Art & Nature

Art & Nature Festival brings art and the community together in celebration of our history and future.

Creative Science

The event serves a number of purposes: to provide a festival of art and ideas for the community; to inspire artists; to find and develop connections between art and science; to raise awareness of environmental issues; and to celebrate Laguna Beach as a center for the appreciation of art and nature.

The theme of Art & Nature speaks particularly to the identity of Laguna Beach, which for over a hundred years has fostered art, the love of nature, and environmental awareness.

In 1929, when the Laguna Beach Art Association built a gallery to show and sell their work, they chose a commanding location on the coastline, close to the natural wonders they loved to paint. The present museum occupies the same site. There could be no more appropriate venue in which to explore the art-nature connection.

12th Annual Art & Nature: Ocean Ions by Christian Sampson

Begins November 7, 2024

Christian Sampson’s Ocean Ions is a bridge between scientific inquiry and artistic expression, drawing connections to color theory, spirituality and abstraction, site specific land art projects and sublime and utopian ideals of the American West. Installed in Laguna Beach’s Heisler Park November 7-11 and accompanied by an indoor exhibition, Ocean Ions investigates the complex interplay between light, color, and movement, and explores the concept of ions—molecules that have gained or lost an electrical charge through movement—and their effects on the environment and spectator.

In conjunction with LAM’s yearly Art + Nature series, Sampson in planning a performance and art installation right on Laguna Beach that will incorporate dance movements within his artworks. He has envisioned a display of colorful circular sculptures and forms set in motion and animated both by the light of the sun and movements by dancers from Volta Collective draped in costumes painted by Ariel Dill.

Featured EXHIBITION: Fred Tomaselli: Second Nature

This exhibition features nearly 50 new and recent works that highlight the varied and wide-ranging intersections of art, nature, popular culture and current events that run through his practice.

Tomaselli’s resin paintings will be presented alongside selections from his New York Times series—marking the start and progression of the Coronavirus and the worldwide pandemic it caused. Drawing on and altering the front pages of the daily newspaper, these works mark the passage of time and document in diaristic fashion the urgent issues of the days, weeks and months unfolding throughout the world.

Featured EXHIBITION: Jay DeFeo: Trees

Jay DeFeo (1929-1989) returned home to Northern California in 1953. In her Berkeley studio DeFeo looked to nature as inspiration, employing the artistic language she developed while in Florence to fuse modes of representation with approaches to abstraction in a group of drawings that make up Jay DeFeo: Trees.

Trees also features a selection of DeFeo’s photographs of trees captured in the Bay Area during the early 1970s when she began focusing on black-and-white photography. DeFeo took this aspect of her practice with the utmost seriousness, and it was integral to her artmaking. Accompanying these artworks will be a selection of archival materials highlighting the artist’s enduring fascination with trees and nature.

Family Festival

The Art & Nature Family Festival is an event for all ages. Laguna Art Museum partners with local organizations whose missions focus on art, climate, science, animal welfare, and environmental education to present fun and enriching hands-on activities and educational stations throughout the museum.