If I am your light I am also your darkness by Victoria Wagner

What makes me truly happy?

There are a few things that put me in a state of reverence, gratitude and awe…and I suppose that is happiness. 

Connection. Being surrounded by friends and family, sharing food, drink and stories,  on a warm summer evening in the yard or near a body of water. 

Music. That perfect moment when two voices come together to harmonize, creating an entirely new tone. It washes over me like warm water. 

Making. Getting lost in the process, like in a trance, intuitive movements that feel almost like a dance. Could be painting or sanding or baking or singing. I love getting lost and then waking to something new. 

Short Bio

Victoria Wagner, who migrated at eighteen from the Nevada desert to Northern California, contrasts nature and industry in her gem-like sculptures, which are hand-planed from fallen coastal trees and painted with oils. Wagner also addresses this dichotomy in her installations and paintings, which explore transitions of abstracted sound and light from her surroundings. Wagner's work is physically in tune with her local landscape-she harvests the wood rocks in and around her home of Occidental, CA. Her paintings are inspired by the sun, sound, and vibrational pull of the forest while also commenting on the loss of personal reflection and direct experience in the mechanical age as natural resources are diminished by collective inaction. Wagner creates a psychedelic experience that reflects the landscape of Northern California, but also announces its darker and less romantic side.
-Heather Marx, curator

Victoria’s paintings, sculptures and murals have been exhibited and collected internationally. Recently, her work has been featured at Sources Unlimited-Desio + Giorgetti Showroom, Mumbai, Berkeley Art Center, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, CA, Angela Meleca, Columbus, OH, Dose Projects, Brooklyn, NY, Sarah Shepard Gallery, Larkspur, CA, Art Works, Cedar City, UT, Bedford Gallery, Walnut Creek, CA and Alfa Gallery, Miami, FL. 

Victoria has taught, advised and coordinated in multiple programs at California College of the Arts since the Fall of 2001. She loves curricular conversation and development that fosters community and defeats hierarchies that favor outdated models of exchanging and learning.  Her recent book of memoirist short stories, Boughs of Our Form, was published in 2015. 

 Victoria Wagner is represented in California by by Maybaum Gallery