Jim_Isermann

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Jim Isermann
Ticino
2006

Project Area: North Hollywood
Project: Ticino
Project Location: 11023 McCormick Street
Project Type: Developer

Description:

The public art requirement for this development presented a challenge because housing complexes such as Ticino do not contain much public space. The solution Isermann fashioned was to design tiles for the building’s balconies and lobby. Isermann rejected the conventional approach of adding glazed imagery to square tiles. He opted instead to work with tile fabricator, Heath Ceramics, to create a repeated pattern of specially shaped tiles that mimic an I-beam, a component of modern and post-modern construction. The tiles’ color was chosen to coordinate with the building, take advantage of Heath's unique saturated glaze colors, and to have the matte/gloss contrast create a secondary pattern in low or evening light.

Artist Profile

Born in 1955 in Wisconsin, Jim Isermann studied art at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee and later received his MFA at the California Institute of the Arts. Jim Isermann’s artwork explores the relationship between abstraction and design. Using ordinary household materials like plywood, fabric, nylon, paint, and glass, he is best recognized for incorporating bold-vibrant patterns into artworks that include furniture, wall coverings, rugs, paintings, and fabric-covered sculptures. Recently, the artist was featured in a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Isermann has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts; Art Matters, Inc.; the J. P. Getty Fellowship for the Visual Arts; and a Guggenheim Fellowship. The artist’s works are in the permanent collections of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; and the Museum of Modern Art, New York. The artist lives and works in Palm Springs.