When people say that their bathrooms are sanctuaries, they are attesting to the vast potential these spaces offer us in our compartmental lives. While I have found a few bathrooms here on campus that I go out of my way to visit regularly, none can compare to the concept of the personal bathroom. Pomona Art Colony's "Looky Loo: Tour de le Toilettes" was an ode to bathrooms, as well as an art show. The show was a benefit for the DA Center for the Arts; the shops, restaurants, and studios of Pomona's art colony (located at Garey and Second Street) invited me to inspect their "sanctuaries" Sunday afternoon. The artist became host, the viewer his or her guest. It's difficult and awkward to critique what would aptly be called "sanctuary art," but some bathrooms really had it going on.

The artists' studios had the best bathrooms: they went beyond the driving force of "sanctuary" and really created their own interpretation of the bathroom space, or ignored interpretation altogether and put up a mini-show in the bathroom-this indifference seemed to comment on bathrooms through its deliberate treatment of ignoring "the bathroom" in the bathroom.

I lingered the longest in John Jenson's busy bathroom in the DA titled "Postmodern settings for human waste depositories"-caution tape surrounded this sign. Nice. I could tell John was a cool guy; he was listening to Portishead, and he introduced me to his wife and kids. There was a struggle going on in his bathroom. One wall was industrial with large gestural figures, facing a completely collaged wall. Caution tape was strewn over the functional parts of the bathroom (the shower, the toilet, and the sink), and "I had to" shut the door to escape the natural lighting and then turn off the lights-(which were made out of colored bottles)-to "get the other effect." Stars glowed on the floor, Portishead cooed "wandering stars… the blackness the darkness forever," I emerged to tell John how weird that was. He liked me, and I got to see his daughter's hip room.

The first floor's bathroom took me to heaven, or just on top of clouds - take your pick. Clouds covered the toilet seat cover box, leaving no mural inch uncovered, the floor and ceiling were covered with clouds as well, and the artist Max Prothro placed a large silver (like silver-lining) spiral (like the one leading out of munchkin land in MGM's The Wizard of Oz) on the floor. The spiral curved downward, sandwiching me in a heaven with a top and bottom. I've seen a lot of clouds-on-walls motifs, but Prothro's work as "sanctuary art" placed the bathroom's guest in between frothy cumulus clouds.

So, up until this point, the experience of being a guest in others' bathrooms was a solitary one; an important part of the ritual was closing the door and being alone. So, bathroom-checking-out is also a secretive, guilty pleasure. I realized more than ever the importance of bathroom etiquette-the guest is judged onhis/her time spent in the bathroom, and their reactions upon leaving. It's all very personal. In the Cuttress gallery, my space was significantly invaded by two svelte naked mannequins with ornate masks. As they were painted surreal females, I felt like an awkward Tom Cruise in Eyes Wide Shut. The masks softened the harshness of their presence. One was positioned on the toilet, the other standing statuesque in a quasi-Venus de Milo/post-shower reverie. They seemed to be enjoying the bathroom as if they were guests, simply basking (here, shitting can be a type of basking) in the glow of the photographs of other beautiful yet real women.

Several bathrooms in Second Street shops were simply displays of collections, enmeshed in the theme of having a theme. True collectors ruefully overachieved their bathroom's theme, and they like to show their collections. The guilty pleasure was theirs, making me feel less intrusive. The owner of the Crystal Cauldron shop-specializing in incense, lots and lots of incense-created a virtual fairy land: think a bark and rose petal covered floor with a ring of mushrooms, a crystal ball, lots of fairies, and, oh, some incense. She wanted to win, but there were no prizes Sunday; I told her it was wonderful.

I think that it is important for a piece in a toilette tour to not avoid the topic at hand-the toilette, the idea behind the idea of sanctuary which comes, literally, from relief. Collections don't necessarily achieve this. In the La Bomba vintage clothing store, clothes and shoes were placed about the bathroom, no surprise, with a jarring and anomalous skeleton hand sticking out over the toilet. So, the bathroom can be a frightening place-think Psycho, What Lies Beneath, etc. Out of a desire not to be boring, one viable culturally-sanctioned outlet a host has is to frighten his guests: think hate/love, nearness/farness, and the basic human lust for haunted-house-baggage.

So, there really is a thriving community of artists in Pomona; I've been in their bathrooms. The DA center regularly holds visual and performance arts events, and they offer internship programs through the Pomona College and Claremont Graduate School Art Departments. For more information call (909) 397-9716.