Silicon Valley Open Studios at The Art Center of Redwood City and San Carlos

Attention art enthusiasts! If you would like to enjoy the work of local artists and possibly enhance your art collection, visit The Art Center of Redwood City and San Carlos on Saturday, May 14th and Sunday, May 15th from 11:00am to 5:00pm. There will be hundreds of original works of art on display to enjoy, as well as refreshments. Thirteen artists are participating in the 30th Annual SVOS, including Lynne Auld, Rebecca Bangs, Teresa Beyer, Shirley Bunger, Laurie Johnson Lepkowska, Sylvia Lichtenger, Kerith Lisi, Yucali Seki, Fleur Spolidor, Robin Stearns, Cindy Stokes, Donna Wocher and Kari Zinser. The Art Center (Site #18) is located at 1700 Industrial Road in San Carlos. Feel free to stop by beforehand to pick up a SVOS catalog and get a sneak peek at some of the art that will be on display.

More information is available at www.theartctr.org and www.svos.org.

For Lynne Auld, photography and travel have been the constants in her life. Auld uses minimal equipment to capture piercing instances in time. Auld finds inspiration in the quiet moments of everyday living, and sees beauty in the mundane, no matter where she is.

Teresa Beyer paints soft, soulful representations of a world filled with beauty, serenity and love. Recently, Beyer has been inspired to create portraits that capture her subject’s emotions and incorporate meaningful icons. Beyer prefers to work in watercolor, while also exploring new media.

Rebecca Bangs uses pointillism to create breathtaking depictions of nature. Using simple dots and vibrant colors Bangs captures her most joyful moments. She creates her landscapes and florals by applying five to seven layers of paint dots, developing a richness that stops people from a distance and entices them to come closer to see the lush, interconnected layers.

Shirley Bunger’s mixed media work celebrates the ephemera of our lives, granting it new life and meaning in her beautiful mixed media pieces. She uses books, magazines, letters, photos and bits of paper, all items that once held great meaning for someone, and a range of techniques, from collage to sewing to printmaking, to reconfigure and reconnect these discarded pieces. The resulting works reveal a rich perspective on the world – one that both celebrates and challenges nostalgia, and ultimately embraces a sense of hope.

Laurie Johnson Lepkowska is both an artist and an art teacher at The Art Center and through the Adult Art Education program at Filoli Mansion. Lepkowska’s work includes both stunning figurative and still life oil paintings. Creating art has been a critical part of Lepkowska’s life since the age of 12, and has allowed her to travel much of the US and France. “If I walk into a studio anywhere in the world, and smell those smells, I know I’m home and in the company of friends.”

Bi-Coastal artist Sylvia Lichtenger has masterfully tied her training as a New York City artist with California attitudes. She began by painting portraits for family, friends and their children and has over the years added landscapes and cityscapes to her repertoire. Now, Lichtenger works from photographs to explore her memories of New York City. Lichtenger strives to interpret the tension between skyscrapers, nature, and the fundamental loneliness of the human experience.

Mixed media artist Kerith Lisi finds subtle beauty in the worn fragments of discarded and found materials. Working on paper and wood panel, Lisi incorporates images, textures, colors and text from old books to create an intimate conversation with the viewer. Lisi makes use of artifacts of modern life to weave together a narrative that begs the audience to participate through their engagement with the piece.

Built up from layers of bold textures and subtle layers of color, Yucali Seki’s mixed media paintings on canvas entice the viewer with their physicality and presence. Each of Yucali's works reflects a moment that has a positive transforming impact on the mind. Yucali finds inspiration in the beauty of nature and cultures. Yucali uses the fluidity of calligraphy to capture the trace of movements found in nature, martial arts movements and the human psyche.

Since moving from France to the United States 12 years ago, Fleur Spolidor has been researching and painting the history of the Bay Area. Her new body of work, “Alice,” represents the schizophrenic state of this ever-changing city by interweaving “Alice in Wonderland” with the history of San Francisco. “It is fascinating to observe how it can go from one extreme to the other in less than 250 years. In a sense Alice is you, me, anyone who lives or works in the Bay Area and has to adapt or face its challenges.” Spolidor also teaches art classes in French for adults and children.

After facing years of drama that comes from legal and political battles, Robin Stearns turned to oil painting as a way to exorcise the world’s evils. Stearns’ paintings make use of traditional techniques to explore the depths of joy and despair. She focuses on portraiture because to her, nothing is more important that the human condition. Stearns founded the San Carlos Art Academy in 2015 and offers classes for children and teens interested in painting. To Stearns, teaching children to communicate is the most powerful gift we can give them.

The photography of Cindy Stokes focuses on found objects and spaces, with a strong leaning toward abstraction as a metaphor for the uncertainty in life. To Stokes, abstract images simply seem more true than literal depictions of the world. In wrangling order out of chaos from messy subjects, Stokes frequently changes the subject’s story, from stone to flesh or tree branches to blood vessels. “I suppose it’s not surprising that my images sometimes produce as much uncertainty in others as they dispel for me.”

Donna Wocher makes art to express, release and remember, creating a permanent remnant of her experience. She combines acrylic, watercolor and textured marks in her mixed media and watercolor paintings. Wocher sometimes starts with a clear idea of a finished piece and makes a small collage or rending as a model. In other instances, she starts with a feeling state and begins to layer paint, line and textured marks. Drawing on images from dreams, nature and myths, Wocher creates bold abstractions and luminous symbolic images. Her use of bright and vibrant colors invites the viewer to experience an energetic vitality.

From her early days in the visual arts to her formal training as a musician, Kari Zinser has always seen images and music as synonymous. Zinser looks at artwork and senses something intrinsically musical: a vibration, a tone, an internal hum that resonates with the atmosphere of a piece. “Music has become my muse, infusing what and how I see, often dictating composition, color, and mood. I am also informed by all of the realities of living on this earth: the chaotic mix of beauty and ugliness, sorrow and joy which exists in large and small amounts around us every day simultaneously.”

Whether you are an art lover, collector, looking to discover local artists or take a peek inside a working art studio, be sure to come and check out these thirteen studios at The Art Center of San Carlos and Redwood City.