Rust never sleeps

Perusing the photographs of Alexandra Mooney, the featured artist for Ventura’s annual Harvest ArtWalk, means indulging in a smorgasbord of sensuality. A passion for texture and infatuation with color combine to stunning effect, creating an exhibit whose work often resembles abstract paintings more than digital images.

 “The Beauty of Decay,” currently on display at ArchiTexture Salon in Ventura, concerns itself with an intimate examination of materials not often associated with visual pleasure — splintered wood, rusted metal and flaking paint are all found in abundance. Mottled hues resembling an infrared heat map resolve themselves into the worn hood of a Chevy truck; a streak of orange against sky-blue metal conceals an oil drum; a delicate curl of white paint contracting into a bow uncovers the blistered siding of an abandoned horse trailer. But the crudeness of the subjects enhances, rather than detracts from, the satisfaction they offer. Liberated from an exploration of traditional beauty, the images become more complicated and compelling.

When pressed to define the subject of her photographs, Mooney grasps most readily at the word decay. But it’s clearly something broader — a theme she describes alternately as texture, imperfection and ripeness.

In her artist’s statement, Mooney writes, “In a society that is obsessed with youth, beauty, the relentless pursuit of perfection and the elimination of flaws, I have found that some of the most beautiful things in life are things that have progressed and aged.” That is a revolutionary perspective in a society where, she notes, high school-aged girls regularly receive breast implants as a graduation gift.

But for Mooney, who is the Ojai Valley School Creative Director, the pictures capture something deeper. A former drug addict and recovering bulimic, she has succeeded during the last 15 years in getting sober, earning her dream job and raising a son whose arrival, she says, “saved my life.” Along the way, she developed a profound appreciation for those “things that have survived — not just survived, but flourished — under bad circumstances.”

Sitting at a concrete table outside ArchiTexture Salon, Mooney pauses to run her fingers over the rebar reinforcing its edge.

“I think this is beautiful texture. Most people would think it’s damaged, it’s broken. I think that’s actually what makes it beautiful.” She smiles. “I guess that’s kind of like people.”

As a child growing up in an affluent family on the Upper East Side of New York City, Mooney says she was more drawn to “the dark side of things.” On family trips out of the city, she was fascinated when drives through Harlem revealed a world of smashed windows and broken rubble, a rougher landscape than the privileged neighborhood she inhabited. She fell in love with the work of New York photographer Ernst Haas, whose pictures of torn posters and crushed cans made her “drool.”

But as an adult, Mooney moved to Los Angeles, where she quickly became bored shooting actors’ and models’ portfolios. “Everything had to be beautiful and thin and perfect. I just burned out on the whole thing.”

She didn’t pick up a camera again until 20 years later, an event that coincided with her now 14- year-old son’s birth and her own sobriety. Her selection as this fall’s featured artist is the culmination of a long creative journey, Mooney says, that has had “its own rhythm, its own process of coming to fruition.”

Drawn to pattern and textures, she began photographing details that caught her eye with a small digital camera. Although she eventually purchased better equipment, as an artist who lacks the formal training of other photographers, Mooney says the approach to the exhibit was mainly intuitive.

“I don’t have an exact process . . .. I can always tell when something looks right because I get goosebumps.”

She received early encouragement from a colleague, who asked if she planned to sell her photos and from Erika Harding, ArchiTexture’s owner and a friend for whom Mooney had done design work. Harding calls the art, some of which depicts construction machinery in a field off the Ojai bike path, “approachable.”

“It’s very stimulating,” she says. “It’s unique and colorful.”

Though Mooney was delighted to learn she had been chosen as the featured artist for ArtWalk, a distinction offered to two Ventura County artists each year, she says there was “no attachment or expectation” when she entered the competition.

“My commitment to myself was to take pictures that I really loved . . .. Even if I wasn’t selected, I would love them just as much.”

That passion applies equally to Mooney’s choice of venue, which she had settled on even before learning of her selection. ArchiTexture Salon’s bohemian aesthetic acts as the yin to Mooney’s yang — its lime-green walls, brick interior and exposed rafters provide the perfect backdrop for her work, including the brushed metal frames, custom-designed from scrap metal by Ojai Muffler, that surround her larger pieces.

Harding scouted store locations for two years before settling on the current spot, which was a gutted former sign shop. Lucky enough to find a landlord who shared her vision, she worked with architects to redesign the interior while preserving its uniqueness: “We enhanced the beauty of the building rather than covering it up.”

That ethos, which is echoed in ArchiTexture’s approach to customer care, begins to explain why a salon isn’t quite so odd a location for an exhibit rejecting traditional notions of beauty as it first sounds. They believe in the natural approach.

“Most of us,” Harding says, “aren’t too keen on plastic surgery.”

They focus on treating customers like family and creating an atmosphere where everyone feels at home. The best compliment she ever received, she says, came from a customer who observed, “This place is like Cheers, where everyone knows your name.”

For Mooney, who will turn 50 in a few weeks, aging naturally means embracing the texture of our own bodies after a life well-lived.

“I have scars everywhere. I’ve been in horrible accidents. I have a foot that’s reconstructed — and yet I can still dance. I have kind of insane curly hair, and probably by magazine standards I could lose 20 pounds, but you know what? I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.”

And what about Mooney’s photographs, with their knife-scarred wood and rust-spreckled metal?

“There’s actually a ton of life in rust and decay. Rust is growing all the time.”   

Public reception: 3-5 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 18, at ArchiTexture Salon, (805) 641-3900, 25 S. Ventura Ave., Ventura. ArtWalk: 1-10 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 18, and 12-4 p.m., Sunday, Oct. 19. www.venturaartwalk.org.