Found objects in playful sculptures
Oakland’s Royal NoneSuch Gallery takes its name from the antics of a mischievous theater troupe in Mark Twain’s “Huckleberry Finn.” This sense of liveliness is part of what drew artist Kat Geng to the gallery. Of the team at Royal NoneSuch, Geng says that they “take play seriously in art, and are always supportive of risk-taking.”
Geng’s new show, “Lost in the Found,” is on view at Royal NoneSuch through Feb. 25. The show features her colorful mixed-media sculptures and is the first in the gallery’s new space near Jack London Square. The pieces incorporate mundane objects like toy cars and combs, items that Geng finds “everywhere,” including on the streets of San Francisco. The artist says she is drawn to the items for their color or texture, their power to evoke memories and even their sense of latent energy.
“I often imagine objects as animate,” Geng says. “I may see a shoelace, and the way it is draped reminds me of a heavy rainfall or a shoelace on my sneaker and I want to give it life. Let it prance about.”
Geng moved to the Bay Area five years ago, drawn to a place that she considers “a haven for free thought and exploration.”
She first landed in Emeryville, living in the marina on a shrimp trawler. Now, she house-sits in San Francisco and makes art in her studio in the Inner Richmond neighborhood.
Geng takes part in what Royal NoneSuch’s co-director Christina Wiles calls a “thriving and supportive arts community.”
“I think there’s some incredibly interesting experimental contemporary art happening in the East Bay right now,” Wiles says. Maxine Marshall is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mmarshall@ sfchronicle.com