SILENT AUCTION ARTISTS | Art Alliance

Meet our Silent Auction Participating Artists

"Blurred Boundaries"

Monotype

Helen Bell, n.a.w.a.

Planning a career in advertising, Helen Bell pursued double majors of Art and English at Western Maryland College (now McDaniel), continued her studies at the Maryland Institute of Art and was awarded a scholarship of one year to the Telfair Academy of Arts and Sciences (now Savannah College of Art and Design) in Savannah, Georgia. Her art has varied over the years to include oil painting, printmaking, metal sculpture and assemblage as well as mixed media works.

Commissions include Sheraton Raincross Hotel, Ronald Mac Donald House, March Air Reserve Base, Redlands National Bank and multiple private commissions. Her work was chosen for the corporate rental program of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Solo Exhibits include Rizzoli International, South Coast Plaza, Zola Fine Art, Los Angeles, EOS Gallery, Redlands, Sandstone Gallery, Laguna Beach, Riverside Art Museum (two: one contemporary, one plein air) and Mission San Juan Capistrano. Her quick pick plein-air “Julia’s Door” was highlighted for the 80th anniversary of the museum’s architectural gem in Posters and Giclées.

The artist is a juried member of the National Association of Women Artists founded in 1889 and the California Art Club founded in1909. The artist is included in “Who’s Who in the West” and “The California Art Review.” Her contemporary work is represented by the A Gallery, Palm Desert, California.

"Inner Bloom"

Medium Linoleum Cut Relief Print

Jesus Cruz, Jr.

I am an artist specializing in creating fine art prints using the linoleum cut process. My prints are created with the traditional technique of using knives to carve blocks of linoleum. My style is identifiable by my use of thick and solid fields of ink. The prints often combine figurative and abstract elements with a clean and crisp look. Many of the cuts create different degrees of gray and black imagery.

Chick Curtis

The gift of art comes in many facets. Probably in as many ways as there are personalities. Making art, teaching art, understanding art, interpreting art, preserving art and even selling it are some of the more common aspects.

I think I was born to make art and learn about it. Maybe to teach it as well.

I started painting when I was 50. With no formal art training at that time I have had to rely on enthusiasm and endurance to gain enough knowledge to create the kind of imagery in my mind on canvas.

I can’t begin to voice all that is in my mind. Suffice it to say, what you see in my art is a glimpse into my consciousness and sensibility on a continuing basis. People, ideas, irony, intimacy, anachronism, connection and subtle humor. The human form is one of the most intriguing, wondrous and complex subjects I can think of. It houses our essence. I love to interpret the life force within through the form on the outside.

The only the thing extraordinary about my art is that it’s not really mine. It’s a gift that is passing through me without any choice on my part. I just learn about it, develop it, and enjoy it.

I thank all my fellow artists and my family for their inspiration and guidance in helping me find more ways to express what I see and feel through my art.

"Winter in Montauk"

Oil

Ed Gomez

Ed Gomez is an artist, educator, curator, and cofounder of the MexiCali Biennial. Based in Los Angeles and San Bernardino, he has co-curated transnational, artist-centered exhibitions since the Biennial’s founding in 2006. He co-directs the MXCL BNL LAB, the Biennial’s new research and exhibition space, and hosts the PARA/normal Borders podcast. His work has been shown nationally and internationally, including at HilbertRaum (Berlin), Galeri MOD (Istanbul), and Centro Cultural Paso del Norte (Ciudad Juárez). He is coeditor of MexiCali Biennial: Art, Actions, and Exchanges Since 2006, a forthcoming publication marking the project’s twenty-year history. Gomez is a Professor of Art and Design at California State University, San Bernardino. He holds a BFA from Arizona State University and an MFA from Otis College of Art and Design.

"SG, 2022"

Acrylic on Paper and Wood

"Gracious 1"

Acrylic on Wood Panel

Karen Kauffman

Southern California artist Karen Kauffman was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She spent part of her childhood living in a remote Cree Indian village in Canada. The profound beauty there instilled a deep appreciation for nature, which has strongly influenced her art.

After moving to Southern California, Kauffman went on to study art and design at Art Center College of Design and California State University, Fullerton.

Kauffman works primarily in acrylic on large wood panels, and also works with printmaking, which allows her the freedom and spontaneity of expression for her gestural abstractions.

Kauffman’s work has been exhibited in the Netherlands, Poland and the Czech Republic. Her work is recognized regionally with exhibitions in Palm Springs, Los Angeles, San Diego, and Las Vegas.

Artist Statement

In my approach to painting, it’s like solving a complex visual puzzle. I have no preconceived idea of what the end piece will be. I simply make marks quickly, one after another, in order to override conscious thought, while listening intently to those inner promptings. I embed meaning through shape, line and color, communicating what I cannot verbally express. I continually turn the paintings, around and upside down, as I work, in order to ensure they are balanced compositionally from every direction. The oval and circle have become particularly important to me, emerging often in my recent work. They symbolize, to me, wholeness, the eternal, the sacred feminine and the unity of all.

"Gracious 4"

Acrylic on Wood Panel

Sant Khalsa

Sant Khalsa is an artist and activist whose work develops from a mindful inquiry into complex environmental and societal issues. Her artworks are internationally exhibited and published, as well as collected by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Getty, National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh, Center for Creative Photography in Tucson, Nevada Museum of Art in Reno, and UCR California Museum of Photography, among others. She was honored with the California Arts Council Individual Artist Fellowship Legacy Award (2023-24). Her artworks are published in many books including two monographs, Sant Khalsa: Crystal Clear || Western Waters (Minor Matters, 2022) and Sant Khalsa: Prana - Life with Trees (Griffith Moon, 2019) and compilations including Wild Visions: Imaging and Imagining the American Wilderness (Yale University Press, 2022), Photography and Environmental Activism (Routledge, 2022), Embodied Forest (ecoartspace, 2021), In the Sunshine of Neglect (Inlandia Institute, 2018), and Altered Landscape: Photographs of a Changing Environment (Skira/Rizzoli, 2011). She recently curated the Getty supported PST ART: Art & Science Collide exhibition Desert Forest: Life with Joshua Trees at MOAH Lancaster and co-edited the book of the same title. She is a Professor of Art, Emerita at California State University, San Bernardino, and lives in Joshua Tree.

"Yucca Valley, California, 1989"

Gelatin Silver Print

Denise Kraemer

Denise Kraemer of Riverside is a native of the Inland Empire. She served as the Education Curator at the Riverside Art Museum in Riverside, California for 3 years, where she organizes the adult education programs, monthly lecture series and member critiques. Kraemer curated the printmaking exhibition Pressed at the Riverside Art Museum and has worked with the museum's "Monothon" workshop and exhibition for 4 years. Kraemer received her BA in Art from California Baptist University and her MA in Art at California State University San Bernardino.

Kraemer had a solo exhibition at Riverside Art Musuem, worked with the Arts Connection and Mil Tree in Joshua Tree, Ca, juried the Ink & Clay show at CalPoly Pomona. She also teaches workshops at Division 9 gallery, Riverside Art Museum, and a retired professor at Riverside Community College and California State University at San Bernardino.

"Another Path"

Monoprint on Muslin with Handwork

Matthew Luther

Matthew Luther is a multimedia artist working in Riverside, California. His studio work ranges from printmaking to video and draws inspiration from landscapes and everyday nuances. His artwork often explores the human relationship to nature and the connection of visual imagery to
memory.

Luther’s work is a playful approach to illusion and surface. Photographs are used in combination with printmaking techniques to create paintings that investigate concepts of abstraction, memory, human ideology, and digital consciousness in connection with nature. Original paintings and prints are scanned at a high resolution, reframed, altered, printed, and then finished with gold leaf, paint, or screen-printed imagery on top of the printed surface.

Matthew is originally from Virginia and studied art in Oregon and Wisconsin. Along with international exhibitions in China, Italy, and South Korea, Luther has been a visiting Artist-in-Residence in Iceland, Sweden, Norway, and Finland.

"Tale of Two Birds"

Acrylic, Screen Print Medium, Diamond Dust, Gold Leaf on Panel

Lisabeth Mertins

Lisabeth Mertins is a life-long artist beginning in the 1980s as a staff illustrator for newspapers, magazines and children’s books. In 2009, returning to school, she found a passion for printmaking and ceramic works leading to selling pieces in galleries. Currently, you can find her work at Chemer’s Gallery in Tustin, CA where she is a represented artist.

"Self Portrait"

Mixed Media

Sue Mitchell

Sue Mitchell, co-founder of Riverside Personnel, recently retired after 45 years. Sue serves on the board of the Riverside Art Museum (RAM) and is the founder of “The 52 Project” here at the museum.

Sue had dabbled at taking art classes for 50 years. In 2012, she decided to take a 52-week sabbatical during her 60th year around the sun, and concentrate on a lifelong dream of becoming an artist. She started by developing and journaling an exhibition concept. This led to her writing an exhibit proposal following the guidelines she found on RAM’s website. Her two-gallery concept was accepted and her exhibition “52” opened on her 61th birthday.

During the exhibition, Sue was in residence spending a lot of time interacting with visitors and one of the things she discovered was she was not alone in her desire to explore her creative dreams.

Sue’s second proposal to RAM was “The 52 Project”, a user-friendly way for busy people to be more artful on a regular basis. A unique feature of the program is that they teach basic proposal writing and all of “The 52 Project” members are able to submit a proposal for a mini exhibit. The submittals are juried and 8-10 proposals are accepted each year.

The 52 Project just started its tenth year. Over 425 people have participated and 101 mini exhibitions have been juried in and exhibited at RAM.

Donna Moran

"Parallel Tables"

Mixed Media

John O'Brien

Born into a military family in Sagamihara, Japan, John David O’Brien was raised in many cities in the USA and later a significant portion of his life in Italy. With an MFA in studio art from the University of Southern California, an AA.BB. degree from the Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma, Rome, a Magistero degree from the Istituto Statale D’Arte di Urbino, Urbino, Italy and was qualified as a Master Printer by the Calcografia Nazionale (National Etching Institute) in Rome, Italy. He creates new and site specific artwork for gallery/project exhibitions which he has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in Los Angeles, Rome and New York among other locations, in venues ranging from commercial galleries to artist-run spaces, and non-profit institutions. He has received numerous public art commissions and was the recipient of a California Community Foundation Artist Fellowship, a City of Los Angeles Artist Grant and a Fulbright Research Grant.

"Gustare, 2024"

Steel, 2 Part Epoxy and Acrylic Paint

Mark Schooley

For over fifty years Mark Schooley has been creating an exhibiting his artwork. His work has been exhibited both locally and internationally. Schooley is one of the founders of the non-profit
Riverside Community Arts Association in Riverside, California. Their activities primarily take place at the RCAA Gallery in downtown Riverside. Over the last thirty-six years the RCAA has organized over 700 exhibits and events in the Inland Empire, as well as Riverside’s eight international sister cities. Mark’s artwork is a fusion of art history involving the exploration of abstraction and figurative visions.

"Figures Through the Window"

Acrylic

Debi Varvi

I’m a multidisciplinary artist in the heart of Riverside, California. I love the meditative rhythm of color pencils, the spontaneity of watercolors, the electric current of line work, the anticipation of pulling the print off an etched plate, and the intimacy of a henna application. The strange and unusual, the weird and bizarre delight me. My educational journey has included college courses, private instruction, workshops, and the university of YouTube. I’ve been fortunate to be featured in several group shows, had a couple of solo shows, and am currently working towards several gallery shows for later this year, and in 2026. If you’d like to see more of my work, please visit my website, www.debivarvistudio.com or my social media page on Instagram @debivarvistudio.

"Forbidden Fruit"

Vintage Map, Color Pencil, Metal Foil, Henna Paste, Acrylic Paint

Katrin Wiese

My work is about people and imagination, that wonderful humanity that gets happy just looking at
a color or the expression on a face. My paintings have been exhibited in solo and group shows across the country. My painted sculptures have been featured in the museum shops of MOCA, Walker Art Center, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, The Menil Collection, Boise Art Museum, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Guggenheim Museum, among others. I've taught art at CSUSB, Redlands University, La Sierra University, Mira Costa College, and (a long time ago) at RAM.

Artist's Statement

I have to agree with the dancer Twyla Tharp: "Art is the only way to run away without leaving home."

Acrylic on Wood with Collaged Edge