The CJM Blog

In summer 2014, one of CJM Chief Curator Renny Pritikin ’s first assignments was to liven up The Museum’s lobby. He invited Sacramento-based artist, Dave Lane , to create an installation. The CJM’s first major commissioned art work, Lamp of the Covenant is ninety feet long and weighs 12,000 pounds. Here, Pritikin talks with Daryl Carr, Director of Marketing, about why he chose the artist and why the work is a good fit for The Museum. Daryl Carr (DC): How did you meet David Lane? Renny Pritikin (RP) : I was hired in 2004 to be the director of the Nelson Gallery at UC Davis. I didn't know anyone in the area except an old colleague, Chris Daubert who teaches at Sacramento City College and runs the Kondos Gallery there. He's a great guy—one of these people who knows everyone. Chris said, "If there's one person in town you have to meet, it's Dave Lane. I have a show of his up now.” And so I made a trip to Sacramento to see his exhibition. It ...

Renny Pritikin has been a leading figure in the Bay Area arts community for decades, as Co-director of the historic New Langton Arts, Chief Curator of Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and Director of the Nelson Gallery and Fine Arts Collection at the University of California, Davis. We interviewed him to see how he is approaching this next phase of his career. What interested you about working here at The CJM? My whole career has been about expanding the boundaries of what's permissible and allowed to enter into the world of contemporary art. I said the other day to the Board [of Directors] that it feels at this point like a cri de coeur , a “cry from the heart” for inclusion and expansion of what's possible. The earliest part of my career was spent working at New Langton Arts for experimental art to be taken seriously and then at Yerba Buena [Center for the Arts] it was for the identity movement, people of various heritages, gays and lesbians, political artists, experime...