Renée Lotenero

Three Hundred & Sixty-Five

October 8-November 12

LA sculptor Renée Lotenero created an assignment for herself: draw one sketch per day. Lotenero has always sketched, especially during idle moments while traveling (she exhibited 204 of these small drawings at SOFA in 2009). For Three Hundred and Sixty-Five, Lotenero decided that no matter the circumstances of her day, whether she was traveling or in the studio, busy with family or work, she would create one small drawing.

What Lotenero discovered is that the act of an assignment can be vastly different than the act of pure inspiration. Instead of sketching when the mood struck her, she became more self-conscious about the role of drawing in her artistic practice. “I was interested in the idea of creating a sketch when I wasn't necessarily inspired,” Lotenero explains.  “I wanted to see how they differed when I was sometimes forced to make them.”  In these works she stays true to her previous style in drawing and sculpting—engaging organic forms and the circuitous nature of progress and decay. The images appear on scrap paper or the pages of a personal calendar and are adorned with looped circles vibrating in one section or vine-like lines crawling up another section. Often times, notes appear remarking on the events of the day.

All of the drawings will be installed on the walls of SOFA in chronological order. The hope is that these works, diaristic in nature and created out of discipline, will appear in an accumulation of thoughts, gestures, scribbles of a life lived.

Renée Lotenero has exhibited at the Santa Monica Museum of Art; Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago, IL; The Hammer Museum, UCLA; and Arthouse at the Jones Center, Austin, TX. In 2010 she was a resident at La Ville Matte in Sardinia, Italy. She is represented by McClain Gallery, Houston, TX.