Eight bridges connect the San Francisco Bay, so it is an apt name for a gallery platform that brings the Bay Area art world together.

Our mission is to maintain a vibrant gallery scene, despite restrictions on travel, celebrations and other larger gatherings. We want to support our artists by informing and entertaining curators, collectors and critics with potent online exhibitions of their work.

On the first Thursday of every month, we will launch 8 shows of artists relevant to the Bay Area. They may be working in this place, long considered an epicenter of change, or deeply engaged in the conversations the Bay Area holds dear, whether it’s related to technology, the environment, social justice or sexual identity, to name a few. In addition, each month will highlight the crucial work of a Bay Area non-profit arts organization.

Founding Committee

Claudia Altman-Siegel, Kelly Huang, Sophia Kinell, Micki Meng, Daphne Palmer, Ratio 3, Sarah Wendell Sherrill, Jessica Silverman, and Elizabeth Sullivan

Ambassador Committee

Sayre Batton & Maja Thomas, Joachim & Nancy Bechtle, Matt Bernstein, Sabrina Buell, Wayee Chu & Ethan Beard, Natasha Boas, Douglas Durkin, Carla Emil, Matt & Jessica Farron, Lauren Ford, Ali Gass, Stanlee Gatti, Brook Hartzell & Tad Freese, Pamela & David Hornik, Katie & Matt Paige, Putter Pence, Becca Prowda & Daniel Lurie, Deborah Rappaport, Komal Shah & Gaurav Garg, Laura Sweeney, The Battery, Robin Wright, Sonya Yu & Zack Lara

Sponsors

Lobus, The Space Program

Pace Gallery Palo Alto
Leo Villareal
Harmony of the Spheres

Pace Gallery is pleased to present Harmony of the Spheres, an exhibition bringing together three new LED works by Leo Villareal alongside eight single-panel pieces from his Instance series (2018), on view August 25 – October 10, 2020. This presentation, Villareal’s first at Pace in Palo Alto, continues his longstanding relationship with the Bay Area.

Custom-built software and devising rules that promote principles of emergent behavior are integral to Villareal’s practice. The works in this exhibition build on the artist’s early examinations of artificial and living systems as seen in The Bay Lights, across networked panels and mosaicked tiles that burst with visual force. Together, they provide a rare opportunity to grasp the full breadth of the artist’s practice, placing his innovative sculptural works in direct dialogue with large-scale public installations

This exhibition will be on view in our gallery through October 10, 2020. To make an appointment, please email pacepaloalto@pacegallery.com.

Optical Machine IV, 2020
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
57-1/2″ × 76-1/2″ × 4″ (146.1 cm × 194.3 cm × 10.2 cm)
Edition 1 of 5
Edition of 5 + 1 AP

INQUIRE

Optical Machine IV, 2020
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
57-1/2″ × 76-1/2″ × 4″ (146.1 cm × 194.3 cm × 10.2 cm)
Edition 1 of 5
Edition of 5 + 1 AP

Optical Machine III & IV use LED lights and custom software to translate the layered and sequential logic of systems into beguiling visual experiences that, although abstract, echo the organic behaviors and networks found in nature. Inspired by the rules that govern cellular automata, Villareal develops his own underlying structures that form complex cosmological models.
Optical Machine III, 2020
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
57-1/2″ × 76-1/2″ × 4″ (146.1 cm × 194.3 cm × 10.2 cm)
Edition 1 of 5
Edition of 5 + 1 AP
INQUIRE
Optical Machine III, 2020
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
57-1/2″ × 76-1/2″ × 4″ (146.1 cm × 194.3 cm × 10.2 cm)
Edition 1 of 5
Edition of 5 + 1 AP
Optical Machine III & IV use LED lights and custom software to translate the layered and sequential logic of systems into beguiling visual experiences that, although abstract, echo the organic behaviors and networks found in nature. Inspired by the rules that govern cellular automata, Villareal develops his own underlying structures that form complex cosmological models.
Instance 28, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
INQUIRE
Instance 28, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
The artist’s Instance series comprises singular units that are networked together into a larger, orchestrated whole. The singular works, in their digital and physical forms, become malleable synchronies wherein the possibility of order, however fleeting and subtle, appears visually across the units before gradually dissipating into a chaotic state. As particle systems, they give a sense that things are expanding and colliding, their compositional qualities alluding to antipodal forms associated with the cosmic and the atomic. For the artist, these allusions arise through the process—as he works with code, he observes their results as “echoes that occur by happenstance,” which he then captures. Ultimately, this places his work between the conscious expression of the artist and the liberation of the work into the realm of artificial life.
Instance 27, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
INQUIRE
Instance 27, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
The artist’s Instance series comprises singular units that are networked together into a larger, orchestrated whole. The singular works, in their digital and physical forms, become malleable synchronies wherein the possibility of order, however fleeting and subtle, appears visually across the units before gradually dissipating into a chaotic state. As particle systems, they give a sense that things are expanding and colliding, their compositional qualities alluding to antipodal forms associated with the cosmic and the atomic. For the artist, these allusions arise through the process—as he works with code, he observes their results as “echoes that occur by happenstance,” which he then captures. Ultimately, this places his work between the conscious expression of the artist and the liberation of the work into the realm of artificial life.
Instance 16, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm (38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″)
Unique
INQUIRE
Instance 16, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm (38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″)
Unique
The artist’s Instance series comprises singular units that are networked together into a larger, orchestrated whole. The singular works, in their digital and physical forms, become malleable synchronies wherein the possibility of order, however fleeting and subtle, appears visually across the units before gradually dissipating into a chaotic state. As particle systems, they give a sense that things are expanding and colliding, their compositional qualities alluding to antipodal forms associated with the cosmic and the atomic. For the artist, these allusions arise through the process—as he works with code, he observes their results as “echoes that occur by happenstance,” which he then captures. Ultimately, this places his work between the conscious expression of the artist and the liberation of the work into the realm of artificial life.
Musica Universalis. 2020
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
9′ 6″ × 9′ 6″ × 3″ (289.6 cm × 289.6 cm × 7.6 cm)
INQUIRE
Musica Universalis. 2020
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
9′ 6″ × 9′ 6″ × 3″ (289.6 cm × 289.6 cm × 7.6 cm)
Musica Universalis, the largest work in the exhibition, at just under ten-feet-square, references an ancient philosophical concept that regards proportions in the movements of celestial bodies as a form of music which is not audible but rather a harmonic and mathematical exploration of orbital resonance. Villareal is interested in synesthesia and the remapping of the senses. He creates works that exist purely as light but evoke elaborate sonic worlds.
Instance 29, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
INQUIRE
Instance 29, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
The artist’s Instance series comprises singular units that are networked together into a larger, orchestrated whole. The singular works, in their digital and physical forms, become malleable synchronies wherein the possibility of order, however fleeting and subtle, appears visually across the units before gradually dissipating into a chaotic state. As particle systems, they give a sense that things are expanding and colliding, their compositional qualities alluding to antipodal forms associated with the cosmic and the atomic. For the artist, these allusions arise through the process—as he works with code, he observes their results as “echoes that occur by happenstance,” which he then captures. Ultimately, this places his work between the conscious expression of the artist and the liberation of the work into the realm of artificial life.
Instance 30, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
INQUIRE
Instance 30, 2019
SCULPTURE
LEDs, custom software, electrical hardware, steel
38-3/8″ × 38-3/8″ × 2-7/8″ (97.5 cm × 97.5 cm × 7.3 cm)
Unique
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