New art installations to be revealed at Liberty Station

Unveiling the selected artists for the 2019 Installations at the Station project, the Art in Public Places Committee of NTC Foundation has named Miki Iwasaki, Jason Xavier Lane and Michelle Montjoy.

The foundation, which oversees the ARTS DISTRICT of Liberty Station, chose the three local artists amongst 36 proposals to create site-specific pieces for the 100-acre former Naval Training Center site.

The criteria for selection included four points: Utilizing innovation and encouraging community engagement, enhancing the site, displaying the history of San Diego, and elevating the creativity of the ARTS DISTRICT. Two of the projects, those by Lane and Iwasaki, will be created in collaboration with the Mingei International Museum, which is temporarily housed at the ARTS DISTRICT while their Balboa Park renovations are being completed.

San Diego artist Iwasaki is creating a piece entitled Facetime, a group of three wood and steel sculptures to symbolize the common need for shelter and conversation. As Iwasaki noted, “I hope to design and create set of spaces and objects with materials that contrast the immediate context and environment providing a different experience and transforming an otherwise overlooked space and site.”

He said, “The opportunities for congregation and socialization around the installation will activate the surrounding space, furthering the ARTS DISTRICT as a connection point which forges creative interaction among locals and visitors.”

Iwasaki’s piece will be located at the Sybil Stockdale Rose Garden outside Dick Laub NTC Command Center, between Building 200 and Building 201, near Shop Mingei and Café Mingei, and will be unveiled Aug. 10 during Art Walk. More of Iwasaki’s work can be seen at mikiiwasaki.com.

Lane, also from San Diego, will install a work entitled Tessellation #1, a sculpture to be placed underneath two magnolia trees. The piece will incorporate 3D, hand-cast concrete tiles, along with a hand-hewn timber bench inspired by the original post-and-beam roof construction of Liberty Station in the 1920’s.

Lane noted he was also inspired by the modernist works of Harry Bertoia at the Point Loma Naval Electronics Lab in the 1940’s along with the Art Nouveau/Symbolist paintings and woodworking of the Point Loma School under Reginald Machell in the early 1900s.

“I look forward to the opportunity to create something that has never existed for the public to discover, contemplate, and hopefully enjoy — and also to experience the ways in which it will patina from time, use, and nature,” he said.

Lane’s installation will be located at the Sybil Stockdale Rose Garden outside Dick Laub NTC Command Center, between Building 200 and Building 201, near Shop Mingei and Café Mingei, and will be unveiled Sept. 6. Follow along with Lane at jxlstudio.net.

Hailing from Oceanside, artist Michelle Montjoy will present A Dime to Call Home, a collection of cement-cast sea bags incorporating clothing and nautical rope “arms.” The piece reflects the life-altering experiences felt by new military recruits transitioning from their home life. Montjoy was inspired by a photo she saw of sailors mailing home their civilian clothing and receiving their naval uniform.

“I see my installation at Liberty Station as a conversation about the shifts of identity, location, and routine a recruit encounters when they enter the military, and the connection they have to their family, home, and previous life,” she said.

Montjoy’s installation will be located at Archways along the North Promenade, and will be unveiled Oct. 4. More of Montjoy’s work can be found at michellemontjoy.com .

To learn more about the ARTS DISTRICT and the Naval Training Center foundation, go to ntcfoundation.org or artsdistrictlibertystation.com.