Professor deSoto's 'Paranirvana' Featured in Solo Exhibition

NOOZHAWK (SANTA BARBARA) -- Lewis deSoto’s multimedia works are informed by the artist’s long-standing interest in anthropology, history, mythology and religion, all of which are engaged in the artist’s forthcoming solo exhibition at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, an installation featuring his monumental scale, inflatable sculpture, “Paranirvana (Self-Portrait)” (1999 – 2015). Inspired by the 12th-century Buddha at Gal Vihara in Sri Lanka and conceived in the wake of his father’s death, deSoto’s inflated sculpture serves as not only a representation of universal life, death and supreme consciousness but also a self-portrait. He has been a professor in the School of Art at San Francisco State University since 1988. His recent book, “EMPIRE,” features photographs and essays that investigate the landscape of the artist’s native birthplace in Southern California.