An art show for the mind

By Eduardo Landa
Staff Writer

“Flesh and Stone, A Conversation” opened on Sept. 7 in the Liberal Cultural Arts Center, Room LIB-1940, at Cal State Dominguez Hills.
The 67-picture photography exhibit will run through Dec. 22.
The featured images were taken by photographers Scot Sothern and Andy Romanoff, each of whom have their own distinct styles.
Sothern’s photography focuses on capturing life on the streets while Romanoff focuses on culture, religion and art.
Despite their different styles, Romanoff said there was no hesitation in working together.
“They were either going to work or they weren’t,” Romanoff said.
After being friends for some time, the two artists spent a year and half working on getting the exhibit produced. Once they put their work together, they felt their pictures blended well.
The photographs cover many aspects of the streets of Los Angeles and other locations, as well as different cultural and religious images.
One photograph that stands out: an elderly man standing naked in the middle of a beach in Yugoslavia.
“It elicits the most response from people,” Sothern said.
Each pair of pictures in the exhibition is connected, despite the different styles of the photographers.
“We felt these images are emotionally linked,” Romanoff said.
This exhibit is the artists’ first university show. They said that they feel there is something special to exhibiting for students, as opposed to showing in a private gallery.
Sothern wants students to leave the exhibit and think about the different people in the pictures and the stories they tell.
“I want students to think about them and find things I couldn’t find,” Sothern said.