San Jose artists Deborah Ikeda and Eileen Wong Cervera both had tech careers before embarking on their “second lives” as artists.
Now Ikeda uses a kiln to create fused glass pieces such as bowls, platters and “gems” that she sets in sterling silver jewelry, while Cervera creates oil paintings inspired from photographs that hold meaning for her.
Ikeda and Cervera are two of the more than 375 visual artists from the Bay Area who will be participating in the 2024 Silicon Valley Open Studios (SVOS), the highest number of artists in the event’s 38-year history.
SVOS gives art lovers and collectors behind-the-scenes access to established and emerging artists from South San Francisco to Gilroy and Pacifica to Half Moon Bay. One of the largest Bay Area fine arts shows open to the public, this free event features painting, sculpture, jewelry, photography, woodworking, mixed media, pastels, pottery, metalwork, textile art and more.
“Artists are thriving here in the Bay Area, and Silicon Valley Open Studios is excited to support them,” said Stephen Toll, president of Silicon Valley Visual Arts, organizers of SVOS. “It’s a wonderful opportunity to come out and experience local artists’ creations and support their work.”
Silicon Valley Open Studios 2024 will be held the first three weekends in May, highlighting artists from a different region each weekend.
May 4-5: Coastal and Northern Peninsula
Before Foster City sculpture artist Barbara M. Berk discovered her passion for working with metal, she earned a master’s degree in Russian history and worked in magazine publishing for more than 15 years. Eventually, she was introduced to antique jewelry and began creating sculptural jewelry with precious metals that she wove by hand, and 20 years later she was making lace out of industrial metals and using it to create metal sculptures.
Berk’s work is represented in the permanent collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and has been exhibited locally in the de Young Museum in San Francisco, ACCI Gallery in Berkeley, the Santa Cruz Art League and Sebastopol Center for the Arts.
San Bruno artist Michael Kesselman says his artwork is “simple and accessible.”
“My sculptures portray common objects in unexpected forms, He adds. “In their oddity, they attempt to define the essence of things by disrupting our expectations. Is a chair with five legs still a chair? What happens when two eggs sit at the helm of a beater?”
Kesselman’s sculpture fits with his definition of art in general, which he says is “the opposite of monotony in the extreme.”
May 11-12: Midpeninsula
Mountain View artist Kathy Bonte launched YellowRose, her wearable art line, in the fall of 2016. She works with a variety of materials, including up-cycled metal, cast-off zippers, hardware store items and a plethora of leather and textile swatches discarded by the interior design community. Bonte is the board chair of the Silicon Valley nonprofit Fabmo, which diverts discarded designer materials from the landfill and inspires creative reuse.
Her work has been featured at several Bay Area artisan and holiday fairs, including Art in the Park in downtown Los Altos, the DeYoung Museum in San Francisco and retail establishments including Shady Lane Gallery in Menlo Park.
May 18-19: South Bay
Cupertino artist Kathleen Mitchell is a native of the Santa Clara Valley “before there was a Silicon Valley.”
“Nature is a constant source of inspiration for me,” Mitchell says, adding that regardless of subject matter, she enjoys the challenge of “creating something that is new but also familiar.”
“I love being able to see the history of marks and content emerge through layers of pigment and textures. Creating a new image that is a fusion of old and new is a surprising and intriguing journey.”
Mitchell has exhibited at the Triton Museum of Art in Santa Clara, and in national juried shows. She is a signature member of the California Watercolor Society and currently exhibits at Viewpoints Gallery in Los Altos and Studio Gallery in San Francisco.
Yuting Wang is a watercolor artist specialize in portrait and figure paintings. She was born and grew up in Beijing, China, and now lives in Sunnyvale. She lived and studied in Israel for four years before she came to the United States in 2014.
Wang says her artistic style is shaped by her multicultural background. As a child, she learned traditional Chinese painting and calligraphy. Later on she was trained in various ateliers for realistic sketching and oil painting. She thinks of her art as an alchemy of Eastern and Western aesthetics. While she mainly uses Western watercolor paper and brushes, she also incorporates traditional Chinese and Japanese brushes to create interesting textures.
Her most recent body of work is a series of paintings based on the 24 solar terms of the Chinese lunar calendar. The idea of this series originated from her own journey of finding harmony in the mind and body, and reconnecting to the rhythm of nature.
“I love glass,” says Los Gatos artist April Maiten. “I love the play of light as it passes through and reflects off of glass. This love has led me to the art of mosaics and fused glass.”
Maiten creates indoor and outdoor, functional and nonfunctional, works of art.
“My art is just as much about the process as the product,” she says. “I have to find just the right pieces to make it all come together the way I envision it, so this can be a long process. I enjoy combining glass and fused glass because it enhances the texture that I love so much. I am open to using a great variety of found objects, including computer parts, in my artwork.”
Maiten belongs to the Society of American Mosaic Artists and Los Altos Art Club, and is the founding member of Full Spectrum Mosaic Artists of Silicon Valley.
Saratoga photographer Gale Ensign has found the transition from film to digital images intriguing.
“I process my images on my computer, where I complete my vision digitally. I try, with the use of the computer, to use the same methods I had long used in the darkroom to enhance my images, and love the flexibility and control I have gained. To me, this is the perfect marriage of old and new technology. I print the final image on canvas or fine art rag paper to archival standards.”
Campbell artist Jeff Owen says his sculptures combine the past and the present.
“I have a deep affinity toward the materials I work with,” he adds, “for what the material was once used for and now what it will become in my hands. These feelings direct me on my path. … When a sculpture encompasses all of my creative energy, it is finished.”
Owen works to create unique sculpture. “I resist conformity and mass production,” he says.
To see an interactive map of the artist locations, view a gallery of all the participating artists, and learn about their work, visit https://svos.org.