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Glendale Community College art gallery earns acclaim from LA Weekly

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Glendale Community College’s art gallery was named by Los Angeles Weekly magazine as one of the top 15 art galleries operated by a Southern California college or university.

LA Weekly compiled a list in August of the 15 “best art galleries enlivening SoCal college campuses” and the Art Gallery @ GCC was one of three in the San Fernando Valley to earn the distinction.

“I have to tell you, it was a surprise, first of all,” said David John Attyah, director of Glendale College’s gallery. “We didn’t know it was coming out. It was definitely a pleasant surprise.”

LA Weekly stated that Glendale Community College “hosts exhibitions reflecting the diversity and talent of not just the students but the professors, too.”

The periodical also listed a few of the gallery’s highlights, including the “Pinck Oogen” sound installation by Los Angeles-based artist Silvie Deutsch and displays of faculty projects and artwork.

It was Deutsch’s project that Rhona Blaker, Glendale Community College’s faculty coordinator for contextualized teaching and learning, thought not only garnered attention, but recognition from LA Weekly.

“Silvie Deutsch turned the entire gallery into a harmonic harp that students from the music division were then able to come and play, and I think some of them even composed on that enormous room-sized harp,” Blaker said during a college board meeting earlier this month.

Blaker added that the award was impressive, given that it was designated “for colleges, not just community colleges, but colleges.”

The Art Gallery @ GCC just opened a new exhibition, titled “Four Artists in Paint,” on Monday, which includes artist Nicole Petrou’s “She,” Zach Mendoza’s “Sincerity,” Katelyn Dorroh’s “1% Brown Paintings” and Argineh Zadoorian’s “Otherness.”

Attyah said he’s struggled getting the Art Gallery @ GCC noticed in an area that lacks a central artistic hub.

“Because Glendale doesn’t have its own dedicated art museum like other communities do, we’ve really been trying to kind of increase the quality of the gallery program,” Attyah said. “We’d like to be telling people that you’re seeing the same thing in Glendale that you’d be seeing if you went to other parts of Los Angeles.”

Cal State Northridge and Los Angeles Pierce College, located in Woodland Hills, joined Glendale Community College as San Fernando Valley galleries lauded by LA Weekly.

andrew.campa@latimes.com

Twitter @campadresports

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