Karen May

a manipulated image of a person's face in bright red, purple and yellow, with the letters "salad days" spelled out of cartoon puppet's bodies

Karen May in “Salad Days” // Grand Opening for “Personal Space”

Personal Space presents Salad Days, an inaugural group exhibition featuring work by artists from Vallejo, the broader Bay Area, Los Angeles, Iowa, New York, and London. As the title denotes the vigor and recklessness of youth, the works assembled here suggest the vulnerability of new beginnings through an abundance of color, humor, material experimentation, and bittersweet pathos. Taken together, these artists dredge the joyful precarity of fleeting moments and summertime bliss to reveal something far more dreamlike and mysterious.
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painting of famous painters titled "Normal is Boring"

“Rainbow Cat Picnic” organized by Cynthia Ona Innis

About the Exhibition The title of this exhibition comes from a piece included in the show, Dorian Reid’s Rainbow Cat Picnic.  In Rainbow Cat Picnic, numerous cats are joyously picnic-ing under a big colorful rainbow in what looks to be a very festive occasion.  There may be rain but that rainbow safely covers the cats and their food bowls. The sun is just coming out and those cats are really having a good time! The mixed media works in this show are my Rainbow Cat Picnic–20+ pieces representing an inspiring and colorful excursion to a place of creative nourishment and a celebration as a Read More …

A graphic promoting an exhibition. Below a row of black cutout star shapes, centered at the top of the image, in exuberant black text that has a hand-cut feel, are the words “Feeling Language” in all caps. Below that in a smaller size, the words “organized by Kate Laster”. In the left half of the graphic, a page from a book with swirling patterns is covered with ten rows of the handwritten phrase “You Are Here,” hand written in a beige cursive font in all caps. The name “Mitsuko Brooks” appears to the left. In the same font, a column on the right lists the artists participating in the exhibition. Each word is separated by a diamond or a star shape

NIAD Gallery Exhibition // “Feeling Language,” organized by Kate Laster

This show is all about comfort text: resilience in everyday words, writing and reading. Expression can also be wordless, the use of line and color as new vocabulary, pushing a thought out onto a surface, making marks and continuously trying to communicate with the world.

We tell stories to sustain ourselves and find each other. These messages embedded in art become an emotional telegram– a signal flare with a flame of memory trailing behind it. “Feeling Language” is about books, lists, slogans, language, gesture, touch and the trust given in sharing. Read More …

A portrait of a cat with red fur and an amused expression.

NIAD Online Exhibition // “I Belong To Myself” organized by Maria Seda-Reeder

Being an artist who helps bring new, radical ideas into the world is neither an easy nor simple task. So it takes a certain, special kind of magic—charisma, self-belief, instinct—to move through the world going against the grain, as innovative artists so often do. I’m honored to have the chance to put forth this small sampling of artists from NIAD, an organization that likewise is working at the forefront of contemporary art.  Read More …

NIAD artists on KALX radio

On Friday, July 29th, DJ Surface Tension invites KALX listeners to tune in to an ear-opening conversation with the “sounding artists” of NIAD Art Center as they discuss their most recent release Sounding Artists R Sweet and So R You.  Featured in this conversation are artists Luis Estrada, Christian Vassel, and Raven Harper. This studio compilation captures the rawness of NIAD’s community artists at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic. Recorded in early 2020 over the phone and in zoom, the outcome is equal parts poignant, hilarious, beautiful and boundary-pushing. Sounding Artists R Sweet and So R You is a sonic answer to the age old question: what is music? Find the Read More …

- A painting by Shantae Robinson: Untitled (P0084). Paint and collaged elements on a square canvas, arranged in a rough grid on a red background.

NIAD Online Exhibition // “Touching,” organized by Zachary Epcar

About Touching Touching brings together a selection of works that expand, contract, distort, and modify. Through this they make some sense of the world. They are texturally complex, engaging, thoughtful, and irreverent. They open up like portals; through a variety of materials and approaches they offer us windows to an elsewhere. About Zachary Epcar Zachary Epcar (b. San Francisco) is an experimental filmmaker whose work has 
screened at festivals, museums, microcinemas, and DIY venues worldwide. He lives in Oakland, California where he is a member of Light Field, an artist-run film programming collective based in the Bay Area. View Zachary Read More …

NIAD Online Exhibition // “Can’t Be Shook” selected by Alex Gartelmann

Posted onAuthorNIAD Art Center

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 …

NIAD Online Exhibition // “DreamForms” selected by Lauren Ari and Julio Del Rio

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About the exhibition This online NIAD exhibition is in conjunction with DreamForms, curated by Roberto Martinez, currently at the Richmond Art Center. It represents the ceramic visions of Julio del Rio and (myself) Lauren Ari.  I had the pleasure of being a painting instructor at NIAD where Julio Del Rio is a studio artist. I was inspired by the well of creativity, the open-heartedness and the community which is a sweet world unto itself.  It has been a joy to go back and choose these works to share with you!   “You may say I’m a dreamer but I’m not the only one Read More …

an arrangement of works by NIAD studio artists included in NIAD Holiday Gift Guide #5 - a red ceramic snake, a wrapped necklace, a watercolor of football helmets, a scarf, a weaving, a t shirt, a beaded necklace and a print

NIAD Holiday Gift Guide #5, collected by Dawline-Jane Oni-Eseleh

Posted onAuthorNIAD Art Center

About the collection Gift-giving can be so tricky! It can be hard to know if someone has an item already, if it will be useful, or if it’s something that maybe you like instead of the recipient.  When I choose a gift for someone, I try to focus on their interests or recent big events in their life  – did they just move into a new home? Are they always dressed to the nines? Do they love sending videos about cute animals?  I curated this shopping guide with those friends in mind, so whether you are buying a gift for your new Read More …

A two by three grid of six featured artworks in the "Color of Happiness" collection.

NIAD Holiday Gift Guide #2: “The Color of Happiness” collection by Rebecca Jantzen

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About “The Color of Happiness” collection “It was hard picking out [the collection] because there’s so many different styles and mediums. The happiness feeling is what they all have in common. People should buy art because it will make them feel happy!” About Rebecca Jantzen, the collector “I describe myself as visually impaired and learning disabled. I am a socially engaged artist who loves her art work. I love holidays and I like to make cards for special occasions. I like to draw things that brighten up my spirit and the day; images of peace, love and happiness. One of the reasons Read More …

NIAD Windows Exhibition: “Con Los Animales Estamos Conectados,” selected by Christo Oropeza

Posted onAuthorNIAD Art Center

About the exhibition:  I recently became a dog father of a small two-month-old puppy.  Over the months after his arrival, I have learned so much about myself through him: patience, being present in the moment, not holding people in time and space, and unconditional love.  I had no idea that this was the relationship that would be built between him and I, and it has rocked-my-socks off because of how much of a connection has and continues to develop.    Having worked with NIAD artists at SFMOMA’s Mini Mural Festival in the Summer of 2021, I was excited to do an Read More …

Online Exhibition: “Memory” organized by Ling Shang

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About the Exhibition Memory can be buried deep in our mind. It emerges at a quiet moment, when looking through a window on a peaceful afternoon, or while mixing in a noisy crowd. Memory can come in colors, in detail, or totally abstract. Powerful, but impossible to describe in words.The selected works can be any part in our memories: those sweet, lonely, joyful, silly, bitter, innocent, or nonsensical moments. About the Organizer Born in Beijing, my understanding and sense on art come from the rich memories of the seemingly long past and my present life in lively everyday reality. My Read More …

An ink drawing of floating hearts surrounded by smaller hearts, large floating flowers with hearts on the petals, flowers surrounded by flowers, all shapes filled with thin washes of color, blotched here and there. Some are colored with pencil. The colors are varied and bright. The artist's signature is in the bottom right corner.

Online Exhibition: “A Firmament in the Midst of the Waters” organized by Jay Youngdahl

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About the exhibition   Viewers can learn much from the work of NIAD artists. Their work offers the viewer a recognition that life is often a jumble of color and form.  Things arise, and often not in a linear or scientific manner. In reviewing the NIAD catalog, a religious/spiritual theme emerges.  Based on the conception of the beginning of the world found in the Old Testament book of Genesis, out of a chaos a world is born. Let there be light. About the organizer Jay Youngdahl is an artist, writer, and activist. For the past few decades he has made his Read More …

A black ink drawing, smudged in some areas, with three crowded rows of bees filling the bottom half and three rough rows of winged figures in the top half, jostling each other for space.

Online Exhibition: Ravel, organized by Danny Volk

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About the exhibition   Ravel is an exhibition of two and three dimensional work that attracts with loose references leaving the mind to give up meaning in the pursuit of possibility. Recommended listening to accompany the viewing of the exhibition: Maurice Ravel’s Boléro. About the organizer Danny Volk received a Master of Fine Arts in Visual Art from the University of Chicago (Chicago, IL) and a Bachelor of Arts in Theater Studies from Kent State University (Kent, OH). His recent exhibitions, screenings and performances include Mrs. Lincoln, What Did You Think of the Play at Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design (Milwaukee, WI), The News Gallery at SPACES (Cleveland, OH), The Read More …

Image: Untitled (D7526), Karen May.

Online Exhibition: Every Sing, selected by Jesse Malmed

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About the exhibition   Every SingSome SingAny SingThis Sing   Or what we might call singinging, both to and away from alongongs. This online exhibition brings together a series of works from some of the artists at NIAD that harmonize with singing things, through fan culture, instrument studies, exploded gig posters from a pole on the studio table, scores and how songs move. About the selector Jesse Malmed is an artist and curator working in video, performance, text, occasional objects and their gaps and laps over and under. 

Untitled (D8628), Saul Alegria.

Online Exhibition: Perfect Memory, selected by Justin Clifford Rhody

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About the exhibition “Our relationship with reality and life is that same relationship that exists between the satellite image and the actual earth.”  – Luigi Ghirri   “Our engagement with the picture, our questioning of it, shapes and defines the ways we draw meanings from it. Pictures tell stories only to the extent that we ask them to; and as our questions change, those stories do as well.”   – Martha A. Sandweiss About the selector Justin Clifford Rhody is an artist working in photography, filmmaking and sound. He currently lives in New Mexico with his partner and frequent collaborator Abigail Read More …

Untitled (D3615), Eddie Braught.

Online Exhibition: Group Chat, selected by Kate Rhoades & Katy Kondo

Posted onAuthorNIAD Art Center

About the exhibition Since we’re curating this show as a duo, we were drawn to work that deals with collaboration and togetherness. In the last year as we’ve been isolated from our larger communities, we have also been deeply entangled with the few people in our bubble. In this exhibition we present works that were produced through collaboration with those long gone, like Karen May’s Untitled which responds to Man Ray’s Larmes (Tears). We also included works considering groups, like the stoic duck couple in Danny Thach’s Untitled. With our social spheres out of whack, these artists have given us new ways to think about being Read More …

Untitled (D9706), Karen May

Online Exhibition: Bookends, selected by Ellen Lake

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About the exhibition   Bookend (plural bookends) A heavy object or moveable support placed at one or both ends of a row of books for the purpose of keeping them upright. … one of two things occurring or located at either end of something else. For this exhibition the ceramic works of Ann Meade and Saul Alegria are the supports holding together a shelf full of treasures by NIAD artists.   About the selector Ellen Lake is an interdisciplinary artist living in Oakland, California. Her work experiments with technology, explores archives and collections, returns time and again to painting and process, and ranges Read More …