Artist: Takeshi Nakayoshi

Title: Mythic Dance

Medium: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 40 x 40 in

Takeshi Nakayoshi is a is a Japanese Asian Modern & Contemporary painter.

From the artist's statement:

"These paintings are the result of my life searching process for getting to something neither I, nor other people, have ever seen before as a potentiality of color phenomena.

Artists need an original voice, When as a young man, I realized I did not yet have a such thing. So, from this point on I started from zero to find my own original voice. That was decades ago. I was under Diebenkorn's influence, attracted to his thin layering upon transparent gestural strokes, which I found myself fascinated by, and thought it was important for the destiny of my future painting. I first combined my investigation with Latin flavored color, since I very much preferred Latin subtle color. My formula was LATIN x ABSTRACT = Takeshi Nakayoshi."

Artist: Amy Ahlstrom

Title: Used to #2

Medium: Silk and cotton quilt

Dimensions: 12 x 12 x 1.5 in

I am a textile artist creating modern, conceptual pop-art quilts. The common thread in my quilts is often text; I utilize words to convey meaning and as visual elements. My background as a graphic designer and illustrator informs my process; I design my work digitally, then make patterns and cut images to create appliquéd quilts. They are fused together and quilted using hand-guided machine quilting; I "draw" on the quilt with thread, guiding the quilt under the needle. This quilt, Used To #2, was created in the fall of 2019. It is about my experience living with chronic anxiety and episodic depression; it is a self-portrait that is slowly fragmenting. I made this quilt when my depression returned, inspired by the song "Used To" by the band Wire; "Does the pain remain when the head is turned/And the body walks away?/You used to know". With this quilt I hope to convey the feelings of disembodiment and detachment that can occur during my depressive episodes. Since 2019, I have been creating quilts that honestly address mental health while celebrating creativity and resilience. I am designing visual representations of my personal experience with anxiety and depression in hopes that viewers with mental health conditions feel seen, and to create a space in which mental health can be discussed openly, free from stigma and judgement.

Artist: Tomas Nakada

Title: Modern Setts

Medium: Oil on wood

Dimensions: 24 X 22 in

From the artist's statement: "Art cannot be fully understood through science or philosophy. It is its own way of exploring the world and ourselves. Art shows us who we are and challenges us to see things differently. It helps us break free from our everyday routines."

Artist: Anne Veraldi

Title: The Year of the Rat

Medium: C-print

Dimensions: 20 X 30 in

This piece is from a series of photos using found toys to depict the 12 Chinese zodiac signs.

"I believe that mental healthcare is an under funded and under utilized part our healthcare system. Access Institute provides an important mission to provide mental healthcare to all especially low income clients. "

Artist: Christina Xu

Title: Kept Wild

Medium: Acrylic on canvas

Dimensions: 48 X 48 in

From the artist's statement: "As a first generation American, I have spent most of my time and energy understanding what it means to belong to a place where one doesn't have roots: a common anxiety that many may face, be they immigrants or not. As I honor certain aspects of my life as an Asian woman and as a child to immigrant parents, my conversations with my pieces evolve, and I grow through the relationships I have with myself and the world.

In my role as an artist, I highlight the beauty that already exists; beauty that often gets the least amount of representation. I paint people-people of color, women, students, workers-the pillars of society. I paint to represent my culture, my community, and to facilitate a conversation between piece and viewer. I hope my paintings evoke feelings of joy and wonder and that those feelings evolve into reflection and exploration. "

Artist: Laine Justice

Title: Kitten Bird Clouds | Pink Sky

Medium: Watercolor and ink on hot press paper

Dimensions: 22 X 30 in

From the artist's statement: "I am an intuitive maker working in painting, textiles, bookmaking, and more. Markmaking over extended periods of time, I create sculpted, emotive animal landscapes. Composed of overlayed creatures shifting identity and form, marks and hybrid animals push and pull to recenter us while we recenter them back into landscape, or further into abstraction. Raw pigment, drawing and impasto combined with spectral materials like mini glass mosaic, give surfaces sheen and texture that bounce animals back and forth between conflicting visual planes, creating image within image. ?Pareidolia is the concept we are all so familiar with: staring up at the sky, searching, and finding a familiar shape in the clouds. Even though it's autonomous we often ask someone, do you see that too? My work explores these these imaginative, elusive spaces and their intersection with our sense of place and self. The spirit of the wild, ecological world with our human, emotional worlds, passing through the personal lens of trauma and disability. The role of curiosity and play which provides endless possibilities, questions, and answers as we relate to ourselves and each other is ever present in my work: always asking, "I'm right here" and "what do you see?"."

Artists: Sandow Birk & Elyse Pignolet

Title: AK-47 Palmette #1/ 99 Names of God Series

Medium: Ink and gouache on paper

Dimensions: 30 x 22 in

From the artist's statement: "Sandow Birk has been concerned with the politics of contemporary life since graduating from the Otis Art Institute in 1988. With an emphasis on social issues, frequent themes of his past work have included inner city violence, graffiti, politics and civil rights, travel, war, and prisons, as well as surfing.

In 2023, Birk's work will be featured at Crystal Bridges Museum of Art, Detroit Institute for the Arts, and San Jose Museum of Art, among others. In 2022, Birk's White Out: New Paintings for the US Capitol debuted at Catharine Clark Gallery.

In 2001, Birk began collaborating with Elyse Pignolet. Pignolet is an American with Filipino heritage who attended California State University, San Francisco and graduated in 2007 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from California State University, Long Beach.
Birk has worked with Mullowney Printing since 2004 and has been represented by Catharine Clark Gallery, San Francisco, since 1994.