Skidmore Contemporary Art
presents
ALSO ON VIEW:
Gallery Selections
Visitors are warmly invited to spend time with these works at Skidmore Contemporary Art in Laguna Beach, and to encounter firsthand the calm intensity and quiet optimism that define the gallery’s longstanding program.
Gallery Selections on view include the following, among others:
Jennifer Bain
Messages, 2025
Ink, acrylic on clayboard;
12.5" x 15.5" Framed
$850
With stylistic nods to both traditional East Asian ink painting and contemporary naturalism, Messages resonates with fine draftsmanship, organic composition, and serene narrative. Perched on angular branches softened by expressive ink blooms, Jennifer Bain’s birds face one another in what feels like a conversational exchange of messages carried through song, if not by sheer presence.
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Richard Baker
View From "A" Mountain, 2024
Oil on canvas;
45" x 60" Framed
$9,500.
This composition’s stark foreground, defined by the dark curve of the mountain and scattered Sonoran Desert cacti, lends the canvas a sculptural presence, while the expressive brushwork in the sky introduces a lyrical, cinematic voice. Richard Baker’s approach bridges realism and abstraction. Offering both a meditative landscape and a chromatic statement with a bold, contemporary sensibility View From “A” Mountain aligns with aspects of color field painting yet portrays a specific place and time.
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Laura Browning
Morning Light, 2025
oil on canvas;
48" x 36"
$5,500.
This luminous painting by Laura Browning captures the mesmerizing interplay of light and water with striking realism. Rendered in a gradient of cerulean to aquamarine, the composition immerses the viewer in a tranquil seascape, where delicate ripples and refracted light dance across the sandy sea floor. Meticulous attention to the fluid geometry of water recalls elements of photorealism. The effect of Morning Light remains meditative and atmospheric, yet on closer inspection aligns with sensitive gestural abstraction or subtle action painting.
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Caroline Gray
Dancing With Light,
2024 Limited Edition Photographic Print
on Canson Platine Fibre Rag
63" x 57” Framed
$9,500.
A striking study in fluid motion and ethereal elegance, Dancing with Light is a suspended moment in time beneath the water's surface, where gravity loosens its grip and gesture becomes pure expression. Photographer Caroline Gray captures the dancer’s flowing, slate-blue gown, her body gracefully entwined and partially mirrored on the undulating plane above. Rich aquamarine tones dominate the composition, while the gentle distortion from the waterline introduces an abstract, painterly quality that nods to Surrealism and the dreamlike aesthetic of photographers such as André Kertész. Printed on luxurious Canson Platine Fibre Rag, known for its deep blacks and subtle tonal range, the image possesses a tactile richness that enhances its lyrical ambience.
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Andy Burgess
Lavender House, 2024
Limited Edition Hybrid Screenprint, 15/22
32 ½” x 37 ½” Framed
$3,850.
Acclaimed British artist and printmaker Andy Burgess continues his signature exploration of modernist architecture through a vibrant, geometric lens. From a 2024 limited edition series of hybrid screenprints Lavender House captures a stylized midcentury home bathed in saturated hues of lavender, cobalt, and coral, all rendered with crisp, angular precision. Burgess's lavish hand-screened diamond-dust-infused prints evoke the visual language of geometric planes and richly textured colors of hard edge abstraction, with nods to the work of Richard Diebenkorn's color field paintings and David Hockney's experiments in collage.
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TR Colletta
Chapter 11 - Ars Longa, Vita Brevis, 2025
Oil on linen;
50" x 50"
$14,500.
Boldly rendered in a vibrant, fire-engine red, this machine radiates presence and personality. The typewritten page carries the Latin message "Art is long, life is short." Capturing more than nostalgia, this work invites us to contemplate the enduring link between society, industry, and individual creativity. Its layered symbolism reflects Colletta's signature blend of iconic Americana with contemplative wit. Chapter 11's formal clarity and saturated palette reverberate with pop realism and the studied stillness of Wayne Thiebaud’s object portraits. Fusing craftsmanship, irony, and timeless subject matter, its narrative depth resonates with technical mastery.
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Daryl Gortner
Showstoppers 2025
Oil on linen;
49.5" x 37.5" Framed
$16,000.
Rendered in oil on canvas, Showstoppers is a mouthwatering burst of nostalgic delight through its hyperrealistic depiction of brightly colored candy sticks arranged in a classic mason jar. Brimming with vibrant hues of cherry, orange, peppermint green, electric blue, and cinnamon red, each striped confection gleams with luminosity. This piece is both a feast for the eyes and a meditation on desire, memory, and Gortner’s passion for color, light, surface texture, and glassy transparency. An homage to the tradition of photorealism, Gortner’s work is also revered by collectors for her joyous Pop Art sensibility.
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Courtney Murphy
Agate, 2025
Oil on panel; 30" x 30"
$5,800.
A moment of poised motion with exquisite sensitivity and technical refinement, rendered in oil on panel, Agate focuses on a pair of bare feet mid-step, cloaked in flowing fabric. Courtney Murphy's work is known for an elegance reminiscent of classical realism but with a painterly touch that lends the piece a contemporary sensuality. Her cool palette is anchored by shades of indigo, violet, and pearl conjures a meditation in motion, inviting viewers into a scene balancing intimacy with stage presence, and unselfconscious emotion with technical mastery.
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Eric Nash
Pacific Coast Highway Only, 2025
Oil on canvas 48" x 60"
$16,500.
The clean geometry and luminous clarity of Eric Nash's Pacific Coast Highway Only, set against a cloudless azure sky above California’s open, light-drenched landscape, calls to mind the allure of travel, freedom, and the romantic mythology of the America’s Pacific coastline. Nash’s minimalist approach translates the impersonal utility of the highway sign into a looking glass reflecting the viewer’s choice of symbolic journey, whether foretelling an escapist’s dream or a retelling a past event from memory. "The signs," the artist asserts, "are both stories and places." The work also invites the viewer to engage in the present moment by offering a calm yet saturated visual experience that signifies the vastness of infinity beyond its frame. At 48 by 60 inches this piece commands attention with its strong graphic impact and dynamic cultural resonance.
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Brighton Smith
Via Palm in Blue, 2024
Oil on canvas 40" x 30"
$4,800.
Suggestive of a fleeting moment between day and night, the stark elegance of Brighton Smith's solitary palm silhouetted against a softly graded dusky sky backdrop is reminiscent of the quiet grandeur of Ed Ruscha’s Southern California imagery. With its subtle tonal shifts and meditative simplicity, calling to mind the restrained lyricism of modern tonalism, Via Palm in Blue's serene palette and iconic theme offers a striking yet contemplative work of contemporary minimalism with a distinctly West Coast sensibility.
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ALSO ON VIEW:
Gallery Selections
On view through March, 2026
The selection of works aspires to reward close looking. Their subtleties of surface, light, and composition fully emerge when experienced in person in the manner anticipated by the artist's dialogue with physical scale, tactile texture, and spatial sensitivity. Each artist's work offers a distinct visual register yet bears in common an attentiveness to atmosphere, color, and form. They share a clarity of creative vision and a disciplined respect for highly crafted technical execution.
To explore other works of art available at
Skidmore Contemporary Art
please visit us at
Skidmore Contemporary Art
326 N Coast Hwy
Laguna Beach, California 92651
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To find out more please
reach out to
lia@liaskidmore.com
310-922-5070