Ideas for exhibits at The Drawing Room
Hi Renée,
I’m using this page to put together some ideas for exhibits of my art as a solo show or part of a small group exhibit. I’ve been putting off approaching galleries to inquire about representation or solo shows, but now that I have a heart sculpture painting headed for public display, I should really take advantage of that momentum by getting a show on the calendar.
I’m approaching The Drawing Room first because I feel a good connection with you about our similar creative process and belief in arts potential to make society better. Below are some bodies of work that I have been adding to. If a curator told me to make more of any of these in specified sizes by a specific date, I would welcome that advice and fill those canvases. I am also very open to ideas about how to price these works.
Inquiry Paintings
I was very encouraged that my painting “Arts Equity District” sold so quickly from the Future Tense exhibit in October 2020. I have some other paintings that use that approach, and I have a pile of sketchnotes waiting to become paintings. I’ve continued to use art to understand and document meetings related to education and city policy. I would like to add paintings about the way advocacy groups are organizing toward racial, economic, and environmental just. Find more examples of these paintings here.
Teaching Art Online
Acrylic and mixed media collage on canvas, 30" x 24", 2021
I teach a lesson to students where we scribble our emotions onto paper and then use those scribbles in a new piece of art that tells a story about our feelings. This painting uses the example scribbles and drawings from a year of teaching online to tell a story about my experience as a teaching artist during a year when classes were all held over Zoom.
Grace and Compassion
Acrylic and mixed media collage on canvas, 24” x 30”, 2021
This painting is a reflection on a year of meetings with San Francisco Unified School District beginning in April 2020. Read all about it in this article on Mission Local.
Surreal SF Landscapes
I do enjoy paintings San Francisco landscapes and playing with perspective and the patterns that emerge as neighborhoods flow down the sides of the hills like fog. You can see more examples of these landscapes here.
Bernal and the Bay in Bloom
acrylic on canvas, 30” x 24”, 2020
Floating Telegraph Hill
acrylic on canvas, 11” x 14”, 2021
In December, I started experimenting with these floating hill compositions.
Floating Bernal Hill
acrylic on canvas, 11” x 14”, 2021
Abstract and Allegorical
Sometimes, I just play with lines and forms. You can see some more of my abstract paintings here. I also have paintings that I categorize as allegorical here.
Reaching
acrylic on canvas, 24” x 48”, 2021
Calibrated
acrylic on canvas, 8” x 10”, 2022
Trees
I also wouldn’t mind developing a series of paintings inspired by science and nature. I’ve become found of the Alemany Farm near my home, and could see spending time painting portraits of all the plants they grow there or painting portraits of all the trees in Holly Park.
Fungi Forest Network
acrylic on canvas, 40" x 30”, 2021
This is inspired by the work of Suzanne Simard who proved that trees communicate with each other and send resources to each other through their roots via a network of mushrooms. There is a magical inter-species forest community that people are just beginning to barely understand. I would have submitted this painting to the Tides of Change show, but it is too big.
Portrait of a Tree With Feelings
acrylic on canvas, 18” x 24”, 2021
This canvas started as one of my election week paintings from 2020. I sat in Holly Park processing the stress of an national election whose results were still uncertain. In that first iteration (which you can see and read about here), I included the words, “FEEL that nervous ANGRY ENERGY HARNESS [and] Unleash That CREATIVE POWER.” A year later, I decided that the painting would be better without the words - but those feelings are still in there.
Now, you can see the the view of Twin Peaks in the background.