Do you like the work of Monet, Rauschenberg, Turner? They’re all fabulous artists of course but you only get to view one artist and one style at a time! But what if you could combine them all at one go? That’s what collage allows me to do. I can pull images from  a wide variety of resources and styles, add additional images or textures in acrylic, pencil or ink and create my own vision. A final coat of varnish protects the work and gives it maturity.

I was born in Ireland and travel extensively.  This, combined with my background in architecture and graphics, is what influences my art the most.  I love ambiguity and the juxtapositioning of objects and images, many bearing little if any relationship to each other. I love seeing text on images – Chinese, Arabic, Sanskrit – none of which I can read. With my own  personal twist I often include words or sayings in Irish in my work with the meaning reflected in the title of the piece in English. Working on small panels makes me focus my ideas and to ruthlessly eliminate material which does not work. My subject matter usually deals with the human emotions of love, fear, nostalgia, etc. – but also with the issues of the day – war, peace and justice.

I use wood panels as they are strong but light and can easily be sanded down to start from scratch when things go wrong – which happens rather a lot.

I make colorful mixed media paintings. The subjects vary from urban scenes to landscapes. I try to show a reality that might not be obvious but uses a combination of elements that are surprising.

I want to make an emotional connection with the viewer that will captivate your imagination, draw you into the story, and be memorable.

It is my intention to create thought provoking, one of a kind pieces of art. I started painting fabrics in 1972, this evolved into a fashion/wearable art business. My fabrics eventually went into the HOME DECOR market. I'm currently designing re-assembled jewelry, hand painted/dyed scarves/shawls/ wall hangings & mixed media collage.. 

Claudia is a self-taught British artist currently residing in San Francisco. After selling her first painting at London's Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers when she was seventeen, she went on to obtain a BA in Philosophy & Psychology from the University of Oxford and an MSc in Social Anthropology from University College London. Fascinated by the human condition, Claudia has worked with communities across the world in both mental health and therapeutic art settings.

Claudia's portraits have been selected for a number of prestigious international exhibitions including the Royal Society of Portrait Painters in London and the Pastel Society of America in New York where she was awarded the Herman Margulies Award for Excellence. Claudia was recently selected to attend Project 387's artist residency in Mendocino where she produced a contemplative art project exploring the relationship between transience and wellbeing.

“I have met many people because of my artwork and feel privileged to be able to bear witness to the stories of both old friends and strangers. My encounters help me to understand how we both build and are built by the world around us; through the roles we perform, the narratives we imagine and, ultimately, the lives we choose to lead. Amongst these idiosyncrasies, a deep commonality is revealed that unites us all as human beings.”

I am an artist, a traveler, a writer and a teacher.

I engage in the process of visually exploring and describing my experiences as a woman living in an urban culture in the 21st century.  I am a mother and grandmother and all of my experience instructs my practice.

The human figure and nature are central to my work.   I question what is familiar and find nuances buried in the layers of the everyday.

Text is an important component, and most every piece has a story or text beneath and through the work.  Building layers, sometimes placing familiar imagery in context of a new environment, the voice of my work is evident in the line and space that becomes a new language within the work.

Painting, drawing and taking photographs is a form of discovery for me.  

Bio

Robbin Milne is a California painter and studio artist.

She is associated ArtsBenicia, Oakland ProArts, San Francisco and Berkeley communities.

She has exhibited her work in the Bay Area 
during the past 15 years in solo as well as 
group shows such as the Oakland ProArts 
Annual Open Studios, Arts Benicia Auction, 
Arts Benicia Open Studios.

Robbin has also been seen in other venues 
including the Benicia Library Art Gallery, 
Orinda Art Gallery, Bedford Art Gallery, 
Sebastopol Arts Center and other venues in 
the area.  

Her work is in Bay Area private collections:  In 
Napa and the South Bay areas, including 
Filoso/Obrien of Oakland and the Heydlers of 
Danville, now in Germany.  Collectors abroad 
include Canada, France and Italy and Turkey.  

Ms. Milne received the Ralph DuCasse Award 
for Academic Excellence in Studio Arts, and 
completed her BA in Studio Art at Mills College,
Oakland California.

She was born in Lake Charles, Louisiana in 
1957.

She continues to offer art instruction and 
appreciation, and has worked in the National 
Institute of Arts and Disabilities with adults.

The son of a seamstress and mechanic, my art-making process continues a family history of labor through the meticulous hand-made acrylic paintings on wooden panel and ink drawings. As a first-generation middle-class American growing up in the 80's & 90's under the influence of MTV, Nickelodeon, plastic toys, candy and bold fashion – my work construct and unravel my landscape, architecture and interior spaces with flat color, line and intricate patterns.

Pushing the cannon of Chicano art beyond graffiti or large-scale murals, these works also investigate identity through the lens of such a richly traditional infrastructure. My work, create a new kind of iconography, symbolically operating on the micro level of the personal, able to be inserted into a larger historical and cultural dialogue.

Like clocking in and out of my very own studio sweatshop, my process extends from super-controlled acrylic painting into laborious experimental ink drawings on paper, continuing an abstract investigation into line, color and pattern- an homage to my mother and reminiscent of a childhood play area in her sewing room piled with fabric swatches. The vulnerable process of creating “swatch-drawings” celebrate accidental moments and mishap when man imitates machine; one of life's lessons which forces us to make lemonade out of lemons. Through both painting and drawing my cultural and personal history is explored, questioned and celebrated.

Jeff Snell's paintings unite traditional landscapes and popular culture as vigorous abstract rhythms. Working with brush and spray, Snell uses expressive gestures that incorporate a variety of forms found in nature and elements of urban flair. The organic qualities of his subjects exist in a fantastic world, where the natural position and order of the landscape is challenged in an unruly microcosm. His paintings radiate an energy and excitement that engage the viewer and offer a glimpse of nature's inner sanctum.

In this current series, I'm investigating environments from the imagination, thinking of these as glimpses of atmospheric forces mingling with eachother. Each canvas is a window into a bit of ordered chaos where nature is continually changing and the viewer is center stage to a swirling cosmos.

I love to explore with paint, drawings, and collage in a mixed media way, usually inspired by the figure and everyday life.  Using collected ephemera, old and new, along with figure drawings, water media, or oil paint, stirred up in a mixed media, until it works for me.  I'm influenced by expressionism and surrealism, landing somewhere between realism and abstraction.  Texture, hand of the artist, color, and mysterey interest me.

I hope the viewer engages their imagination while looking at my paintings.

Currently my paintings are exhibited in the Los Gatos Museums Gallery, andThe CottonWorks

 in Los Gatos Calif. 

Michael Murphy is an American artist and architect from San Francisco, where he practiced architecture for approximately six years before moving to London, UK. The experience of living abroad for ten years was instrumental in the formation of his current aesthetic tastes as well as the profound re-appreciation of San Francisco’s architecture upon his return in 2008. 

It is because of these renewed impressions of San Francisco that he created the series "Forgotten Modernism" which is the title of a visual exploration of San Francisco's rich catalogue of modern architecture.   Often overlooked, Modern architecture in San Francisco has played an important role in the ongoing Modernist Movement, and this work is an attempt to acknowledge the contribution that these stunning buildings make to the visual landscape.   Using bold colors and a stylized graphics, he portrays this architecture not as something that quietly blends into a background, but rather elevating achievements that embody the best and highest principles that Modern architecture has to offer all of us.

Recently, he has expanded his subject matter to include the architecture of cities outside of San Francisco, as well as his most recent work, an attempt to capture the essence of San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art and it’s surrounding context of 20^th Century architecture.

Michael has exhibited his work in London, Amsterdam, Valencia, Tokyo and within the US in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago.