The room is quiet except for the soft shuffle of the old projectors sliding image after image onto the pale walls. The is a slow realization, however, as you slowly move around the gallery, that from Al’s Grand Hotel, to the movies with their headsets, and the ice slowly melting in one corner, there are sounds everywhere. A whisper of a past life comes out of these interesting and conceptual art pieces from California circa 1970. 

Currently featured at the Bronx Museum of Art, this show, State of Mind: New California Art, contains the work of 60 artists from the late 1960s to the mid 1970s when many flooded into California for new inspiration and experiences. The wide range of topic, genre, and media make this show particularly interesting. Walking through the rooms allows the viewer to imagine processes, and take in the ideas and messages of these works. “Field Piece,” by Barbra T. Smith, which features large plastic tubes which light up in reaction to people walking around them is a fun experience that challenges the idea of the delicacy of a piece of art and the boundaries of interaction and preservation.

State of Mind: New California is a great free art show at the Bronx Arts Museum that gives insight to the minds of and talent of the fearless and creative artists who paved the way for years after.