The Legacy of Legacy Arts

Legacy Arts for eight years was a bastion in the Artists Village in Santa Ana. Margie Tabor Zuliani along with her artist membership were instrumental in the evolution of the Artists Village from a small group of artists who moved into the Santora Building to a thriving avante guarde arts community, that resulted in a building boom of Artists Lofts and Studios in Santa Ana. Ms. Zuliani Chaired several citywide art walks, in Santa Ana, inspired and funded through donation Site Specific Installations, Cultural Arts Exhibits, Children’s Art Exhibitions, established artists exhibitions, and emerging artist exhibitions. She hosted at Legacy Arts a landmark exhibit for the graduating class of Otis College of Design a Conceptual Exhibit called Delusionarium, one of three ongoing Exhibitions, the last one at CSUF Grand Central Arts Center. Ms Zuliani had the first Santa Ana Seven’s (crated in San Francisco) Robbie Miller performance art at Legacy Arts Gallery after many hours crated in a box, Robbie Miller was de-crated upon arrival at Legacy Arts Gallery. That art performance went on to the Laguna Art Museum’s OC SCENE Exhibit, where Robbie was crated in Mexico and moved (in his crate) from Mexico to the Laguna Art Museum. She brought together the now legendary collaboration between the art collection of Gene Isaacson and the art creation of contemporary artist Dennis Hare. She edited the last art exhibition catalogue for Companions in Clay of noted Art Collector, Gene Isaacson and the last essay written by Armand Labbe, respected curator of the Bowers Museum for thirty years.

Ms Zuliani has taught art classes, worked for, collaborated with or has been affiliated with every arts organization in Orange County for the past ten years. Even after closing Legacy Arts Gallery in Santa Ana in November of 2004 due to five months of flooding in her gallery she has continued to be at the forefront of arts creation, art teaching, art activism, art expression. Some of the arts organization she is associated with are Orange County Elementary Arts Academy, Santa Ana Unified School District, Bowers Museum of Cultural Arts, Arts Orange County, Disney Imagineer Collaboration, Capistrano Community Education Programs, Department of Education, 21st Century Access, City of Santa Ana Department of Park and Recreation, Orange County Dept. of Education. OC Fair Art Visual Arts Program, Bowers Museum, Chair of ArtWalk Santa Ana, Imagination Celebration, Loretta Sanchez’s Artistic Discovery Awards, Coordinator Young Americano Photography Contest, Events Chair Santa Ana Council of Arts and Culture. Orange Art Association, Orange County Fine Arts.

Ms Zuliani is a contemporary artist and has exhibited her work in Orange County for the past 10 years. She has several highly acclaimed series of work. The Appalachian Series which chronicles in drawings the first half of the twentieth century in the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia where she grew up. She explored the mountain woods and lived a Walton’s Mountain existence. These works are in part charcoal on paper and  pastel on paper that immortalize her family and children in the farming community she lived in. For example one work on paper called At The Bus Stop depicts a large group of children many of whom are her brothers and sister (she comes from a family of twelve) assembled to catch the bus on a chilly morning in winter. Another work is of young lovers now celebrating their 65th anniversary this year but were young lovers of eighteen at the time sitting on a porch of a house that no longer exists because it has long since burned to the ground.

The next series is a series called Bird On A Wire, it is really autobiographical. A single bird alone in a vast sky with its beak wide open as if in a scream of outrage and demanding to be heard. the other series is called Afffected, this series of work is in acrylic on Canvas.Images of people showing extreme emotion after a tragedy or event that are demonstrating great emotion. For example a group of children grieving at the funeral of a young friend lost in Bosnian war. Another image of a young girl grieving for her boyfriend who was murdered for steeling a pumpkin. Profoundly touching an image of a infant entitled The Untouchable, a baby left under a bridge to die alone in India who rests in the arms of a caretaker who is now left with a furrowed brow and scares on her soul for all time.

Ms Zuliani continues as the Editor-in-Chief of ART FORUM the a twenty eight year old Speaker Series at Santa Ana College for the past seven years founded by the late Professor Gene Isaacson. This series, the only college lecture series of its kind in Orange County brings to the community noted artists and architects to discuss contemporary issues in art and architecture. This spring semester has highlighted contemporary artists from Los Angeles encouraged to come to Orange County by David DiMichele the Director of ART FORUM.

It was Ms Zuliani’s contribution to the arts community and the larger community that has garnered her many awards notably from Orange County Administrators, Golden Orange Award, OC 4th District PTA Community Service Award, Community Building Award Honorable Mention from the City Santa Ana, Certificate of Recognition, California State Assembly, Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition United States Congress, Certificate of Recognition, California State Senate, California Arts Educations Award.

What will the future bring for legacy Arts in Garden Grove? Legacy Arts started on Main Street in the early 90s in the Dolls Exquisite Shop, that closed a year after Ms Zuliani joined. A short time later Ms Zuliani with the encouragement and support of Santa Ana College opened Legacy Arts in the Artists Village.

Here we are 2007, the first exhibit at Legacy Arts Gallery Studio and Gallery for 2007 brings to the art world the virtually unseen POP art of Mark Leysen, who is a noted abstract artist, who has exhibited widely for many years in Southern California. This unique exhibition of POP retro-imagery The Past Picture Show celebrates the Historic Main Street in Garden Grove, where Legacy has found its new home. It pays tribute to the Azteca Restaurant’s Elvis Theme, the Antique Car Show and a whole culture of retro-mania in the air and in this wonderful community where Ms Zuliani has lived for 25 years. We can’t wait to see what will come next. Her four children graduated from Garden Grove High School. She was a member of the Crystal Cathedral for many years but now has found a new home at the First Baptists Church of Garden Grove, which is celebrating its 110th anniversary this year in Garden Grove. “It really feels like I have come home to Garden Grove, Legacy Arts has come home to Garden Grove, it was here all along just waiting for me.”