Come meet Oakland textile artist Alice Beasley and Berkeley illustrator and urban sketcher Cathy Raingarden at their NOT TO BE MISSED art reception in the Exhibition Room at the Castro Valley Center for the Arts on Saturday, March 2, 3:30-5:00pm. Local artist and musician Susan Sarti will entertain with jazz piano and refreshments will be served.
Alice’s quilts celebrate the human condition in pieces that both intrigue and inspire the viewer. She comments, “I am often drawn to telling hard facts with this soft medium; reveling in the irony of making political statements using grandma’s tools.” Black History Month and the politicians in the news are the subjects of many of the quilts on display.
Alice’s work has been exhibited in many venues throughout the United States including the de Young Museum in San Francisco, The Textile Museum in Washington, D.C., the American Folk Art Museum in New York City, and the Smithsonian Anacostia Community Museum, as well as abroad in Madrid, France, Japan, Namibia, and Croatia. Her work has been purchased or commissioned by the City and County of San Francisco, the de Young Museum, the United States Embassy, the County of Alameda, Kaiser Hospital, Highland Hospital, and the Sunnyvale Medical Centre.
Cathy Raingarden’s sketches of familiar Castro Valley haunts such as Rudy’s Donut House, Al’s Market, and Lake Chabot fill the Lobby of the Center for the Arts. Cathy’s subjects are anywhere she wanders. This past year’s inspirations included New Zealand, Columbia, all over the Bay Area, and always Castro Valley where she used to live. Cathy has a full page in every issue of THE VALLEY, always a Castro Valley scene, and this month it is of the Castro Valley Center for the Arts. Cathy explains that urban sketchers draw from real life rather than in a studio. Last year she filled a dozen sketchbooks, “from the mundane to the marvelous.” Cathy’s enthusiasm for sketching is infectious. She hosts a monthly group, First Saturday Urban Sketching, and would love to talk to guests about how to get started. Her materials are on display.
All featured works of art are for sale. A portion of the sales will go to the Castro Valley Arts Foundation toward supporting arts in the school and community.