Gray clouds loomed over the San Gabriel Mountains, slowly passing over their peaks late in the morning. Warm amber bulbs strewn around the trunks of olive trees at Padua Hills Theatre became shrouded with the encroaching haze of sprinkling rain. But as artists began to open their booths and people poured inside, the venue quickly flooded with soul, color and curiosity.
The Claremont Lewis Museum of Art (CLMA) hosted its 22nd annual FestivArts showcase on Nov. 1 at the Padua Hills Theatre, bringing 44 artists to the foothills of Claremont. Among them were 5C staff and longtime Claremont artists, and for many in attendance, the festival was a reminder of how deeply the city’s art scene connects to the Claremont Colleges — a legacy stretching back to Scripps College art department head Millard Sheets.
“They made [Claremont] into a mecca for culture,” Shearer said. “The colleges, Pomona and Scripps, have a lot to do with it. They recognized the community as a valuable resource to give their students real world experiences.”
David L. Shearer, executive director of Claremont Heritage Inc., displayed various historically significant works of art at the festival, including an original print by Sheets, who is known throughout Southern California for his building-mounted mosaics. Shearer spoke about the impact that the Colleges continue to have on the city’s art scene today.
“They made [Claremont] into a mecca for culture,” Shearer said. “The colleges, Pomona and Scripps, have a lot to do with it. They recognized the community as a valuable resource to give their students real world experiences.”
The Padua Hills Theatre is now known for hosting picturesque weddings, but before ceremonies and receptions, it hosted performances and festivals — most notably the Mexican Players from its opening in 1930 until the end of its commercial operations in 1974. Since 1953, the theatre has hosted the Padua Hills Art Festival, which CMLA acquired in 2011 and renamed FestivArts.
Seth Pringle, director of the CLMA, spoke about the importance of the venue for the festival and its history.
“It’s a really big part of what makes our festival special is the venue,” Pringle said. “I think it’s really beautiful when art can be experienced in a historic setting.”
That history was reflected in the work of the 44 artists whose booths were tucked into nearly every corner of the open-air property. The paintings, jewelry, ceramic and glass wares on display in the gallery were bright, dynamic and gripping, drawing curious passersby in for a closer look.
Linda Garcia-Dahle, a lifelong artist, painter and member of the Pomona Valley Art Association (PVAA), displayed vibrant oil paintings in the interior of the theatre. Garcia-Dahle spoke about her muse: the dynamics of light, how they are represented in her art and how they connect with others emotionally.
“What I am interested in is the light,” Garcia-Dahle said. “Light and shadow evokes emotions in people, and what I feel when I paint and what other people feel too is a sense of calm, peacefulness and serenity.”
While Garcia-Dahle explored the emotional effects of light through painting, Elizabeth Redd, a glassblower and blacksmith, experimented with movement and form through glasswork. Redd spoke about how she is captivated by the process of glassblowing and its experimental nature.
“I love to blow glass, it’s really interesting to me,” Redd said. “I like to experiment with different movements and different shapes, and it builds up from that.”
That spirit of experimentation extended to the festival’s ceramic artists, whose work reflected the range of techniques in Claremont’s arts community. Several artists displayed eye-catching ceramics, including Bobby Free, a local ceramicist and lab technician at Saddleback College. Free has attended FestivArts for five years. For this showcase he experimented with alternative firing techniques on his ceramic wares.
“What I did with this firing was I brought it to the peak temperature, and as it cooled I put wood into the kiln to reduce the oxygen in the atmosphere,” Free said. “It keeps iron and copper from reoxidizing, so it stays darker.”
Karen Kuo, a painter, sculptor and ceramics technician at Scripps, also displayed ceramic wares at the festival. Her art involves manipulating shapes to produce colorful warped objects and mind-bending images, drawing on a longstanding studio arts tradition at Scripps that Kuo said remains visible in the College’s facilities and equipment.
“Scripps has such a long, rich history with ceramics and studio arts,” Kuo said. “You can really feel that legacy around the studio, right down to the historic equipment, kilns, and clay mixers that makers used back then and that we still use today.”
Douglass Pearsall, a multi-disciplinary artist and museum associate at the CLMA who draws inspiration from traditional African artforms and commercial imagery. Like Shearer, Pearsall spoke to how Claremont shares an artistic legacy with the colleges.
“The thing about Claremont is it’s known as an art community,” Pearsall said. “One of the first art schools on the West Coast was in Rembrandt Hall at Pomona College. Millard Sheets was a really big influence [here]. So, Claremont has a really rich art history.”
Kathleen McCall, president of the PVAA, said she is proud of Claremont’s arts community, which owes much of its legacy to Sheets and other artists like him.
“Millard Sheets and Milford Zornes started the Padua Hills Arts Festival,” McCall said. “People come from all over California to the ‘Village Venture’ and other art shows that we have. Even though the weather has been cold with possible rain, the turnout has been fabulous.”
Nearing the end of the afternoon, the dreary overcast had dissipated and the warmth of the sun returned to Padua Hills Theatre. As people began to leave and artists packed their wares, the festival offered a reminder of how the artistic traditions established by Sheets and the Claremont Colleges continue to shape the city’s arts community.
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