September 17 – October 15, 2016 A public exhibition of works from the private collection of Fabio Cei, including Creative Growth artists George Wilson and Donald Mitchell, is on view at the Casale Monferrato Castle.
For information about the location of this exhibition, click here.
Castle of Monferrato Piazza Castello, Casale Monferrato, Italy Tel. 0142.444.329
September 14 – October 1, 2016 RECEPTION: Saturday, September 17, 6-8pm CLOSING RECEPTION: Saturday, October 1, 8-11pm
After Pop Life is an exhibition and event series inspired by the late musical genius and cultural force of Prince, whose untimely passing earlier this year marked a moment of tremendous loss, but also appreciation of his gifts to culture. With works by more than thirty contemporary artists, the exhibition honors the pervasiveness of Prince’s legacy and how his prodigious musical output and indelible personal style seem more alive than ever. The project will activate two galleries in the Minnesota Street Project complex with artworks that are at once thoughtful, playful, and of course, sexy.
Organized by critic and curator Glen Helfand, the exhibition pays tribute to Prince as a multitalented figure who not only wrote, recorded and performed his music, but also made films, fostered and supported other artists, designed clothes, and was a generous, humble philanthropist, particularly in the Bay Area. Less a memorial than a tribute to how many lives Prince touched, how many dance floors he activated, and how his work provided the soundtrack to meaningful moments in so many lives, the show probes how certain pop stars seep deeply into our consciousness—we each own him in our own way. Those who revere Prince, in a sense, appropriate an aspect of The Artist. The exhibition celebrates and considers his actions and ideas of an astoundingly generous performer, who was also presciently, steadfastly in control of the ownership of his music and visual style.
“Of course the music is the starting point,” says Helfand. “The passion felt for Prince, not to mention his highly defined visual aesthetic—and all that purple—make him such a compelling, inspiring figure. His presence brings up so many issues, big topics like sexuality, race, and belief, but his work also offers such unfettered pleasure. Prince brings so many people together. I was so struck to find out just the incredible range of artists who were so deeply affected by his passing.”
More than thirty artists will exhibit drawing, painting, photography, sculpture, installation and a karaoke project that riff on all things Prince. The art will express deep familiarity of specific songs, album covers, mediated moments, pure adoration and the less tangible aspects of the Prince aura. The gallery complex’s media room will be transformed into a karaoke lounge within which visitors can croon their favorite Prince hits to existing and artist-made videos during gallery hours.
Participating artists include: Sadie Barnette, Paulina Bercynski, Libby Black, Rebeca Bollinger, Bonanza, Luke Butler, Maria Guzman Capron, Sofia Cordova, Veronica de Jesus, Didi Dunphy, Marco Garcia, James Gobel, Daniel Green, Rachel Harrison, Cliff Hengst, Scott Hewicker, David Huffman, Geoff Kaplan and Yisha Dai: General Working Group, Kevin Killian, Laura Hyunjhee Kim, Jason Lazarus, Rodney McMillian, Kori Newkirk, Adam Novak, Jennie Ottinger, Erika Ranee, Rex Ray, Yukari Sakura, William Scott, Tamra Seal, Jenny Sharaf, Wayne Smith, Sarah Thibault, Lava Thomas, Gina Tuzzi, Anne Walsh, Jenifer Wofford, Marilyn Wong and others.
The exhibition is a follow-up to a legendary 1993 exhibition titled Pop Life, also organized by Helfand, which was staged at San Francisco’s New Langton Arts on the eve of Prince’s San Francisco concerts of that year. The outpouring of interest and emotion that came after Prince’s death in April was an inspiration to revisit and update the project. After Pop Life includes artists from the original exhibition including Rex Ray, Cliff Hengst, Scott Hewicker, and Wayne Smith. A 32-page exhibition publication, designed by General Working Group, will be produced for the show and will feature original digital collage and essays by Helfand.
After Pop Life will also highlight Prince’s quiet philanthropy. Prince helped to launch the Oakland-based #YesWeCode initiative dedicated to transforming the talent pipeline to increase opportunity in the tech sector.
For more information on #YesWeCode and Prince’s support, visit here. For exhibition information, visit here.
EVENTS
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 17TH, 5PM-8PM Reception and literary evening featuring a stage reading of noted San Francisco writer Kevin Killian’s Poet’s Theater play, Life After Prince, written in 1993 and updated this year, which wittily follows a string of female Prince protégés to the unemployment office. Reception to follow from 6-8 p.m.
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 1ST, 8PM-11PM A GLAM SLAM closing event on October 1st will feature "23 Positions in a One Night Stand," a BNNZA fashion performance organized by Bonanza in collaboration with Marco Garcia and Maria Capron. Inspired by Prince’s notorious 1991 MTV Music Awards performance of the song Gett Off, the show will feature Prince-inspired looks, fierce posturing and durational performances that will activate and accent a full-on dance party in the Minnesota Street Project Atrium. Proceeds from this closing event will support #YesWeCode. Purchase tickets here.
1275 MINNESOTA ST / GALLERY 104 + MEDIA GALLERY San Francisco, CA 94107 415.243.0825 - Tues-Sat 11am-6pm minnesotastreetproject.com
The Beautiful Story Of An Artist With Down Syndrome Who Never Spoke A Word: Judith Scott’s twin sister Joyce tells her story. by Priscilla Frank September 6, 2016
Judith Scott’s sculptures look like oversized cocoons or nests. They begin with regular objects ― a chair, a wire hanger, an umbrella, or even a shopping cart ― which are swallowed up whole by thread, yarn, cloth and twine, swathed as frenetically as a spider mummifies its prey.
The resulting pieces are tightly wound bundles of texture, color and shape ― abstract and yet so intensely corporeal in their presence and power. They suggest an alternate way of seeing the world, not based on knowing but on touching, taking, loving, nurturing and eating whole. Like a wildly wrapped package, the sculptures seem to possess some secret or meaning that can’t be accessed, save for an energy that radiates outward; the mysterious comfort of knowing that something is truly unknowable.
Judith and Joyce Scott were born on May 1, 1943, in Columbus, Ohio. They were fraternal twins. Judith, however, carried the extra chromosome of Down Syndrome and couldn’t communicate verbally. Only later, when Judith was in her 30s, was she properly diagnosed as deaf. “There are no words, but we need none,” Joyce wrote in her memoir Entwined, which tells the confounding story of her and Judith’s life together. “What we love is the comfort of sitting with our bodies near enough to touch.”
As a kid, Joyce and Judith were wrapped up in their own secret world, full of backyard adventures and made-up rituals whose rules were never said out loud. In an interview with The Huffington Post, Joyce explained that during her youth, she wasn’t aware that Judith had a mental disability, or even that she was, in some way, different.
“She was just Judy to me,” Joyce said. “I didn’t think of her as different at all. As we got older, I started realizing that people in the neighborhood treated her differently. That was my first thought, that people treated her badly.”
When she was 7 years old, Joyce awoke one morning to find Judy gone. Her parents had sent Judy to a state institution, convinced she had no prospects for ever living a conventional, independent life. Undiagnosed as deaf, Judy was assumed to be far more developmentally disabled than she was ― “uneducable.” So she was removed from her home in the middle of the night, rarely to be seen or spoken of by her family again. “It was a different time,” Joyce said with a sigh.
When Joyce went with her parents to visit her sister, she was horrified at the conditions she encountered at the state institution. “I’d find rooms full of children,” she wrote, “children with no shoes, sometimes with no clothes. Some of them are on chairs and benches, but mostly they are lying on mats on the floor, some with their eyes rolling, their bodies twisted and twitching.”
In Entwined, Joyce chronicles in vivid detail her memories entering adolescence without Judith. “I worry that Judy might be forgotten completely if I don’t remember her,” she writes. “Loving Judy and missing Judy feel almost like the same thing.” Through her writing, Joyce ensures that her sister’s painful and remarkable story will not be forgotten, ever.
Joyce recounts the details of her early life with startling accuracy, the kind that makes you question your ability to render your own life story with any sort of coherence or verisimilitude. “I just have a really good memory,” she explained over the phone. “Because Judy and I lived in such an intense physical, sensate world, things were kind of burned into my being much more strongly than if I spent a lot of time with other kids.”
As young adults, the Scott sisters continued living their separate lives. Their father passed away. Joyce got pregnant while in college and gave the child up for adoption. Eventually, while speaking on the phone with Judy’s social worker, Joyce learned that her sister was deaf.
“Judy living in a world without sound,” Joyce wrote. “And now I understand: our connection, how important it was, how together we felt each piece of our world, how she tasted her world and seemed to breathe in its colors and shapes, how we carefully observed and delicately touched everything as we felt our way through each day.”
Not long after that realization, Joyce and Judy were reunited, permanently, when Joyce became Judy’s legal guardian in 1986. Now married and a mother of two, Joyce brought Judith into her Berkeley, California, home. Although Judith had never displayed much interest in art before, Joyce decided to enroll her in a program called Creative Growth in Oakland, a space for adult artists with developmental disabilities.
From the minute Joyce entered the space, she could sense its singular energy, founded upon the urge to create without expectation, hesitation or ego. “Everything radiates its own beauty and an aliveness that seeks no approval, only celebrates itself,” she wrote. Judith tried out various media introduced to her by the staff ― drawing, painting, clay and wood sculpture ― but expressed interest in none.
One day in 1987, however, fiber artist Sylvia Seventy taught a lecture at Creative Growth, and Judith began to weave. She started by scavenging random, everyday objects, anything she could get her hands on. “She once grabbed someone’s wedding ring, and my ex-husband’s paycheck, things like that,” Joyce said. The studio would let her use nearly anything she could grab ― the wedding ring, however, went back to its owner. And then Judith would weave layer upon layer of strings and threads and paper towels if nothing else was available, all around the core object, allowing various patterns to emerge and dissipate.
“The first piece of Judy’s work I see is a twinlike form tied with tender care,” Joyce writes. “I immediately understand that she knows us as twins, together, two bodies joined as one. And I weep.” From then on, Judith’s appetite for art-making was insatiable. She worked for eight hours a day, engulfing broomsticks, beads, and broken furniture in webs of colored string. In lieu of words, Judith expressed herself through her radiant hulks of stuff and string, bizarre musical instruments whose sound couldn’t be heard. Along with her visual language, Judith spoke through dramatic gestures, colorful scarves, and pantomimed kisses, which she would generously bestow on her completed sculptures as if they were her children.
Before long, Judith became recognized at Creative Growth and far beyond for her visionary talent and addictive personality. Her work has since been shown in museums and galleries around the world, including the Brooklyn Museum, Museum of Modern Art, the American Folk Art Museum and the American Visionary Art Museum.
In 2005, Judith passed away at 61 years old, quite suddenly. On a weekend trip with Joyce, while lying in bed alongside her sister, she simply stopped breathing. She had lived 49 years beyond her life expectancy, and spent nearly all of the final 18 making art, surrounded by loved ones, supporters and adoring fans. Before her final trip, Judith had just finished what would be her last sculpture, which, strangely, was all black. “It was so unusual she would create a piece with no color,” Joyce said. “Most of us who knew her thought it as a letting go of her life. I think she related to colors in the way all of us do. But who knows? We could not ask.”
This question is interwoven throughout Joyce’s book, repeated again and again in distinct yet familiar forms. Who was Judith Scott? Without words, can we ever know? How can a person who faced unknowable pain alone and in silence, respond only, unimaginably, with generosity, creativity and love? “Judy is a secret and who I am is a secret, even to myself,” Joyce writes.
Scott’s sculptures, themselves, are secrets, impenetrable heaps whose dazzling exteriors distract you from the reality that there’s something underneath. We will never know the thoughts that ran through Judith’s mind while she spent 23 years alone in state institutions, or the feelings that pulsed through her heart as she picked up a spool of yarn for the first time. But we can see her gestures, her facial expressions, the way her arms would fly through the air to properly nestle a chair in its fair share of tattered cloth. And perhaps that’s enough.
“Having Judy as a twin has been the most incredible gift of my life,” Joyce said. “The only time I felt a kind of absolute happiness and a sense of peace was in her presence.”
Joyce currently works as an advocate for people with disabilities, and is engaged in establishing a studio and workshop for artists with disabilities in the mountains of Bali, in Judith’s honor. “My strongest hope would be that there are places like Creative Growth everywhere and people who have been marginalized and excluded would be given the opportunity to find their voice,” she said.
September 10 – October 15, 2016 RECEPTION: Saturday, September 10, 6-8pm
Diane Rosenstein is pleased to announce Dan Miller: Click, a solo exhibition of paintings by the Oakland-based artist. This show will present both painted and typed works on paper created by Miller at the Creative Growth Art Center from 2010 - 2016. This is Dan Miller's first show at the gallery and in Los Angeles.
Dan Miller enfolds gesture and text in compositions that articulate an innate and pure language. His paintings (all works on paper) are a coalescence of line and memory that reveal then conceal the artist's elegant outlook. He immerses repeated words and symbolic motifs in a vigorous palette of acrylics, inks and graphite. Letters are drawn then overdrawn, evoking a pattern language.
Dan Miller (USA, b. 1961) has work in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC, and the Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive (BAM/PFA), Berkeley, CA. He had a solo exhibition at White Columns (2007), NYC and was included in group shows at BAM/PFA and ABCD, Paris, France.
Read the press release here.
DIANE ROSENSTEIN GALLERY 831 North Highland Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90038 1.323.462.2790- Tues - Sat 10am-6pm dianerosenstein.com
September 8, 2016 – October 20, 2016 PRESS IMAGES BELOW
Although black and white thinking can often be limited to two points of view, taking a closer look reveals that each one is actually made up of infinite shades of grey. Inspired by such fluid notions of opposites, Creative Growth Art Center invites you to discover works that revisit binaries as defined by formal aesthetics like black/white, rough/smooth, and graphic/painterly, as well as by the more topical political contrast between Republicans and Democrats in light of the approaching Presidential Election. Each juxtaposition, whether literal or political, challenges the human tendency to alienate the different and unfamiliar based on defining one extreme.
George Wilson presents a new series of stark ink drawings based on Communist propaganda posters while Ron Veasey illustrates a skeptical face in the presence of the Republican elephant symbol. Artists Dan Miller and Barry Regan reference opposites from a color wheel perspective—Dan using complimentary tones of orange and blue to compose his signature fine-lined drawings and Barry reversing his usual circle motif by drawing round outlines in white ink on black paper.
Nicole Storm’s double-sided works further the duality of painting when both sides are utilized to translate a vision, just as John Martin’s iconic ceramic fists point to a historical movement that sought to empower rather than isolate. Through polarities defined by the artists of Creative Growth, the viewer must evaluate if they are opposites at all or simply parts of a whole.
Designing the White On the ramp, Designing the White presents works made in a recent visiting artist workshop led by Min Gu on Chinese painting and calligraphy techniques. Exploring the diversity of mark making, Creative Growth artists have generated multiple iterations on Xuan (rice) paper, playing with black/white, dry/wet, and concentrated/diluted binaries.
Exhibition Opening: THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 8 MEMBERS’ PREVIEW: 11AM - 2PM MAIN EVENT: 5PM - 8PM LIVE FLAMENCO MUSIC BY DAVID PÁEZ BAR + SNACKS
September 3 – September 25, 2016 Opening Reception: September 3, 2016 – 6 to 8 pm
Outside—as in: out-of-doors, as in: not belonging to.
Outside is the fourth and final presentation in Karma’s 2016 summer season of landscape-fixated exhibitions in Amagansett. Outside has been curated by White Columns’ director Matthew Higgs and includes the work of more than thirty artists (of all persuasions.)
The ‘outside’ alluded to in the exhibition’s title is as much a physical place (i.e. the world around us) as it is a psychological state (as evidenced by the mercurial sensibilities of so-called ‘Outsider’ art.) It is in this liminal space—between what can be measured or depicted and that which remains unknowable—that Outside seeks to operate. The artists in Outside, of many generations, both conventionally and unconventionally trained, subscribe to no recognizable ideology or tendency. If Kippenberger had his ‘psychobuildings’, Outside has its ‘psychogeographies’ or perhaps more accurately its ‘psychotopographies’. Outside ultimately suggests that our sense of ‘place’—like our sense of ‘self’—remains elusive: a shape-shifting terrain, constantly in flux.
Participating artists: Etel Adnan, Aaron Birnbaum, Pearl Blauvelt, Robert Bordo, David Byrd, Brian Calvin, James Castle, Jane Corrigan, Andrew Cranston, Verne Dawson, Louis M. Eilshemius, Embah, Tom Fairs, Rocco Fama, Bruno del Favero, Jeff Funnell, Maureen Gallace, Pam Glick, Ray Hamilton, Daniel Heidkamp, John Hiltunen, Merlin James, Chris Johanson, Christopher Knowles, Nate Lowman, Bill Lynch, Dwight Mackintosh, Noel McKenna, Marlon Mullen, Annie Pearlman, Helen Rae, Aurie Ramirez, Jessi Reaves, Tyson Reeder, Adrianne Rubenstein, Sven Sachsalber, William Scott, Spencer Sweeney, Danny Thach, Wiliam Tyler, Matthew Wong, Joseph Yoakum
Matthew Higgs would like to thank all of the participating artists and their galleries for their enthusiasm, generosity and support. Thanks also to Brendan, Marie and the entire team at Karma, without whom this exhibition could not have happened.
Karma 249 MAIN STREET, AMAGANSETT, NY 11930 631.267.7728 - Mon—Sun, 11AM—7PM karmakarma.org
August 25 – September 25, 2016RECEPTION: Thursday, August 25, 6-8pm
Ampersand is pleased to present Franklin, A Word Nobody Ever Seems to Say, a solo exhibition of Cedric Johnson’s brightly colored and deeply imaginative works on paper and ceramic masks. Born in Corpus Christi, Texas in 1952, Johnson has been making art for over 25 years at Creative Growth Art Center in Oakland, California. Speaking of his own work, he simply says that it comes “straight up from my imagination.” Taking clues from his titles, it is evident that this imaginary world is at once rooted in the everyday and oddly fantastical. A dynamic line drawing of two blocky women, for instance, is titled Mother and Daughter, while Let’s Get Married features a trio of well-dressed, disproportionate figures. At the other extreme, we have The Creeper, whose multicolored, distorted face and toothy grin is certainly a bit creepy, whereas a series of abstractions titled The Creature is dependent on what you bring to the work and will likely shift each time you view it. Central to the exhibition are Johnson’s ceramic masks. Like his works on paper, the masks are made of cubistic parts and are finished with bold, glossy colors, bringing alive the world of his drawings in larger-than-life dimensions.
This is Cedric Johnson’s first solo exhibition. His work has been featured in group shows, among them Chromatic: 35 Colorful Years of Creative Growth, Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco and John Hiltunen +1, Gallery Paule Anglim, San Francisco, curated by Matthew Higgs.
Ampersand Gallery & Fine Books 2916 NE Alberta St., B, Portland, OR 97211 503.805.5458- Wed-Sat 12pm to 7pm, Sun 12pm to 5pm ampersandgallerypdx.com
Meet the Disabled Artists Creating a New Space for Talent in the Art World
At the Creative Growth Art Center, a professional studio for artists with physical and intellectual disabilities, men and women gather in a shared workspace filled with paint, ceramics, and endless opportunities for creativity and joy.
By Jonathan Parks-Ramage August 17, 2016
Wall Street, 1987. A group of executives convenes in a mile-high boardroom. The atmosphere is tense, filled with the conflicting ambitions of ruthless stockbrokers.
"Buy low, sell high," their CEO decrees.
Suddenly, a woman dressed as the Kool-Aid Man interrupts the proceedings.
"Who wants to buy some Kool-Aid?" she yells.
The room erupts into cheers. Businessmen sip Kool-Aid from champagne flutes as Whitney Houston's "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" blasts over the speakers. The Kool-Aid Woman lip-syncs to the song as the meeting descends into chaos.
This is not, of course, a scene from actual Wall Street history. It is taken from a surreal video short, titled Three Moments in the Life of the Kool-Aid Guy, by rising contemporary artist Susan Janow. Though Janow's CV reads like those of other emerging stars in today's marketplace—with major exhibitions in Paris, New York, and Berlin—her personal biography is markedly different than those of her peers. She did not study at Yale, the Rhode Island School of Design, or any of the country's top fine arts programs. Janow is developmentally disabled. She has spent the entirety of her professional career working at the Creative Growth Art Center, a professional studio for artists with physical and mental disabilities.
Janow's video is one of the first pieces I see upon visiting Creative Growth's headquarters in Oakland, California. It is on display in the center's gallery, which exhibits new media works from the center's artists. The gallery is connected to Creative Growth's studio space—a vast, open-plan workroom with lofted ceilings and large windows.
"Creative Growth is an amazing creative community of artists, volunteers, clients, staff... we're all pretty much equal here. That's a really unique environment when you look at other programs for people with disabilities. They have a voice here," says Becki Couch-Alvarado, the center's executive director, as we tour the studio. "I don't think there are many opportunities in their lives for them to have that voice, where they're the focus of attention in a positive way."
Approximately 90 artists are assembled here, divided into groups and sitting at huge, white worktables. Creative Growth is equipped with resources to work on projects in any medium: painting, drawing, ceramics, embroidery, woodwork, and video. Staff members assist the artists, providing them with materials or facilitating the use of a kiln or table saw. The philosophy of Creative Growth is that these artists are inherently gifted—and only need space and support to realize their visions.
"I think everybody has a creative impulse, right?" Couch-Alvarado says, motioning to the workroom. "If you give someone the opportunity to use that impulse, they will. That's what we're doing here... and everybody has something to say."
Creative Growth nurtures bold new voices, and the art world is listening with increased interest. In recent years, Creative Growth has seen its artists enter permanent collections of museums like the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the Smithsonian, and the American Folk Art Museum. The center's clients have exhibited in art fairs and galleries worldwide, entered into collaborations with major brands such as Marc Jacobs and Barneys New York, and are privately collected by celebrities including Lady Gaga and Michael Stipe.
I sit down with Janow during her lunch break, curious to meet the artist behind the Kool-Aid video. Janow brought her preferred meal today: a hot dog (no bun or condiments), two packets of red Jell-O, and fruit punch Kool-Aid. Janow, who is 36, commuted to Creative Growth today from her home in San Leandro, where she lives with her stepmother. This is a common reality for many of Creative Growth's artists: some are capable of living on their own, but others with more severe disabilities reside in supported living centers or with relatives. Janow sports glasses and a near-permanent smile. She is gregarious and outgoing, speaking in loud staccato bursts, punctuated by laughter.
Janow explains that the idea for the Kool-Aid video started because she simply loves Kool-Aid. "I'm a Kool-Aid drinker. I just came up with the thing. I said, 'I drink Kool-Aid, so... why the heck not do a Kool-Aid commercial?'" she says, attacking her hot dog with a plastic fork. Janow, a kinetic ball of energy, adds that she also loves Whitney Houston.
Apart from videos, Janow works with paint, wood, and ceramics, but drawing is her favorite medium.
Janow is also best known for her drawings: intricate geometric grids, rendered by hand in a stunning range of color. They have been exhibited at major art fairs—including Frieze, DDessin Paris Contemporary Drawing Fair, the Outsider Art Fair (in Paris and New York)—and will soon be featured in a large-scale installation in Anthropologie's Palo Alto store. Janow is successful enough to break out on her own but has no desire to leave Creative Growth; it is essential to her creative process and identity.
"I still come here because I love this place. I will not quit this place because I love it so much. This place is like home away from home number two. Once I got here, I was like, 'These are my people.' These are my people, and I'm sticking to it," Janow asserts.
This sentiment is shared by everyone I speak with at Creative Growth—both artists and staff. It was this unique environment that inspired Matt Dostal, now a ten-year employee, to first volunteer. "[When I first came here] I was completely moved by everything: the quality of art, the incredible artists—but also the sense of community," Dostal recalls. We speak in Creative Growth's woodworking area.
"We cultivate relationships that are part coworker, part friend, part family member. We spend more time with each other than most of our families. Many people with developmental disabilities are parked in front of the TV for the day, so this is an incredible social component for them," Dostal says.
"I found a calling I didn't know was out there."
Clearly, the program is a transformative experience for the artists, but it can be equally pivotal for the staff. "[Before Creative Growth] I studied art. But I was listless. I was working weird jobs," Dostal recalls. "This place grounded me... I found a calling I didn't know was out there. It's an incredible fusion of supporting an underserved and vulnerable population, coupled with intense creativity."
Dostal introduces me to John Hiltunen, another of Creative Growth's emerging stars. Hiltunen is 67, bald, and wears a plain T-shirt. Suspenders stretch across his stocky torso, holding up blue jeans. He sits at a table, working on a wood-mounted collage. He's manipulating a magazine cutout of a headless fashion model, gluing a dog face on her shoulders. The result is an absurdly chic Labrador puppy—sporting a sexy red jumper.
Hiltunen says he got the idea to do collage after a "special artist" visited Creative Growth a few years ago and the center's gallery displayed one of his collages. Dostal, observing our conversation, clarifies that it was noted collage artist Paul Butler.
Since then, Hiltunen has worked exclusively in collage. His work typically features comically composed animal/model mash-ups. These high-fashion non sequiturs have gained serious traction in the contemporary art market; Hiltunen's work has exhibited at prominent galleries like White Columns in New York and major contemporary art fairs such as Frieze and the New Art Dealers Alliance in Miami. Though his resume reads like that of a jet-setting art star, Hiltunen enjoys a much simpler lifestyle. Hiltunen first moved to the Bay Area from Texas to live at Serra Center, an independent and supported living center for adults with developmental disabilities.
"I've lived with [Serra Center] for the whole 39 years I've been [in the Bay Area]," Hiltunen explains. "First, they had a bunch of dormitories on a hill, and I lived there. But then I moved out, and... I've been living on my own for about 30 years. I'm still with the Serra Center. But I'm with the independent program."
Hiltuen lives with his wife, Carol, who also attends Creative Growth. They have been married for 29 years, and they met at Serra Center started coming to Creative Growth at the same time.
Hiltunen leads me to another table where he introduces me to his wife. She works on a sewing project as we chat about their relationship; she tells me that it's nice to be married to a fellow artist because it gives her more encouragement to do art.
Towards the end of our conversation, the room begins to stir as everyone migrates toward the lunchroom for today's big event: a meeting about the second issue of Creative Growth Magazine. Creative Growth artists are the magazine's sole contributors, and its publishing is a community effort. The first issue was carried in select galleries and bookstores in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The publication was the brainchild of volunteer/journalist Matt Haber and staff member Kathleen Henderson.
Haber and Henderson stand in front of the lunchroom as artists find seats for the meeting. The room buzzes with anticipation; the theme for the second magazine is about to be announced.
"We're here to discuss the next issue... and we have a theme: It's love!" Henderson announces.
There is a thunderous round of applause for love.
"Let's hear it for love!" Haber yells out.
"So, all kinds of love: brotherly love, sisterly love, carnal love, love of the vending machine," Henderson elaborates.
"What about love of animals?" asks an artist named Lisa, petting a raccoon stuffed animal.
"Yes, love of animals," Haber encourages.
"What else do we want to do in this magazine? What are some of your ideas?" Henderson asks.
The 90 or so artists begin shouting out topics for the love issue. Their ideas come rapid-fire as Haber takes notes: pets, couples, cruises, friendship, space, bed, fashion, teachers, horoscopes, Pokémon, God, and taco grease.
"I just want to say," Lisa pipes up, mid-brainstorm, "owning a dragon—I want an article about that in the magazine."
"About owning a dragon?" Henderson asks.
"Yeah, because when you own a dragon, you don't really know what you're getting yourself into," Lisa says, inspiring a wave of giggles.
"What about love of hot dogs?" Henderson asks. "I think there's someone at Creative Growth that really loves hot dogs..."
"That's gotta be me!" Janow shouts. The room breaks into knowing laughter.
"All right, we have a lot of good ideas. Who's excited for the next magazine?" Haber calls out. The room whoops and hollers.
The meeting adjourns. Everyone heads back to their workstations, chatting excitedly. The studio hums again with activity as artists dive into their projects.
I stay behind for a moment, perusing the previous issue of Creative Growth Magazine. In the back pages, I discover horoscopes written by the artists. The astrological predictions range from humorous ("Pisces: Be careful not to say anything racist at Fisherman's Wharf or you will have an accident.") to cryptic ("Libra: In 1 month, 3 Spanish models will come to America from Spain.") to blunt ("Virgo: You are never gonna change."). But it is the Aries forecast that resonates with me: "You will go on a trip to the happiest place on earth." Looking out at the workroom—brimming with creativity, joy, and life—it occurs to me that I already have.
Charting Experience: Four Artists with Developmental Disabilities Map Singular Visions By Sola Agustsson August 6, 2016
The process of creating art always involves transmitting one’s singular sensory experiences into a discrete vision. The Los Angeles exhibition Mapping Fictions brings together four contemporary artists who organize information and experience through text and images, charting popular culture, physical space, and personal knowledge in painstakingly detailed work. Andreana Donahue and Tim Ortiz of Disparate Minds curated the exhibition, which is now on view at The Good Luck Gallery, a space dedicated to self-taught artists. Disparate Minds is an organization that follows progressive art studios, described as “studio environments where adults with developmental disabilities can pursue and maintain lives/careers as artists.” Each of the artists in Mapping Fictions is neurologically or developmentally atypical, and works at a different progressive art studio.
Joe Zaldivar’s work reimagines screenshots from Southern California found on Google Street View. The snapshots are ephemeral, but his drawings of maps, buildings, and interiors reference specific local businesses. The titles and representations of these places are straightforward, pinpointing the moment in time quite factually. Yet, the drawings are subtly, humorously laced with cultural references. Bart and Homer Simpson, for example, turn up in The Coffee Roaster, 13567 Ventura Boulevard, Sherman Oaks, California, among other works.
Zaldivar’s YouTube channel has drawn over 2,000 followers, and lends insight into his particular vision. Recording directly from broadcast television, as well as VHS tapes he’s found at yard sales, Zaldivar pieces together seemingly isolated scenes. News segments, commercials, and movie clips from past and present blend together as white noise. But because he records them by hand, cam-style, the videos are a little shaky. It’s an idiosyncratic archive; inserting his presence into the documentation, Zaldivar hones in on recorded moments that are soon to be forgotten. His works highlight the markers of time, location, and pop culture as essential tools for processing information and charting our lives.
Daniel Green similarly turns his gaze on daytime television. His Days of Our Lives series structures personal events with the scheduling of popular soap operas. He intersperses the hourly schedules with illustrations of characters, logos, and personal commentary onto his mixed media on wood pieces, graphing them like TV Guides. The Sun (2010) reveals much about Green’s mapping of information by merging each December of the artist’s life with a television program from that time, reflecting on a universalized nostalgia for the cable television of our childhood. Now that we live in an era where television is as often streamed as it is broadcast at a set time, watching TV can be a less communally timed experience. But in the 1980s and 1990s, you had to be glued to a television to watch a show—and you could be sure thousands of other people were watching too.
Like Zaldivar, Green also combines pop culture iconography with the personal. In his portrait of the cast of Star Trek, for example, the artist infused facial features from his friends onto the television characters.
On the surface, many of these works and their organizational principles seem chaotic, yet there is a distinct order in the way each of the artists construct their works. Roger Swike draws his textual graphs intuitively at first, adding more deliberate details as he moves through the process. Later, he places them into color-categorized folders. Creating a lexicon of his own through numbers and pop culture references, he forms particular patterns in the pieces, which he later revisits to add further nuances to his own methods.
San-Francisco artist William Scott is interested in community-based organizing through activism and utopian philosophy. The exhibition includes some of the plans for Praise Frisco, the artist’s envisioning of a new city rising in the wake of a “cancelled” San Francisco, including a revitalization plan for his own socially marginalized area of Hunter’s Point. Ambitious and precise architectural drawings relay his idealist vision for the future.
All of the artists unlock ways of seeing the world through their work, specifically by incorporating text in their drawings and diagrams. Though we may not understand exactly how they view the world, through lists, architectural plans, maps, and pop culture symbols, we can concretely relate. List-making unifies in its inherent ability to convey how each person plans, schedules, and quantifies their existence—be it in the form of a daily routine or a list of goals. Pop cultural references bring together collective touchstones and experiences with the individual’s. And through maps and blueprints, a specific time and place can be mathematically pinned down. These methods of organizing and categorizing—list making, diagramming—give order and sense to all our lives. But the artists in Mapping Fictions show how these tools are not just personal, but communicative. They mediate their experiences of the past and dreams for the future in this public, yet intimate archive.
Sola Agustsson is a writer based in Los Angeles. She studied at UC Berkeley and has contributed to Bullett, Flaunt, The Huffington Post, Alternet, Artlog, Konch, and Whitewall Magazine.
Get out your social calendar and save the date, we guarantee that whether you're local or living abroad, you won't want to miss these Creative Growth related events! Use this calendar as a look ahead at confirmed events, and as details solidify we will be sure to keep you informed.
Holiday 2016: Revel
This annual event brings you incredible Studio sale finds and original artwork from over 100 artists! Take home one-of-a-kind textiles and customized furniture, ceramics, rugs, mosaics, wood, drawings and paintings, prints and more.
December 2, 2016 – January 12, 2017
Ontario, Canada — Oakville Galleries
Solo show of Judith Scott's work.
September 25 – December 30, 2016
Sheboygan, WI — John Michael Kohler Arts Center
"Escape Routes"- Curated by Amy Chaloupka, 12 works by Creative Growth artist Dan Miller are included in this group exhibition highlighting artists whose work explores escapist tendencies.
October 2, 2016 – January 22, 2017
Bonn, Germany — Bundeskunsthalle (Art and Exhibition Hall of the Federal Republic of Germany)
Curated by an interdisciplinary team of academics, this group exhibition is actively supported and co-curated by people with Down's syndrome and includes work by Creative Growth artist Judith Scott.
October 28, 2016 – February 12, 2017
Düsseldorf, Germany — Direct Art Gallery
“American Dream”- During this year’s joint gallery weekend “Kunst in der Carlstadt,” this exhibition features work by Dan Miller, Dwight Mackintosh and Donald Mitchell.
November 4 – December 22, 2016
San Francisco, CA — 836M
"Home"- An exhibition of depictions of new worlds or homes that will include William Scott’s take on a more “wholesome” San Francisco, that will also feature his notions for public housing projects.
December 19th, 2016 – January 27th, 2017
San Francisco, CA — 836M
"Large Drawings"- Part two of an exhibition series, 836M features large-scale drawings by Dan Miller and other Creative Growth artists.
October 24– December 9, 2016
San Francisco, CA — SFO Museum - Terminal 3 - Level 2
"Celebrating a Vision - Art and Disability"
March 12 – December 4, 2016
Miami Beach, FL- Deauville Beach Resort — NADA Art Fair
Visit Creative Growth's booth at this renowned art fair exploring new or underexposed art that is not typical of the “art establishment.”
December 1–4, 2016
Oakland, CA- Slide Space 123
"Valegro"- A group show, featuring work by John Hiltunen, explores how humans and animals live with and use each other, how we cope with the world together at the intersection of empathy and projection.
November 3– December 2, 2016
The Curiosity Cabinet — Creative Growth Art Center
A participatory workshop that features the prints department and invites viewers to add to the “cabinet of curiosities” with a drawing, screenprint, or risograph print.
October 27 – November 12, 2016
Paris, France- Hôtel du Duc — Outsider Art Fair
October 20– October 23, 2016
Binaries — Creative Growth Art Center
A study in formal opposites; aesthetic components are juxtaposed alongside one another. Black vs. white; up vs. down; material vs. immaterial. Also in light of the presidential election, we highlight the political binary of Republican vs. Democrat with presidential portraits by Allan Lofberg and other artists’ interpretations and observations on our system of government.
September 8 – October 20, 2016
Los Angeles, CA- Diane Rosenstein Gallery
"Click"- Solo show of Dan Miller's paintings and drawings.
September 10 – October 14, 2016
San Francisco, CA- 836M
"Common Threads"- An exhibition highlighting Creative Growth's fiber arts and fashion projects.
September 12 – October 14, 2016
Casale Monferrato, Italy — Casale Monferrato Castle
Group show featuring works from the private collection of Fabio Cei, including Creative Growth artists George Wilson and Donald Mitchell.
September 17 – October 15, 2016
San Francisco, CA — Minnesota Street Project
"After Pop Life"- Organized by critic and curator Glen Helfand, this exhibition pays tribute to Prince with works by more than thirty contemporary artists, including Creative Growth artist William Scott.
September 14 – October 1, 2016
Portland, OR — Ampersand Gallery & Fine Books
"Franklin, A Word Nobody Ever Seems To Say"- Curated by Myles Haselhort, Creative Growth artist Cedric Johnson makes his debut in his first solo exhibition highlighting his signature abstract drawings and ceramic masks.
August 25 – September 25, 2016
Amagansett, NY — Karma
"Outside"- Curated by Matthew Higgs, this group show features Creative Growth artists John Hiltunen, Dwight Mackintosh, Aurie Ramirez, William Scott, and William Tyler.
September 3 – September 25, 2016
New York, NY- MoMA PS1 — Printed Matter’s New York Art Book Fair
Books For All debuts the first published reproduction of John Hiltunen’s collage book in an edition of 500. Other original book works by Hiltunen will also be presented.
September 16 – 18, 2016
Pop-in@Nordstrom x Vans x Creative Growth
Olivia Kim, Director of Creative Projects for Nordstrom, invited Creative Growth artists to collaborate as Pop-In@Nordstrom celebrates the 50th anniversary of Vans, the iconic skateboarding and lifestyle shoe company.
August 5– September 4, 2016
Los Angeles, CA — Good Luck Gallery
"Mapping Fictions"- Curated by Andreana Donahue and Tim Ortiz of Disparate Minds, this four-person show included the work of Creative Growth artist William Scott.
July 9 – August 27, 2016
Redux — Creative Growth Art Center
July 1 – August 19, 2016
San Francisco Art Book — Fair Minnesota Street Projects
July 22 – July 24, 2016
Peres Projects, Berlin
Wild Style: Exhibition of Figurative Art, including early paintings by Creative Growth artist Dwight Mackintosh
June 10 – August 5, 2016
Home 2016: Where Horror Meets Hilarity Meets Adventure — Creative Growth Art Center
May 6 – June 17, 2016
The 2015 Wynn Newhouse Awards Exhibition
The Palitz Gallery at Syracuse University Lubin House, New York Curated by Andrew Saluti featuring work by 2015 award recipient Dan Miller.
April 19 – May 15, 2016
Judith Scott - Bound and Unbound
Aspen Museum of Art
March 11 - July 10, 2016
Olivia Kim, Director of Creative Projects for Nordstrom, invited Creative Growth artists to collaborate as Pop-In@Nordstrom celebrates the 50th anniversary of Vans, the iconic skateboarding and lifestyle shoe company.
Creative Growth artists have hand drawn, painted and stitched limited edition sneakers -- styles like the Slip-On, Old Skool and Sk8-Hi -- adding a joyful and avant-garde vibe to the classic shoe. Vans styles are on sale from August 5 to September 4 at Pop-In@Nordstrom!
Creative Growth is super-stoked to be part of this anniversary project!
AVAILABLE ONLINE AND IN SELECTED STORES:
CALIFORNIA San Francisco San Francisco Centre
WASHINGTON Bellevue Bellevue Square
Seattle Downtown Seattle
Participating artists include:
Angela Archuleta Barbara Mealey Carrie Oyama Casey Byrnes Cedric Johnson Dan Miller Dinah Shapiro Donald Mitchell Edwards Walters Emily Dunster Farey John Hiltunen John Mullins Joseph Alef Juan Aguilera Kim Clark Lulu Sotelo Maureen Clay Nick Pagan Nicole Storm Ray Vickers Sherrie Aradanas Sherron Freeman Stephanie Nguyen Ying Ge Zhou
Thank you to:
for their generous donation of shoes for this collaboration
for donating the proceeds of sales to support Creative Growth artists and programs.
Vans Off the Wall artwork by John Martin
A Little Birdie Told Me
Work by Rosena Finister Essay by Danielle Wright August 2016
To spread joy, you must have it first; or so I’ve heard. Ms. Rosena Finister, a veteran artist at Creative Growth Art Center in Oakland, California, embodies this in an elegantly understated manner. Her joy is as unassuming as it is genuine. I first meet her during a visit to Creative Growth on a blustery Wednesday last fall. It’s lightly raining outside, but inside I am treated to a warm welcome from both the on-site studio manager that day, Matt Dostal, and the marketing and community development manager, Jessica Daniel. Matt tours me around with unswerving patience, fielding all types of requests, exclamations, assertions, and anecdotes with impressive grace and humor.
Creative Growth is an art studio for adults with developmental disabilities founded over 40 years ago by wife and husband team Florence and Elias Katz. Elias was a staff psychologist at the Sonoma State Hospital and Florence was an artist and instructor for both high school and college students. As legend has it, the Katzes hatched the idea for their signature studio model after hosting a private art-making event for a number of artists with disabilities. They were then granted a National Endowment for the Arts award, which they leveraged to establish Creative Growth in Oakland in 1972 — the premier institution dedicated to fostering artists with disabilities. With regard to national and international attention in the contemporary art world, Creative Growth is the most widely recognized of the trio of studios the Katzes have established in the Bay Area (with NIAD and Creativity Explored rounding out the suite).
When we pass her workstation, Ms. Finister is quietly, carefully hand-embellishing what looks like a denim Kangol hat. I remark on the luminescent bird she is conjuring up and Matt informs me that the piece is part of a head-to-toe ensemble that Ms. Finister is painstakingly painting by hand for Creative Growth’s annual fashion show, part of their signature fundraiser. I am told by Matt that some artists work year-round on pieces to be auctioned at the event. I never see the whole garment, but I’m taken by Ms. Finister’s delicate touch and her off-hand remark about how the birds speak to her. I wonder about what they might be saying and make a note to come back to inquire about that after the tour concludes. There is a bird-like quality to her as well. She is extremely petite, less than five feet tall, and crowned with a puff of downy, jet-black hair that boosts her height another inch or two.
I am brought through different sections of the studio — woodworking in one area, textiles in another. The space is awash in silvery light from the big picture windows and abuzz with activity, with people milling and flitting about. There is even a quiet workspace upstairs that functions a bit like a private studio for artists who thrive with reduced noise and activity. I see their newly revamped animation studio area, including a section of wall painted Day-Glo green for video compositing. The tour ends where it began, in the eclectically decorated gallery near the entryway. I am momentarily distracted by the variety of work on display in the exhibition (Holiday 2016: Revel) and notice a piece or two of Ms. Finister’s; one depicts a bucolic scene of figures picking sweet potatoes, and another portrays a lively party full of slim, nimble-looking figures playing music and waltzing to inaudible tunes. I remember that I want to chat with her about her birds and quickly make my way back to her station. Ms. Finister is a pleasure to converse with, but I have to strain to hear her over the low hum of activity in the studio. When I do, I detect the faint hint of an accent, a bit of Southern charm. She has a delightful way of punctuating sentences with a hushed, “You know?,” a refrain that gives her speech a unique and gentle cadence. I ask her where she’s originally from and with her soft voice, she begins her story.
Ms. Rosena Finister grew up in Louisiana picking cotton on her family’s farm. It was hard physical labor. She describes how her family dug potatoes: The kids and relatives would trot behind the mule-driven plow and collect the spuds, depositing them on a wagon trailing behind. They also grew corn and peas and raised livestock. They raised pork and had a cow, which she learned how to milk. She briefly mentions that she is one of five sisters and, I believe, at least as many brothers. I do not catch exactly how many siblings she has, but I know the number isn’t a small one.
When she was a little girl, her family members would sit around and tell stories and she would write them down. They did not have a typewriter so she had to hand-write her tales. This, she says, is how she learned to pay attention to the details. She tells me she moved to the Bay Area over 50 years ago and shocks me when she alleges to be a ripe 72 years of age. “I’m an old lady,” she says with laughter in her voice.
As a single mother of three, she worked all manner of odd jobs to keep food on the table. From sewing garments to soldering, Ms. Finister was truly a Jane-of-all-trades. She chuckles when she tells me that she burned many a hole through her clothing with the soldering iron while testing transformers. She explains that she had divorced early and that the father of her children refused to pay child support. She says it was rough, that she had to work all of her life. Two of her children live nearby in Oakland. One of her two sons moved to Stockton to raise a big family. Her other son resides in Oakland and is between jobs and does not have children. Her daughter also lives in Oakland and has kids. Ms. Finister has six grandchildren all together, some of whom she occasionally babysits.
There is a considerable gap, fifteen years or so, between her only girl and her youngest boy. I am curious about this but I don’t pursue it. She mentions that her ex-husband liked to garden but when they split she let the yard grow over. She was done with it, she reports. Like other activities that she has let fall by the wayside, it was just too much work to maintain. “When I got rid of this husband, I wanted to rest.” I can understand this considering the farm-to-table nature of her upbringing. Growing up, her parents were very strict and discipline was a significant part of her life from an early age. It was different for her children. “Kids got to do what they want to do,” she muses, “pick up what they want to pick up.
While she didn’t have time to make visual art when her kids were young, she enjoyed writing short poems and rhymes for them. “Like kid stuff,” she describes. I ask her to share one with me and she recites:
“Red, White, and Blue the monkey favors you.”
I wait for elaboration, but that’s all there is to it. We laugh. She intimates that it’s not exactly a masterpiece — not quite like something written by Maya Angelou. I recollect that Maya Angelou was a woman of many talents as well, notably a dancer early on in her career. This seems to surprise her. I say that the two of them aren’t all that different, which she summarily brushes off.
Up to this point, it doesn’t seem like much of anything rustles Ms. Finister’s feathers. I am surprised when she describes how she is downright scandalized by the price of short ribs these days. She recalls wistfully how steaks used to be thicker, bigger, and cost less. She recounts how she used to stretch $25 to buy groceries for her and her kids for a week and regales me with prices from times past — a gallon of milk and a half gallon of ice cream for 50 cents a piece. It’s hard for me to fathom.
Ms. Finister continues to be a busy individual despite her children having grown up, splitting her time between church, children, grandbabies, and making art. I’m amazed when she says she hadn’t learned to draw before she came to Creative Growth. Here she’s tried her hand at a range of media, including textiles, drawing, painting, and animation. When she isn’t painting or drawing, she is taking dance and computer animation classes. She informs me she doesn’t do hand-sewing or quilting anymore because it is simply too much work, and besides, she wonders aloud, who wants to buy a handmade quilt? When I mention that someone like me might be interested, she lets the comment slip by without a remark. She’s sharp, but her perceptiveness is tempered by an easy-going attitude. She can’t be bothered to waste energy fussing over things she deems inconsequential. I can’t picture her becoming overwrought about anything, really. She is direct and present-tense in a refreshing way. Her demeanor has a way of putting others at ease.
Ms. Finister’s presence at Creative Growth is a bit of an anomaly. She was somehow grandmothered into the studio without having to go through the usual channel — a social worker referral through Golden Gate Regional Center. By some divine fortune, she found her way to Creative Growth and both the former studio manager and executive director had the good sense to let her in.
She’s known the current studio managers, Julie Alvarado and Matt Dostal, for about two years and speaks highly of them both. When I ask who inspires her, she gives me both names and indicates that it was Julie who taught her how to paint. A veteran artist of Creative Growth who has worked at the studio for over 20 years, Ms. Finister tells me that she loves to make art. She says working at Creative Growth studio is like a dream.
In her piece, “Ordinary People Swinging with the Movie Stars,” she dances alongside Whitney Houston and Mary J. Blige, while Matt, the Creative Growth studio manager, strums the guitar, and one of Creative Growth’s administrative staff taps out a rhythm on the drums. It seems appropriate that the studio manager would create the melody while the administrator keeps a steady beat. When I ask her about dancing, she declares that she loves to boogie. She explains that she just likes to move and doesn't have time to learn a particular dance.
As for her hand-painted garment, she says the birds in the reference image convey messages to her. In her dazzling imagination, when she sees a picture she sees a story. The relationship between the elements of the image seems to develop gradually in her mind. She says she likes a bit of quiet so she can ponder and process her tales. She says she sometimes only needs a few hushed moments to get her bearings. This resonates with me. As she seems to keep herself rather busy, she admittedly doesn’t have much time to weave tall tales. It begs a question that I can’t resist: if she had all the time in the world, what would she do? She answers, “I don’t know, I just do what I do. Painting and drawing, go and learn other stuff about art.”
Ms. Finister continues to whittle down her activities, cutting out things like the church newsletter she used to produce because, according to her signature refrain, “it was too much work.” She spent too much of her money and time buying paper and producing content to justify her involvement. She has worked hard physical labor all of her life (including raising three kids without support) and I wholeheartedly believe her when she says a given activity is no longer worth the effort.
When I ask about her piece depicting the potato harvest, she tells me about the barn (or “the crib,” as her family called it) where they once stored potatoes. They would cover them with hay to preserve them after harvest and bury the flowers during planting season to begin the cycle anew. She tells me that most of the food they ate, they grew. I marvel over the idea of having that kind of visceral relationship to food. It seems as if she’s been making things with her hands for her whole life.
When she is not painting scenes of the farm (of which she has sold many), she depicts all manner of other subjects. You see, Rosena Finister finds stories everywhere, whether it’s about the man who hustled her for 5 cents when she was downtown shopping or the man she encountered one day wearing a dress and insisting folks clear the reserved seating at the front of the bus for elderly folks and those with disabilities. She writes them down on paper and, in her own words, she’s made “a couple of books,” but has only printed one once.
When asked if she considers herself an artist, she responds, “Yeah I do, I’m making money.” She says even if she wasn’t making money from her art, she’d still enjoy the process. When I ask her what she cares about, she says, “I care about a lot of things. I really care about me.” She pauses there and I can’t suppress a burst of appreciative laughter, reveling in the beauty of her self-assuredness. She goes on, sharing how she cares about family, about people, her children (pronounced “chilren,” which tugs at my heart-strings; her phrasing evokes fond memories of my grandfather who was born in Georgia), her grandchildren… She professes her love of people, and how she’s willing to do anything for them. It’s important to Ms. Finister to care for people, to communicate, and to “blend in well.” I’m curious what she means by “blending in,” but I have more questions and I’m running out of time.
With regard to being an artist, she likes that she can make work on her own schedule and that it affords her the freedom of choice. I ask her what she likes the least about being an artist. She says she can’t think of anything. I think this is a wonderful answer, even if I can’t relate. Ms. Finsiter’s creativity extends to her clothing. She makes her own neckties. She says she’s always cutting up fabric and making new clothing. It seems to me that the way she dresses is part of her work. The combination of vibrant reds and phthalo blues offset by a cool bluish green is eye-catching without being ostentatious.
Our conversation meanders on. I ask her what she’s most afraid of. She doesn’t have a response to this so I suggest that perhaps she is fearless. She shies away from that assertion. She’s not being falsely modest, just factual. She suggests that perhaps “fearless” isn’t the most appropriate term. She seems to have a healthy awareness of her age, but she doesn't allow it to put undue limitations on the variety of her daily activities. Though she’s careful not to overwork herself, when there’s something she wants to do she just goes on and does it. I can’t think of a better way to sum up my impression of her. She doesn’t put on a show of humility and she isn’t braggadocious. She just is who she is and she does what she likes. It’s as simple and as profound as that.
Arts + Culture
Why Books Are The Perfect Way To Spread Art To The Masses
Books For All wants to bring the wonderful world of outsider art to your bookshelf.
By Priscilla Frank July 27, 2016
Sometimes the simplest of ideas are the most revolutionary. Art is expensive, often ludicrously so. Even with lesser-known emerging artists, an original artwork will set you back hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars. But an art book? Not so much. For many of us art-loving plebs, books are the most viable means of supporting artists and beginning an art collection of our own.
Carolyn Schoerner is the mind behind Books For All Press (BFA), a non-profit publisher working with artists living with mental illness and developmental disabilities. Prior to BFA, Schoerner worked at Printed Matter, a non-profit bookstore and artist space, as well as White Columns, New York’s oldest alternative art space. The amalgamation of both made sense.
“I just fell in love with the work at White Columns,” Schoerner explained in an interview with The Huffington Post. “It just seemed so pure and natural to me. I wanted to continue working with organizations like it, but I wasn’t sure quite how.”
Through White Columns’ director Matthew Higgs, Schoerner got involved with studios like Creative Growth and NIAD Art Center, which work with artists with developmental disabilities as a joint studio space art gallery. “It’s not art therapy,” Schoerner clarified. “They are artists. Artists who happen to have these disabilities.”
Oakland-based Creative Growth is home to artists like John Hiltunen, who collages fashion editorials and natural history magazines, topping them off with the surreal additions of animal heads. In this chopped and screwed reality, a woman in a trendy empire waist dress and the head of a grey cat struts confidently through a field of bougainvilleas. Aside from making stand-alone collages, Hiltunen makes collaged books as part of his practice.
Hiltunen is one of the first artists, along with Creativity Explored’s Antonio Benjamin and NIAD’s Karen May, whose work will be compiled into a BFA-published art book. Benjamin’s work often features nude portraits designated as vanilla, chocolate or strawberry. May colors atop ArtForum ads, adorning blue chip works at Paula Cooper and Matthew Marks galleries with colorful shapes, squiggles, and various adornments.
The goal, Schoerner explained, is to fold the artists’ work into the contemporary art dialogue without special categorization or marginalization. The book formats will follow the design model of many contemporary art books ― no text, just art. This, however, is especially revelatory for a field in which the artist’s work is so often overshadowed by the details of his or her personal narrative.
BFA aims to do away with the layer of separation that sometimes keeps non-mainstream artists from earning their rightful spots in the artistic canon. What’s more, the press expands upon the already accessible, affordable and inclusive nature of the alternative art world to ensure that anyone who loves Hiltunen’s collages or Benjamin’s paintings can get their hands on them for a reasonable price.
The first round of books, all designed by David Schoerner, Carolyn’s husband, will be published in editions of 500. They will be premiered at the NY Art Book Fair at MoMA PS1 on Sept. 15, 2016. Visit their website to donate and help BFA thrive.
The 2016 San Francisco Art Book Fair presents its inaugural event of an annual festival of artists’ publications. This multi-day event is free and open to the public and will feature artists’ books, art catalogs, monographs, periodicals, zines, printed ephemera, and artists' multiples. These works, ranging from five dollars to several hundred dollars, will be presented by 70 independent publishers, antiquarian dealers, artists, collectors, and enthusiasts. Over the course of the weekend, the fair will be complimented by a diverse range of talks, book launches, and signings.
The mission of the SFABF is to celebrate the unique art publishing community of the Bay Area while providing a platform for national and international publishers to present their work to a new audience.
Preview: July 22, 6–10pm, (featuring live music and refreshments- FREE) Saturday July 23rd, 11am–6pm Sunday July 24th, 11am–5pm
For more information, visit www.sfartbookfair.com
Now in its 14th year, the contemporary art fair will take place on Saturday 2nd and Sunday 3rd of July (preview on Friday 1st) at Hotel Granvia Osaka.53 art galleries from both Japan and abroad will exhibit works from emerging to internationally recognized artists. Dozens of the hotel’s rooms will be transformed into temporary galleries, displaying an exciting array of work, from painting print and sculpture to video installation. Under one roof, with such a diverse selection of artwork, there is something special for everyone at ART OSAKA 2016. We gladly welcome you to join us this year to view, browse and be inspired by the chosen artworks.
See link for all the specifics: http://www.artosaka.jp/
Friday, July 1 @ 2:00 PM - Sunday, July 3 @ 7:00 PM (JST)
Hotel Granvia Osaka 26th Floor 3-1-1 Umeda Kita-ku Osaka 5300001 JAPAN T :+81(0)6 6344 1235