ArtTable members joined for in-person tour of how we are in time and space: Nancy Buchanan, Marcia Hafif, Barbara T. Smith, followed by a discussion with two of the exhibition artists – Nancy Buchanan and Barbara T. Smith.

This major group exhibition is the first to focus on the collaborations and empathic intersections between three remarkable artists in the form of drawing, photography, collage, video, performance documentation, and architectural proposals comprising over 50 years of art making. Embracing the differences between these artists as well as their points of convergence, the exhibition will probe various notions of being, including the political, scientific, and spiritual.

All three artists have deep connections to Southern California, intersecting in the inaugural MFA program at UC-Irvine from 1969 to 1971. Buchanan, Hafif, and Smith all entered graduate school as mothers and were emphatically aware of the gendered expectations and hostilities toward women choosing art making as their primary pursuit, though each presented a unique version of the struggle for liberation from the orthodoxies of gender and sexuality. The exhibition will be anchored by three time-based works demonstrating the overlaps between each artist’s practice and revealing the primary subjects of the exhibition—bodies, communication, and dwelling.