Join us at the Eddie Rhodes Gallery for the opening of “3,734 Dreams Not Remembered” featuring work by NIAD Artists who are Contra Costa College alumni. Read More …
Join us in NIAD’s Galleries for our new June exhibitions! Artists and exhibition organizers will be on hand for a lively discussion in the galleries, and light refreshments will be served. Come browse the exhibitions and check out NIAD’s art-filled studios. Read More …
Join us in NIAD’s Galleries to celebrate the spirit of community activism and creative energy of Richmond High School and NIAD Art Center artists! Richmond Artists Activate! centers artists as agents for lasting social change and leaders in the Richmond community. Read More …
NIAD artists Saul Alegria and Deatra Colbert will be making pet portraits for visitors to SFMOMA on Saturday, February 4th! From SFMOMA’s website: In celebration of our Joan Brown retrospective, SFMOMA is partnering with the San Francisco SPCA to bring you Pet Portraits Day, an exciting live art extravaganza. Joan Brown was known for her enduring love of animals, and you can find many depictions of cats and dogs (many of them her own pets) throughout the exhibition on Floor 7. With this inspiration in mind, meet us at the museum on February 4 and share a digital photo of your pet with Read More …
Opening Reception Friday February 3 6 to 8:30pm Warehouse 416 This year NIAD is delighted to have works by ten NIAD artists in both the Richmond Art Center AOTAD exhibition and a satellite exhibition at the Warehouse 416 art space in Oakland. The reception coincides with Oakland’s First Fridays Art Walk. Art of the African Diaspora, in partnership with Richmond Art Center, supports artists of African descent in the Bay Area through representation, professional development, and building a creative community. Participating NIAD Artists: Christian Vassell Deatra Colbert Dorian Reid Evelyn Davis Felicia Griffin Jason Powell-Smith Shawna Kinard Shawn Read More …
Art of the African Diaspora is the longest running event of its kind in the Bay Area. This year it brings together over 150 artists of African descent, showcasing their work at the Richmond Art Center, as well as in open studios and satellite exhibitions at thirty different venues across ten Bay Area cities. Read More …
Crossover is an apt title for this show, which will showcase the vibrant and newly-connected fiber art scenes of NIAD and Cedars. Crossover is a companion to the textile-centered exhibition Follow the String, on view at Marin MOCA. In preparation for this show, artists from both programs visited each other’s studios, and participated in a tee-shirt and doll making workshop at Marin MOCA. T-shirts and dolls from this workshop will be on view in NIAD and Marin MOCA. Read More …
When Peter Harris is asked which of his ceramic pieces is his favorite, he says with conviction, “I love all of them.” This show is a celebration of “all of them.” The title is drawn from Michael Starofsky’s beautiful series of whale sculptures and pencil holders. Several of these artists are new to working in ceramics, and they are already establishing new forms and vibrant styles. Meanwhile, experienced NIAD ceramicists showcase their newest sculptures and functional ware. Whales and Pencil Holders presents this broad spectrum of subjects and inspiration—enjoy them all. Read More …
Looking through works from the roster of NIAD artists, ideas around bodies coming together under the unifying force of music for release, freedom, self-expression and camaraderie began to emerge. Balloons, dancing, fearless fashion, music, friendship, colorful people and spaces filled with lights, projections and disco balls; all themes that form the ethos of our space. These works highlight motifs and sentiments that conjure the feeling of bliss from celebrating life with chosen families through music. Read More …
Join us for a lively virtual walkthrough and conversation with curators and artists involved in NIAD’s August gallery exhibitions. Read More …
Art is as much community as it is individual. We are shaped by those we love and those who love and have loved us. Love and community are intergenerationally woven into us all. Deatra Colbert and Maria Radilla’s work both speak to the ways in which we look to community as inspiration for voicing our own personal experience in this world. Read More …
About the exhibition The invitation to curate this exhibition initially felt like an insurmountable task. The amount of work I felt thrilled by on a first look at the archive seemed impossible to winnow down. I immediately knew I didn’t want to use some contrived academic framework for decision making. I wanted to create an exhibition of works that I just couldn’t shake, a group of things that struck that deep internal chord which has no words or explanation. I decided that I would make an initial large list of things I was drawn to, and then revisit those lists repeatedly over several weeks, seeing what remained stuck in Read More …
About the exhibition We all hear voices. Some come from inside, and others come from outside. The truest voice is the voice coming from inside which only you can hear. We hear this voice day and night. It can be loud, or soft, or strong, or annoyed, or happy, or sad. When we let our inner voice out it can create different forms of art, sometimes in words, sometimes with color, sometimes in three dimensions, sometimes with only lines. This expression can vary every day depending on the hardness of materials, the stiffness of mind, and the softness of heart. Inner Read More …
About the collection NIAD’s Windows Exhibitions are a pandemic-era innovation, born out of the necessity to see art, and for art to be seen, that continued unabated during lockdown. Way back in July 2020 Amanda announced in The Latest, “Starting now, each month we will add new exhibitions to NIAD’s street-side windows, selected by local artists, curators and NIAD community members… Interested audiences can now drive by, take a stroll past our windows, or get in touch with us directly to arrange for sales or more information on art and artists.” Many thanks to NIAD Gallery Director Julio Rodriguez, the deft facilitator Read More …
For 25 years, Deatra has had a truly legendary practice as a studio artist at NIAD. Not only does Deatra work across mediums including fiber arts, printmaking, ceramics, drawing, and painting, she is a community connector. And so it’s fitting that this year, she was one of the first artists to return to our 23rd Street studio to work in person. In the video below, she shares her personal approach to making sure life in the Virtual Studio and on-site at NIAD stay continuous. It’s all about friends – whether in the NIAD courtyard or studio, or on-screen in our Virtual Read More …
About the exhibition Have you ever met somebody whose emotions are so big they seem to fill up a room? These wonderful drawings remind me of those passionate people. Each subject fills their piece of paper with their emotions. Whether joyful, calm or anxious, their feelings permeate their faces, their bodies and even the spaces around them. Even when the backgrounds are empty, they are empty in ways that amplify the subjects’ inner states. I don’t know these artists, so I can’t ask what they meant to say. But it’s art, so we each get to make up whatever Read More …
About the gallery The NIAD MiNi Gallery is a collection of work that showcases the diversity of NIAD’s studio artists in material and form, featuring the artists who contributed to the SFMOMA MiNi Mural Project. About the event From the SFMOMA website: In 1940, more than sixty-five artists made their creative processes public when they participated in Art in Action, an exhibition of live art making conceived by architect Timothy L. Pfleuger as part of the Golden Gate International Exposition on Treasure Island. Among these artists was Diego Rivera, who during this time painted the mural Pan American Unity, which Read More …
Join us online from 6-7 PM PT, Thursday July 8th! We’ll welcome Nan Collymore and Celia Lesh in conversation about organizing this month’s NIAD Windows Exhibition, Soft Material. Our guest speakers will share some insight on how this collaborative project came to be. You could have the opportunity to meet and talk with participating artists from NIAD, Creative Growth, and Elbow Room: Deatra Colbert, Shantae Robinson, Raven Harper, Gail Lewis, Sherrie Aradanis, Elmeater Morton, and Ricky Bearghost. About Thirsty Thursday Hosted by Julio Rodriguez, NIAD’s Gallery Manager, Thirsty Thursday is our new event series bringing together artists and curators with interested Read More …
About the exhibition Soft Material is a collaborative garment construction project, between artists who have an interest in and connection with what one might call fashion and textiles, and what can also be understood as the corporeal, the body and performativity. Soft Material supports and connects artists living with disabilities whose communal studio programs have been severely interrupted by the pandemic. The project was born out of an interest in proposing a model for generating clothes reciprocally, with many voices and a disregard for efficiency. About the organizers Nan Collymore makes work that is tactile and continuous—as though Read More …
NIAD is one of three organizations commissioned by SFMOMA to contribute murals to its Mini Mural Festival this summer. During this special online kickoff event, Acción Latina, NIAD, and SOMA Pilipinas will discuss our organizations’ work and missions. Then, the artists will reveal their mural designs for the first time. Don’t miss this special preview! SFMOMA Mini Mural Festival Kickoff (online)Thursday, June 24th, 5:30 PM PTRSVP today! Image: NIAD artists in our courtyard working on sketches for SFMOMA’s Mini Mural Festival. Top row: Luis Estrada, Esmeralda Silva, Miguel Chacon. Circle: Jonathan Valdivias. Bottom row: Julio Del Rio, Deatra Colbert, Christian Vassell’s sketches.