SF State’s Fine Arts Gallery is bringing the past to the present by using the ancient art of calligraphy to express cultural and political viewpoints.

The California Calligraphy Summit will showcase the work of 12 different artists from different ethnic backgrounds, which are reflected in their works, who either grew up or live in the Bay Area, one of whom is an SF State alumnus. The exhibition, which opens on Sept. 23 and runs until Oct. 10, 2006, focuses on the diversity of current world issues.

“One of the issues in the exhibition, which is about calligraphy and its relationship to contemporary art, is that many of the calligraphy traditions that are represented are very international,” Mark Johnson, gallery director and art professor, said.

The opening reception on Saturday, Sept. 23, from 2 to 4 p.m., will include discussions with one of the featured artists, Wosene Worke Kosrof, and art historian curator Lizzetta Lefalle Collins.

“We’re going to have special guest speakers,” said the summit’s public relations coordinator and art history major, Stefan Oehme. “It’s a privilege to have the artists coming to our campus.”

The Exhibition Design class is responsible for coordinating the summit, which began with the idea for a contemporary calligraphy exhibition in 1999 by former graduate student and featured artist, Faye Zhang.

Although the gallery’s main focus is on student shows, one of which is held each semester, it also presents an exhibition of professional work as an opportunity to think about art in the professional artists’ community, its relationship to contemporary culture, and its relationship to teaching and learning at SF State, according to Johnson.

“We all felt it was time for the calligraphy show, and the reason for that is two-fold,” he said. “Number one is that as the world becomes increasingly technological, it’s nice to see things made by hand. And in addition, the exhibition is something that touches upon world politics.”

Calligraphy is one of the oldest artistic traditions, according to calligraphy and Chinese character professor, Chris Wen-Chao Li.

“The origins of Chinese calligraphy can be traced back to 500 to 1,000 B.C., when characters were first etched into bone,” he said.

But calligraphy is not solely Chinese or Japanese characters. The artists featured in the summit come from various cultural backgrounds, including Arabic, Filipino, and Ethiopian.

“Western art history is so dominant in America, but we in California have a different perspective,” Johnson said.

“This show is largely Asian-American, but not just East Asian, because there is an Iranian-American artist, who attended SF State, and another who works out of an Istanbul-ese tradition.”

According to Johnson, each piece tells a story. For instance, a piece by Stella Lai, a graduate of the California College of the Arts in San Francisco, is titled “100 Cunts,” and reflects the traditional Chinese method of repetitiously painting characters meaning a single word.

One of the pieces by Iranian artist Ala Ebtekar shows prayer texts written in calligraphy overlapped with icons of wayward airplanes. When the piece is viewed at a slight distance, the shape of the prayer text resembles buildings.

Filipino artist John McKenzie created a piece of sentences reading “War is ugly,” “War is wicked,” and “War is evil.”

“There’s a whole bunch of international issues that are involved,” Johnson said. “So it’s a little worldview at SF State.”