Adapta Project Translates to Transform Local Art Scene

"What do you think about this?" asks the young, twenty-something brunette, as she stands back to survey her work.

"That looks really good," replies her compatriot as he hands over another part to the developing multicolored puzzle.

With a curator's eye and an artist's attention to detail, the small hand-painted squares take on a new life, as Kinsee Morlan forms a creation of her own along the south wall of Cream, a chic coffee shop tucked away in the quaint neighborhood of University Heights.

Jorge Tellaeche also contributed vibrant pieces to the growing gallery for the most recent Adapta Project event, Sezio Vs. Adapta: Round Three, making an intricate and inviting display out of the otherwise bare Cream wall.

Though Kinsee continued her tedious work of positioning, stapling, hanging and surveying, Jorge found a little time to sit and gab with me about their ever-evolving communal art project, erupting straight from the akin streets of San Diego, Tijuana and beyond. Enjoying a moment's rest and a sip from a bottle of Newcastle, Jorge, with his contagiously passionate energy, regales me with Adapta's simple, but subterranean beginnings.

Adapta Vision

Like many successful revolutions, Adapta was set in motion by a couple of young people who got together and started talking. With comparable ideas and innovative attitudes about art, space and the oscillation of life, particularly between San Diego and our close brethren city of Tijuana, Kinsee and Jorge decided not to create an art scene, but to plant the seed for an "art scene" that would create itself.

"We're so used to the concept that art belongs in this white box and we want to stay away from these rules," explains Jorge. "[The idea] is that a place is a piece of art, music is a piece of art and interaction is a piece of art."

The recent "Adapta Vs. Sezio" art-off at Cream, which Kinsee and Jorge industriously prepared for, featured a three-round fine art installation within the same space. Adapta Project's events continue to be embryonic, as the music, the artistic pieces and the spaces are forever changing.

Adapta Resume

Adapta's "Army of Icons," a gallery that took place at The New Children's Museum San Diego, featured video installations as well as fine art from some well-known artists like Andy Howell, who exhibited two portraits of street people. The cleverly titled "Subject and Thrones" art gallery that Adapta hosted in November of 2007 at the Paul Basil Studio and The Guild showcased chairs designed by renowned architects who took a little time out of their hectic schedules to participate.

Highly expensive chairs and original pieces by notorious artists, however, are harder to take home these days, given the condition of our recent economic recession. For 2009, Jorge hopes to create more street art, video and sculpture exhibits where the art featured can be functional, as Adapta's events are not limited to an exclusive demographic. As far as audience goes, Jorge would just like to see "anybody that is really interested in seeing art."

Adapta Range

Gallery spaces, first and foremost, are chosen just as exceptionally as the music. The medium and the art have ranged from warehouses, as in Adapta's first show at the Buzz Clothing Warehouse in San Diego, where they literally "just nailed art work on the old wood" - to more recently: "A Room of One's Own," which was showcased at a private luxury estate in Tijuana.

The title of the recent event at Cream, "Adapta Vs. Sezio," though it boasts "competition" is uncomplicated. "When we're in San Diego we're seen as a TJ project. And in TJ, we're seen as a San Diego project," says Tellaeche with a smile. Sezio, which is a Bay Area-to-Southern California based project, might be the contender for San Diego, and Adapta for TJ; but then again - does it really matter? Perhaps that's the point.

The reason for the changing space as a local trans-national blend is simple. "[San Diego and Tijuana] have a mix of exchange," says Tellaeche. "We want to break away from the imaginary lines." Representative of these ideals, both Jorge and Kinsee live in the same building in Tijauana. Both make the trek from TJ to San Diego several times a week.

Adapta Project

Kinsee Morlan, who is the art editor at San Diego CityBeat, is white, and is still learning Spanish. Jorge Tellaeche, a freelance graphic designer who was born in Mexico City, was raised cross-culturally in Mexico and San Diego.

The Adapta Project, though it encompasses both San Diego and Tijuana art and artists, reflects the everyday lives of its originators, breaking through the American vision of "The Border," which represents the political and social barriers that plague not only the U.S. and Mexico, but across the globe. "I don't feel like I'm limited to TJ's problems," says Jorge. "The world's problems are our problems."