If you can't tell by now, I have a thing for Palm Springs. Steve doesn't love it quite as much as I do but Julie is my desert exploring partner and we had a very anticipated, and highly enjoyable meetup on Saturday. So sit back and enjoy this long post about two interesting female artists who were contemporaries yet so very different from not only one another but from others creating at the same time. Wow.

"One of the first things you notice about Ms. Frey's large figurative sculptures is that they are rigid, archetypal, Caucasian males or females. The men wear blue suits and often have blue lips. The women wear blouses and brightly colored skirts or dresses, and their lips are often bright red. To her, men in suits were a symbol of power, where the uniform became more important than the man. Women in dresses were a symbol of 1960s suburbanite submission."

While the moderators tried to imbued feminism and male 'toxicity' in some of her works, I saw whimsy there, too.

After the hour long lecture we were granted special access to Viola Frey's work in one of the museum's Art Vaults. How very, very cool.

After lunch at our favorite little Mexican place, we hit a very groovy estate sale, along with the Goodwill.

Our final stop was a greater opportunity to experience the art of Viola Frey. The Pit Gallery was hosting a closing reception after having an extensive Viola Frey retrospective. What timing and how amazing to be able to really study her pieces. Wow.

Most, if not all, of the artworks have kiln gloves or hands as a focal point.

“In these works, the mythical ‘artist hand’ is the dominant motif, seen not only in the mark making of the artist through her application of paint and glaze, but in the form and subject matter of the artwork itself."

I asked if Viola had journals. No. What is the true meaning of Man Standing on Glove (1985)? It is, as Tony Marsh hypothesized, Ms. Frey (the glove) being held down/oppressed in a field full of men? If that's the case, who are the three faces adorning the fingers of the glove? I have so many questions.

Scholars believed Ms. Frey used bright colors on her figures' hands to symbolize "vitality and the importance of hands. This was a woman who spent her whole life with her hands in mud so hands were very much the seat of her strength."

What inspired Viola Frey? She was influenced by the Bay Area figurative paintings of artists like Richard Diebenkorn and Elmer Bischoff as well as by the bold, cartoonish paintings of Joan Brown. Interestingly, I'm going to an exhibit of Ms. Brown's work soon so I'll know more about her, as well.

Viola Frey was renowned for her bricolage sculpture. She was inspired by her collection of figurines and bric-a-brac and from these objects she slip-cast molds in whiteware. She then reassembled them into larger compositions. The work was later glazed in a range of bright colors. I think this piece was my favorite. It reminded me of some sort of melted Llardó.

If this isn't enough information about Viola Frey, this three minute video displays even more of her unique talent.