New SpaceMarch 18, 2021
Art Institute of Contemporary Art, San Diego
On March 15, 2021 a new organization was announced: The Institute of Contemporary Art, San Diego, dedicated to experimental art and learning, will open its doors to the public in September 2021. A living laboratory of art and ideas, the organization is the invention of a merger of two local institutions, Lux Art Institute (1998), a leading contemporary arts space in North County San Diego, and the San Diego Art Institute (1941), the only cultural institution dedicated solely to experimental contemporary art in Balboa Park. The ICA San Diego embodies the shared commitments of both organizations to regional and international contemporary artists, education, and community engagement.
The merger, supported with a grant by the Sahm Family Foundation, was recently finalized with a single, consolidated Board of Directors, and an Executive Director, Andrew Utt (pictured), a curator and museum executive who currently serves as Executive Director of Lux. He will oversee an adventurous, diverse array of exhibitions, installations, public programs, and classes that will unfold in its galleries in Balboa Park and Encinitas locations and via site-specific commissions and installations in San Diego.
The new organization will inaugurate its combined 15,000 square feet of indoor space and six acres of exhibition and public programming space with a curatorial and programmatic focus in 2021 and 2022 on the environment and the first solo show in California of Mexican conceptualist Gabriel Rico (b. 1980, Lagos de Moreno, Mexico).
The institute will operate two locations, ICA North and ICA Central.
“ICA San Diego will be a welcoming, inclusive public space to gather, question, learn, and shape the future, and everyone is invited,” enthused Utt, a curator with expertise in Latin American art and contemporary photography and a museum leader who holds an M.A. in Museum Studies from Harvard University and a B.F.A. from California College of the Arts. Utt, who is bilingual, previously lived and worked in Latin America, organizing exhibitions of contemporary art in Argentina and Colombia. “We will present art and learning with a mission to question, quite literally, everything. We want artists to contribute to public life in San Diego County, and the ICA is their platform.”
"We will present the most experimental and innovative art in San Diego County,” said Karen Gilbert, the organization’s new Chair, Board of Directors, who currently serves as Chair of the San Diego Art Institute. “The ICA will introduce and nurture new artists and our educational and curatorial programs will be diverse, inclusive, and responsive to the issues of today.”
“This is a wonderful new chapter in the cultural life of San Diego County,” said Linda Brandes, President, Board of Directors at Lux Art Institute. The new organization extends its gratitude to Brandes for her service, dedication, and looks forward to her working with her on the board as Chair Emeritus.
"This is something that was very important to my great-grandmother, who has long felt there was a need for something more than a typical museum in San Diego,” said Abigail Sahm of the Sahm Family Foundation and great-granddaughter of the late Ramona Sahm, who in 1998 donated the seed money for Lux. “The ICA reflects our tradition of supporting preeminent arts organizations and our new focus of programming that benefits children and seniors from low-income areas, where exposure to the arts is extremely limited.”
For more information visit: https://icasandiego.org/
The merger, supported with a grant by the Sahm Family Foundation, was recently finalized with a single, consolidated Board of Directors, and an Executive Director, Andrew Utt (pictured), a curator and museum executive who currently serves as Executive Director of Lux. He will oversee an adventurous, diverse array of exhibitions, installations, public programs, and classes that will unfold in its galleries in Balboa Park and Encinitas locations and via site-specific commissions and installations in San Diego.
The new organization will inaugurate its combined 15,000 square feet of indoor space and six acres of exhibition and public programming space with a curatorial and programmatic focus in 2021 and 2022 on the environment and the first solo show in California of Mexican conceptualist Gabriel Rico (b. 1980, Lagos de Moreno, Mexico).
The institute will operate two locations, ICA North and ICA Central.
“ICA San Diego will be a welcoming, inclusive public space to gather, question, learn, and shape the future, and everyone is invited,” enthused Utt, a curator with expertise in Latin American art and contemporary photography and a museum leader who holds an M.A. in Museum Studies from Harvard University and a B.F.A. from California College of the Arts. Utt, who is bilingual, previously lived and worked in Latin America, organizing exhibitions of contemporary art in Argentina and Colombia. “We will present art and learning with a mission to question, quite literally, everything. We want artists to contribute to public life in San Diego County, and the ICA is their platform.”
"We will present the most experimental and innovative art in San Diego County,” said Karen Gilbert, the organization’s new Chair, Board of Directors, who currently serves as Chair of the San Diego Art Institute. “The ICA will introduce and nurture new artists and our educational and curatorial programs will be diverse, inclusive, and responsive to the issues of today.”
“This is a wonderful new chapter in the cultural life of San Diego County,” said Linda Brandes, President, Board of Directors at Lux Art Institute. The new organization extends its gratitude to Brandes for her service, dedication, and looks forward to her working with her on the board as Chair Emeritus.
"This is something that was very important to my great-grandmother, who has long felt there was a need for something more than a typical museum in San Diego,” said Abigail Sahm of the Sahm Family Foundation and great-granddaughter of the late Ramona Sahm, who in 1998 donated the seed money for Lux. “The ICA reflects our tradition of supporting preeminent arts organizations and our new focus of programming that benefits children and seniors from low-income areas, where exposure to the arts is extremely limited.”
For more information visit: https://icasandiego.org/
