BFree Studio shakes up the La Jolla art scene with ‘Identity through Americana’

A few weeks ago, as I walked down Girard Street in La Jolla, California, I glanced through the window of the BFree Studio and saw Ethan Chan’s “Hail to the King.” Compared to what else is on offer in nearby galleries—spaces awash in high-end nature photography and prints of 20th century masters—Chan’s wall-hanging dragon, composed of sauce packets bound together with cellophane tape, stood out.

But it didn’t stand alone. Chan was one of five young artists exhibiting in Identity through Americana which ended its run on July 30 at BFree. 

Gallery manager and curator Zachary Dobbins said that he discovered a common element in the work he selected from the response to his “very broad call for artists” with its request for work from current or former students in the Southern California area.

“The best artists all had this strange through-line of Americana,” he said, “whether that be in their relationship to their home country, where their parents were from, and then now first generation US citizens and their strange calling and relationship with Americana.” 

Reflecting on Chan’s choice of sauce packets from various fast food restaurants as media, Dobbins said, “I don’t think there’s anything more ‘Americana’ than that other than maybe some of the firearms in the show.”

Chan, whose father is Chinese and whose mother is of mixed Filipino, Spanish and Japanese descent, describes his work in this exhibition as a “love letter” to his parents. He grew up in Kenosha, Wisconsin. 

“My father always grew up with these little trinkets and dolls and carvings of dragons around the houses with a symbol of power and status,” Chan said at the artist’s talk on July 15. “I liked the idea that there can be a juxtaposition making them solely out of materials that are very American, and very niche, almost Midwestern kind of fast food culture item. But then it's also a soy sauce packet, so it's also Asian.” 

It’s also a work with a limited wall-life, as sauce packets will inevitably leak over time, or even explode. Chan acknowledged this concern in the Q&A section of the artists’ talk, but he didn’t seem at all worried about the difficult conservation problems this work could pose for a buyer.

“I always thought about it as like, ‘Well if I'm going to be a sculptor and an installation artist making these big obscure things that nobody could really fit in their house, I might as well make it as inaccessible to people buying as possible,’” he said. “I like the idea that the artwork inevitably will expire and smell and look gross so it's got no home so just enjoy it while it lasts.”

Helena Westra’s precisely detailed mixed media works pose no such conservation dilemmas.

In her wall-hanging “The Lovers’ Pardon,” you see mourning doves (fully-formed sculptures in painted ceramic) nailed to the wall. On the bench below, you see the hammers and nails used to nail the birds to the wall as if the artist had abandoned her work in mid-task.   

When I first saw the work, it conjured up thoughts about Christ’s crucifixion and about environmental devastation. But Westra told me that the work’s meaning was more in keeping with its title. It was inspired by her disconcerting realization that a recent relationship was “not the right fit” for her.

Interior image of BFree Studios. Gallery manager Zachary Dobbins at desk.

Other sculptures of hers in the exhibition combine dead-on realism, creative use of mixed media, and storytelling.  One such work, titled “I’ve Been Thinking Interior Thoughts,” is a miniature human figure with a house where the head should be.

An installation by Lorena Ochoa titled “Gente Altarpiece” directly channels the exhibition’s theme. Part of this altarpiece consists of two separate mirrors: on one you see a line drawing of Elvis, on the other you see one of John Wayne. You can imagine you are one of them by looking at your reflection. But what does this self-reflection mean when you are, as the artist is, Mexican American?

The BFree Studio gallery space is owned by Barbara Freeman, a local venture capitalist and philanthropist, with a longtime interest in the arts. She opened the gallery in late July of 2021, just as COVID-19 was abating. According to Dobbins, COVID was a factor in Freeman opening the gallery when she did. 

“What got her through COVID was the artwork on her walls and the importance of those artworks and living with those things in the space,” he said. “I think it was just a logical progression for her to have a passion product to really run with.”

Freeman’s passion for art, however, is not matched by knowledge about working with artists. That’s where Dobbins’ expertise comes in, she said. “ So together, we kind of as a group decide things.”

Dobbins, in addition to his role as gallery manager, is an artist with a focus on sculpture and installation artwork.

He received his Bachelor's in Fine Arts at Florida State University in 2021, and will be beginning his residency at the Bread & Salt Gallery, in San Diego’s Barrio Logan neighborhood, this fall.

“When I got here I told myself I was going to find myself a job that is in the arts, no matter where that may be; sitting at the front desk of a museum or landing a very amazing position here as a gallery manager,” he said.   

The BFree space has painting classes, music performances in addition to its quickly rotating exhibitions—usually two to three weeks long—that span the range of contemporary visual arts. 

Lights, Night: NEON: Photographs that Glow, is the exhibition slated for Aug. 1—Aug. 15, and it consists of a retrospective of Richard Ybarra’s 40-year output as a photographer. An exhibition opening Aug. 19 is titled Time For Women Artists.  

As for those who want to see Ethan Chan’s wall-hanging dragon, it will soon be going up in one of the food service areas of the University of California San Diego campus. 

Dobbins admits that this show might not be BFree’s most successful in terms of sales to date, but he also measures success by community engagement.  In those terms Dobbins judges the exhibit a success. 

“The amount of people that sit with the works is so much higher,” he said.

“Gente Altarpiece” by Lorena Ochoa (Image Courtesy of BFree Gallery)