, 2016, digital photograph. Previous Next

Rotunda Gallery EXHIBITION Happenstance Jeff Owen DATES: SEPT 2 - JAN 7 YEAR: 2023 Previously on view in the Rotunda Gallery < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us. Happenstance - An Unexpected Journey My artist life began as a child sitting in the back seat of a 1957 Chevrolet with a drawing tablet – only the best from the art store – and my favorite #2 pencil. My mother would throw me and all of her drawing supplies into the car and drive all around town looking for interesting buildings, homes, or people to draw. Always on a busy street, cars whizzing by with all the noise that accompanies them; no matter, we were there to draw whatever was out the side window of the car. I’d say my drawings were never much to look at, but I always received tons of “that’s beautiful” or “I wish I could draw like that” from Mom. Sometimes my scale would be off, sometimes my perspective. No problem, Mom encouraged me. Each adventure would top the last – and each finishing with a quick roll up of the window, a buckle of the seatbelt, and a retreat to home where Mom would pull out her recent work and “touch up” her drawing – then – she began to paint. This was the best time. The fumes of oil and turpentine would fill the house. We, my sister and I, would run over and open a window to get some fresh air into the room – Mom was painting! We would watch her paint, and then, for some unknown reason (except for being a kid) we’d find something else to do – until our curiosity sparked us to again go and see how far she had come with her latest “masterpiece.” This was my introduction to art. My art evolved over the years, sometimes taken with painting, sometimes drawing, until that one special day that I discovered welding. My father-in-law, Chet Christison, lived in Fresno. We would visit him and his wife Thelma at least three or four times per year. His workshop, a huge outbuilding on the property, was filled with woodworking tools. Little did I know that he also loved metal. Inside his workshop, in a corner that you could barely get to without disturbing all the feral cats he loved so much, away from everything else, was an oxy-acetylene torch set, and next to it, a small welder. “What the heck is this?” I asked him. “Oh that, you wouldn’t know” he said. “That’s for welding metal.” I asked him if he wanted it, since I could see it had not been used in some time. “What are you going to do with it? You don’t even know how to use it.” I finally got him to give it to me. The welder went into the back of my truck, along with the oxy set. I was determined to put them to good use. I must be able to find something that needs welding... -------------- My technique is brute force, decide-at-the-moment. My creative process emerges with patterns. I incorporate patterns into all of my sculptures. Taking one piece of steel, adding to it, or deleting from it, then ending when the sculpture encompasses all of my creativity, this is what charges up my artistic energies. When my creative force is flowing, I work on a sculpture to completion. It is finished when the creative flow ends. I have been an artist all my life. I am fascinated with engineering and architecture. The shapes of metal, its patterns, textures and grains all entice me to create. My ability to cut and weld metal allows me to create any art I desire. My aspiration is to create sculpture that is unique, something that no one has done before. I resist conformity and mass production. My art is as individual as I am. My art belongs to our present time or any time. My art does not represent reality inspired by the real world. It makes use of patterns representing independent relationships with no reference – “contemporary-abstraction.” I take delight in rummaging through metal scrap yards, finding those particular pieces of steel that stir me in some way or other. I have feelings for inanimate objects. When I see something tossed aside, I ponder why? I wonder where it has been and where it is going. Each piece I touch has its own individual tale. Was it once part of a bridge, supporting travelers to distant cities? Was it once part of a water tower, supplying nourishment to gardens? Was it used to manufacture others, like itself? When I’ve rescued that piece from limbo, it may take me only moments, or possibly many months, to understand within myself what that metal wants, or needs, to become. Only then will I fulfill “its” dream. Jeff Owen 2023 "Lost Horizons" Previous Next

Permanent Gallery EXHIBITION A Group Exhibition with Chopsticks Alley Season II DATES: SEP 17 - JAN 8 YEAR: 2022 Previously on view in the Permanent Gallery < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us. "Researching and Remembering" Previous Next

Warburton Gallery EXHIBITION Under the Californian Sun Theodore Wores DATES: MAR 13 - JUN 6 YEAR: 2021 Previously on view in the Warburton Gallery < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us. Previous Next

Unknown EXHIBITION Beyond 2D: Sculptures from the Permanent Collection Various Artists DATES: JAN 25 - FEB 20 YEAR: 2022 Previously on view in the Unknown < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Previous Next

Unknown EXHIBITION The Myth of Memory Dana Harris Seeger DATES: MAY 14 - AUG 21 YEAR: 2022 Previously on view in the Unknown < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Previous Next

Warburton Gallery EXHIBITION Spirit in Bloom: May Shei's Ink and Watercolor Worlds May Shei DATES: SEPT 9 - DEC 30 YEAR: 2023 Previously on view in the Warburton Gallery < Back OVERVIEW ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us. “Take time today to look unto the hill, to walk in ways where quiet waters flow; to see the beauty that all nature fills... take time today just to be still and know.” - Take Time , by David Ogletree Although my Hakka grandparents and dad and my Taiwanese mom never read this poem, I learned many of the same principles from them when I was a child. I was very lucky to be raised in the town of Meinong, where the Hakka culture was and is alive and well, and to be raised in our old family home near a National Park. As a result, I grew up immersed in very traditional culture and beautiful nature scenery. "For a deep and true appreciation of art one must educate the eye.” - Helen Keller I believe in painting people you love so much, painting antiques from grandparents, dad and mom, and lovely kids' gifts. The process is a joyful ceremony, painting how I feel and what I care about. "Take one bright star to guide your path.” - Take A Bright Star , by Georgia B. Adams I am so grateful for the many bright stars in my life in art, they helped me a lot, and allowed me to stay strong on the windy path. “Keep a green bough in your heart, and the singing bird will come.” - Chinese Proverb I believe all kinds of beautiful artworks are a universal language. Thanks to my family fully supporting me, I learned watercolor, calligraphy, ink, and Chinese paintings. An artist is similar to a gardener, because without hard work, there are no beautiful flowers, butterflies, or birds. “Beauty seen is never lost.” - John Greenleaf Whittier Most of the time it is true, if we can put the painting in the document, we can frame it and enjoy it year by year. My solo show paintings are a sketch book of my path - either pure, transparent, or ink and watercolor, or opaque mixed media, I tried every possibility for my artwork, to try and find the richness of values, texture and the tone, no matter if they are black and white or color. My family and I would like to thank the Triton Museum of Art for this solo show, which is a golden opportunity and every artist's dream come true, and we appreciate that. May Shei at Lucky Cloud Art Studio www.mayshei.com May Shei 2023 "Time Goes By" Previous Next

For 61 years, our art museum has been a destination for the community, providing a venue where local artists exhibit their work alongside regional and national artists, and where students of all ages learn about art and the creative process through art workshops and art lectures. ! Widget Didn’t Load Check your internet and refresh this page. If that doesn’t work, contact us.

Meet the Triton Museum of Art Staff and Board! To contact the Museum, please visit our Contact Page. Staff & Board Triton Museum of Art Staff Aileen Tran Communications Coordinator Bryan Callanta Curator of Digital Programming Cedric Vu Preparator/Museum Assistant Christina De La Cruz Office & Development Manager Donna Tobkin Business Manager Erin Rempola-Kwong Education Coordinator Lisa Duong Content Designer Olivia Osborn Rental & Events Administrator Preston Metcalf Executive Director & Senior Curator Thao Hoang Program Assistant Vanessa Callanta Curator Board Members Jeff Brown President Cory Morgan Vice President Meilee "Millie" Epler Secretary Mei-Ying Dell’Aquila Treasurer Preston Metcalf Executive Director & Senior Curator Sharmila Bhattacharya Kevin Conner Elke Groves Lisa Xuan Herbold Francisco (Pancho) Jiménez Lorraine Lawson Katelyn Riccardi Board Portal