TRACEY BENSON 
COLETTE CRUTCHER  
ULLA DE LARIOS   
OLIVIA EIELSON 
ELLEN FARIS   
PAMELA FINGADO   
MARC ELLEN HAMEL
CHARLOTTA HAUKSDOTTIR
MAJ-BRITT HILSTROM
DEBRA JEWELL
KAREN OLSEN
PERNILLA PERSSON

DIANE RUSNAK
HELENE SOBOL    
BARBARA STEVENS STRAUSS
HELENA TIAINEN
JENNY M.L. WANTUCH

LEE WILLIAMS

MARCH 30 - MAY 18, 2019
OPENING RECEPTION: SATURDAY, MARCH 30, 2019 FROM 4-7PM
GALLERY TALK: 6PM 

THINK ROUND FINE ARTS
2140 BUSH STREET, SUITE 1, SAN FRANCISCO CA 94115
( BETWEEN FILLMORE AND WEBSTER. GALLERY ENTRANCE IS ON THE DRIVEWAY.)  

GALLERY HOURS: 9AM-12PM MONDAY THROUGH FRIDAY AND BY APPOINTMENT

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Think Round Fine Arts is pleased to present Nordic Light, a group exhibition of two-and three-dimensional works by members of Nordic 5 Arts, a group of Bay Area artists of Scandinavian heritage. The exhibition will open Saturday March 30, 2019 with a public reception from 4-7PM. The artists will be present to welcome visitors and will host a talks about their artworks at 6PM. The exhibition will be up through May 18, 2019.

Nordic Five Arts is a group of professional artists born in Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden, and American artists of Scandinavian descent.

Connections to that heritage are expressed in their work through a deep feeling for landscape, a bond with the cycles of nature, and a spare and elegant design sense. In this exhibition they explore the theme of Nordic Light. Painter Helena Tiainen says: “My spirit is particularly drawn to the long days and magical nights of the Midsummer time, Juhannus in Finland. During this time of the year, birds sing all night long ... The sun never sets, it only dips right below the horizon and the nocturnal twilight lasts a very short while.”Charlotta Hauksdottir adds: The physical space of landscapes can be closely tied to a person’s identity, and infused with personal history. In my digital collage series “Imprints”, the visible and obscured parts of the landscape suggest... the imperfections of memory... The images speak to our individual responsibility for our impressions upon nature.”The collection of two-and three-dimensional works is unified by finely-tuned craftsmanship and a strong and subtle color palette.

Each work is accompanied by an artist’s statement describing the influence of Nordic culture, and of the land itself, on the individual’s creative process. Works include video pieces by Tracey Benson, paintings, photos, prints and collages by Olivia Eielson, Ellen Faris, Pam Fingado, Marc Ellen Hamel,Charlotta Hauksdottir, Debra Jewell, Karen Olsen, Pernilla Persson, Diane Rusnak, Helene Sobol, Helena Tiainen, Jenny Wantuch and Lee Williams, ceramic sculpture by Colette Crutcher and Barbara Stevens Strauss, marble wall reliefs by Maj-Britt Hilstrom, and textile art by Ulla De Larios.

MARK ROLLER

RECENT WORK:
PAINTINGS AND DRAWINGS

MARK ROLLER

RECENT WORK
PAINTINGS AND DRAWINGS

FEBRUARY 6 - MARCH 23, 2019

OPENING RECEPTION: SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2019 FROM 5-8 PM
ARTIST'S WALK THROUGH: 6:30 PM

THINK ROUND FINE ARTS
2140 BUSH STREET, SUITE 1, SAN FRANCISCO CA 94115
(BETWEEN FILLMORE AND WEBSTER. GALLERY ENTRANCE IS ON THE DRIVEWAY.)
GALLERY HOURS: 9 AM-12 PM MONDAY THROUGH FRIDAY AND BY APPOINTMENT

Think Round Fine Arts is pleased to present Recent Works, a new exhibition of "serial portraits" of his wife, Colette Crutcher. The exhibition will open February 6, 2019 with a public reception on February 9 from 5-8 PM. The artist will be present to welcome visitors and will host a walk through his paintings and drawings at 6:30 PM. The exhibition will be up through March 23, 2019.

Mark Roller states, "Doing a series of works, over a long period, has allowed me to attempt to represent Colette, in many different aspects, as whole person. Of course, this attempt will always remain just that, an attempt, the goal elusive, the results provisional...

I hope that my work, with its admittedly peculiar single-mindedness, does impinge on some larger issues, most especially the problematical history of male representations of women. The privileging of the 'male gaze' and the objectification of women in Western image making seems, to me, to be the consequences of a process of generalization in which women are reduced to stereo- (or arche-) types. By being as specific as I possibly can be, I want to counteract this pernicious generalizing impulse, so that the result is not more depictions of 'Woman', or depictions which make some statement about 'women' as a class. Rather, my ambition is to confront the viewer with an evocation of an individual, a full-fledged person who happens to be a woman (as I happen to be a man). 

In certain pieces, Colette's gender is thematically important, even central; in other pieces, it's not significant at all. Can the male desire to make images of women, which seems so deeply rooted (in our culture, at least), be redeemed in this fashion? I don't know, but it seems worth trying."

MARK ROLLER’S ARTIST STATEMENT

In the late 1980’s I began a project which quickly became the sole focus of my work: what I call a “serial portrait” of a single person, Colette Crutcher, my wife. Starting with a desire to document the physical and psychological changes she underwent while pregnant with our first child I became fascinated by the possibilities inherent in an ongoing depiction of an individual through time; time being the dimension missing from a conventional portrait. Doing a series of works, over a long period, has allowed me to attempt to represent Colette, in many different aspects, as a whole person. Of course, this attempt will always remain just that, an attempt, the goal elusive, the results provisional.

Rather than dealing in the objective facts of Colette’s life. I want. Instead, to convey as completely as I can, my understanding of her subjective experience, through the medium of her body, the outward manifestation of her inward self. Poses and gestures, and indeed, all of the other elements in a sculpture or painting, are meant to express a state of mind or emotion, especially those states which recur and are therefore most characteristic of Colette. However, in my slow-witted way, I’ve come to recognize how much of myself leaks into the work, no matter how much I want it to be about her paradoxically my portrait of Colette becomes a self-portrait as well. Although I find this troublesome, I accept it as unavoidable. People sometimes assume the work is a self-portrait by Colette herself, but I have no interest in encouraging that mistake. The work is most definitely a portrait—done by an observer looking at his subject from the outside, getting things wrong and filling in the blanks with his own subjective materials. (Colette saw the inevitability of this from the outset.)

I hope that my work, with its admittedly peculiar single-mindedness, does impinge on some larger issues, most especially the problematical history of male representations of women. The privileging of the “male gaze” and the objectification of women in Western image making seems, to me, to be the consequence of a process of generalization in which women are reduced to stereo- (or arche-) types. By being as specific as I possibly can be, I want to counteract this pernicious generalizing impulse, so that the result is not more depictions of “Woman”, or depictions which make some statement about “women” as a class. Rather, my ambition is to confront the viewer with evocation of an individual, a full-fledged person who happens to be a woman ( as I happen to be a man). In certain pieces, Colette’s gender is thematically important, even central; in other pieces, it’s not significant at all. Can the male desire to make images of women, which seems so deeply rooted (in our culture, at least, be redeemed in this fashion? I don’t know, but it seems worth trying.

Other “big ideas”, like questions concerning the limits of representation and our ability to truly know another human being, have occupied my mind intermittently over the years. But, the overwhelming reason I do what I do is ultimately deeply personal, and very simple: Colette is the most significant fact of my life. I can’t think of another subject that could engage me as fully. ---Mark Roller

SILENT AUCTION
JANUARY 7-FEBRUARY 1, 2019

THINK ROUND FINE ARTS ARTISTS

Carlos Loarca
Josefa Vaughan
Nikki Lau
Rebecca Haseltine
Gabriela Hofmeyer
Marc Ellen Hamel
Betsie Miller-Kusz

Leo Germano
Jennifer Ewing
Colette Crutcher
Pernilla Persson
Heidi Hardin
Elizabeth Guheen
Mark Roller

These Think Round Fine Arts artists have generously donated at least one artwork to be auctioned off in our 3rd Annual Fundraiser. There will be a variety of artworks that includes prints, paintings, drawings, ceramic, and photographs for the audience to bid on. The silent auction will open Monday, January 7, 2019 with a reception on Saturday, January 12, 2019 from 5:30-8PM. Many of the artists will be present at the reception to welcome their audiences and Think Round Fine Arts visitors. Bidding will end at 5PM, Friday, February 1, 2019. If you are interested in bidding but cannot be present, please call (415) 602-9599 or email info@thinkround.org for assistance. 

Heidi Hardin
Families in Paradise (The Four Jews) (2018)

Part II of The Human Family Tree/
A Walk Through Paradise...seven installations

For Immediate Release: September 14, 2018
 

Heidi Hardin 
Families in Paradise (The Four Jews)
Part II of The Human Family Tree/
A Walk Through Paradise...seven installations 

Think Round Fine Arts
2140 Bush Street, Suite 1B, San Francisco CA 94115
(between Fillmore and Webster. Gallery entrance is on the driveway.)

October 1 - December 29, 2018
Gallery Hours: 9AM-12PM Tuesdays / Thursdays + by appointment
Reception: Saturday, October 6, 2018 from 4-8PM
Artists' Talks: 6PM

OTHER WEEKLY ACTIVITIES
FAMILY ART MAKING WORKSHOPS: Saturdays, 10-11:30AM
GUIDED WALK-THROUGH MEDITATIONS: Sundays, 4-5PM
HUMAN FAMILY SUPPERS AND SALONS: Tuesday evenings, 6-8PM
K-12 SCHOOL TOURS AND ART ACTIVITIES: Friday afternoons, 1-2:30PM

All activities are free of charge. Space is limited. RSVP NOW!

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Everyone is invited to join Heidi Hardin, Rachel Leibman, and Jonathan Sacks for ArtSpan’s 2018 Open Studio and beyond, for this exaltation of art, culture, and family. A full program of family art making workshops, artists talks, guest speakers, “family" discussions, interactive 3-D digital demonstrations, and more will accompany this exhibit. Beginning October 14 through December 29, Hardin will lead: Saturday, family art making classes from 10-11:30AM; Friday K-12 school tours and art activity from 1-2PM; and Sunday guided Walk-Through meditations from 4-5PM. Gabriela Hofmeyer is an artist and volunteer helping to facilitate Human Family Suppers and Salons on Tuesdays from 6-8PM. October’s Salon and Supper Series is to Benefit  and Celebrate Gabriela's upcoming October trip to perform at Carnegie Hall in New York City. Space is limited. Please RSVP at heidi@heidihardin.com or by calling Heidi at 415-602-9599. All activities are free of charge. Please join us!

Please visit: http://www.thinkround.org/index/#/our-artists/  for a full calendar of events and more information about our artists, composer, and facilitator. Think Round Fine Arts is located at 2140 Bush Street, Suite 1, San Francisco, CA 94115. For more information please call Heidi at 415-602-9599 or email: heidi@heidihardin.com. Gallery hours are 9-noon, Tuesdays and Thursdays, and by appointment. The opening reception for Heidi Hardin and her other artists is on Saturday and Sunday, October 13th and 14th, from 11AM to 6PM, with Artist Talks at 5PM each day.

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Sixteen years in the making, Hardin premiers: Families in Paradise (The Four Jews), 78 portraits of four families of different ethnicities who have traveled to America to make their homes and a new life. This installation is Part II of Hardin’s extended project, The Human Family Tree/A Walk through Paradise…seven installations, otherwise known as Paradise…  Paradise…is an evocative multimedia meditation on the experiences we share, regardless of faith, culture, or ethnicity, and centers on families who are followers of seven major world religions. Each successive installation focuses on a single religion, presenting 78 freestanding portraits, along with touching objects, environmental displays, and an original soundtrack by Hardin’s longtime collaborator and fellow UCSD alumnus, Los Angeles composer, Jonathan Sacks.

Snapshots from family photo albums transcribed into genre paintings offer an unexpected window into the shared human experiences that bridge the personal and the universal. A labyrinth of footpaths and columns replicating the mythic Tree of Life creates a ‘walk through paradise’ among the paintings for viewers. On a symbolic level, these installations explore ideas about cultural self-definition, the pervasiveness of the American dream, the universality of, and new directions imagined for, the human family and their faiths. As human longevity extends dramatically in the coming decades, and broken heartstrings from family trauma through new trauma incident reduction modalities are able to be healed, Hardin, in this project, call for human beings to consciously decide to manifest heaven on earth, creating paradise here and now. This new vista urges forward Think Round Fine Arts’ nonprofit code of ethics: Earth is home. Humans are family. 

 _____________     
       

Rachel Leibman says, "For my collages, I use small pieces of paper as my palette and “paint” colorful, detailed and elaborate pictures. They are composed from images of ancient illuminated manuscripts, totems, murals, urban graffiti and even scraps of left-over paper. 

These collages tell stories about Jews living in the diaspora. Each piece provides a different narrative, some quotidian and some profound. Although life in the diaspora has often been difficult and cruel, it was important to me that Jews not be depicted only as victims. Jewish people have been proud and resilient, brilliant and common, challenging and generous. In short, beautifully human. So, my stories are of tailors and peddlers, rituals and journeys, scientists and musicians, persecution and resistance.

I love the medium of collage because it provides a vehicle for presenting many layers of meaning. It allows me to choose the source materials, as well as the subject matter, in order to impart my point of view."    

* * *

Heidi Hardin’s Pieces

Rachel Leibman Pieces

 HEIDI HARDIN: ARTIST’S STATEMENT

Having the opportunity to paint families of different ethnicities who are practicing the seven major world religions over the past twenty years has given me the courage, strength, and hope to face and accept the many traumatic events of my own childhood, growing up in an alcoholic, sex-addicted home. Trauma recovery research done by Kaiser Permanente and the CDC in 1992, correlates adverse childhood experiences (ACEs*) and its impact on human health across a lifetime. (Please visit for more information: Https://www.ted.com/talks/nadine_burke_harris_how_childhood_trauma_affects_health_across_a_lifetime.)

Thanks to a new trauma recovery program offered by Kaiser in San Francisco, the Community Self-care Demonstration Program, otherwise known as Turning the Tide of Trauma, I have finally found an effective way to heal the devastation of being molested and raped as a child, as well as the eight other adverse childhood experiences I endured. Through this program and through my painting over the years, I have been able to find my own internal wisdom about these events and redefine my own reality with respect to them.

The Human Family Tree Project/A Walk Through Paradise…seven installations** is intended to mark the end of marginalizing the issue of childhood trauma (and the suppression of women and children by male dominated world religions) here in the US*** and around the world. It is also intended to celebrate the heart of the cause and cure: home and family. In the opinion of California Pacific Medical Center pediatrician, Nadine Burke Harris, “thirty years from now a child who has a high ACE score and whose symptoms of ACEs go unnoticed and untreated will be anomalous…. This is treatable. This is beatable. The single most important thing we need to do today is to have the courage to look at this problem in the face and say, this is real and this is all of us. I believe that we are the movement.” Think Round, Inc. has joined the movement. Turning the Tide of Trauma is now a program of Think Round, Inc. Open enrollments happen bi-annually as part of our free programming. Will you join the movement?

—Heidi Hardin, September 2018

____________________

*Ten ACEs (otherwise known as “childhood enders” by Save the Children) that will dramatically increase the risk of chronic illnesses (including asthma, heart disease, diabetes, lung cancer, addictions, depression, suicide) over a lifetime: 1) alcohol and/or substance abuse in the home; 2) incarcerated parent(s); 3) domestic violence; 4) divorce/abandonment; 5) sexual, verbal, physical, emotional abuse; 6) hunger/malnutrition; 7) mental illness in the home; 8) poverty; 9) lack of education; and 10) lack of care/affection.

**Paradise… is also intended to raise questions about how and why the major world religions discriminate against women and girls, and how this sexual discrimination pervades almost every aspect of humanity’s secular and religious life. (For more information, please read Jimmy Carter’s A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence, and Power.)

***In the words of Dr. Robert Block, the former President of the American Academy of Pediatrics, "Adverse childhood experiences are the single greatest unaddressed public health threat facing our nation today."

To determine your ACE Score, please visit: http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/03/02/387007941/take-the-ace-quiz-and-learn-what-it-does-and-doesnt-mean. If you have a score of four or more ACEs, please feel free to call Heidi and enroll in our trauma incident reduction program, Turning the Tide of Trauma. It is a non-medical, non-religious, and confidential program.

—Rachel Leibman, September 2018

* * *

RACHEL LEIBMAN: ARTIST’S STATEMENT

These collages tell stories about Jews living in the diaspora. Each piece provides a different narrative, some quotidian and some profound. Although life in the diaspora has often been difficult and cruel, it was important to me that Jews not be depicted only as victims. Jewish people have been proud and resilient, brilliant and common, challenging and generous. In short, beautifully human. So, my stories are of tailors and peddlers, rituals and journeys, scientists and musicians, persecution and resistance.

From an artistic point of view, composition is very important to me. I would like for viewers to be able to stand at a distance from my artwork and see something beautiful, exciting, interesting or pleasing. But the medium of collage affords the opportunity to provide an additional level of meaning. I have chosen source materials which further the narratives of the stories. As you get close to the pieces in this exhibit, you will see women scientists, Yiddish actors, partisan fighters, passports, visas, manuscripts, thimbles and thread.

I collected much of my materials from the Internet but also put out a call on social media for people to send me pictures of their loved-ones and ancestors. I received a treasure-trove of depictions of Jewish life around the world. In many of my collages I included photographs of people I know: My grandfather who came through Ellis Island, my in-laws as bride and groom, my friend David who fought in Vietnam, Maggy who was part of the Kindertransport, and my cousin Rob who is an awesome soccer goalie. I think that incorporating these personal materials helps to add relevance and intimacy.

My hope is that when you look at my artwork, you will in turn feel gratified, angry, proud and encouraged. I hope that some of my pieces will just make you laugh.

Rachel Leibman

MORE ABOUT THE ARTISTS

HEIDI HARDIN

Originally from Oklahoma City, Heidi Hardin received her Masters of Fine Arts degree in Painting in 1979 and Bachelor of Arts in Biology and Visual Arts from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) in 1976. Her teachers included Manny Farber, Patricia Patterson, Eleanor and David Antin, Alexis Smith and Kim McConnell. She spent her last year of graduate study at the Whitney Museum of American Arts Independent Study Program for Painters and Sculptors in New York City working primarily with David Diao. While at UCSD she served for several years as studio assistant to Newton and Helen Harrison. Alan Kaprow, the director of the Art Department while she was a student at UCSD, had, as did her teachers and other faculty, a major influence on her learning. She has exhibited her paintings nationally in galleries and museums for the past thirty years and has taught visual arts in San Francisco elementary and high schools, art history at the college level at UCSD and National University and drawing at City College of San Francisco.

Her exhibit/installation, Families in Paradise... (Part II of Paradise...) opened at SomArts main gallery in San Francisco receiving front page recognition in the entertainment section of the SF Chronicle in January of 2004 in a feature article titled, “Simple snapshots become loving tributes—and a mirror into our shared experiences—in Heidi Hardin’s paintings.” The Human Family Tree... (Part I of Paradise...) premiered at the Bayview Opera House in San Francisco in December 2000 to acclaim by the Senate, Congress, California State Assembly and the SF Board of Supervisors. This installation reopened at Newspace in LA on September 11, 2001. Her artwork was represented by Newspace, LA from the early 1980s until 2006 when the gallery closed and its archives—along with Ms. Hardin's exhibits—became a part of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D. C.

As an original Hunters Point Shipyard (HPS) Citizen’s Advisory Committee member, Ms. Hardin has been teaching community children and their families for the past twenty years about the Superfund Cleanup and Reuse of Hunters Point Shipyard in Bayview Hunters Point schools through her innovative art and science curriculum: The Children’s Mural Program (CMP). Over the years, there have been dozens of public murals painted by CMP students on view throughout the community at destinations like the Oakdale campus of City College, the SF main and local Bayview post offices, Bayview Shopping Plaza, the Anna Waden Library, the Southeast Water Treatment Facility and more. In 2010, Ms. Hardin and Think Round were awarded one of the nine public art commissions for HPS through the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency (SFRA) HPS Public Art Program. In 2010-11, more than 60 local CMP students participated in the creation of this commission, titled STREAM of CONSCIOUSNESS, a 120’ x 1’ handmade ceramic and mosaic tile mural. Thanks to the support of the SFRA Public Art Program and many involved in the redevelopment process, this artwork was installed in the back of two benches at the soon to be constructed Hill Point Park at HPS in 2016.

Until 2007, Heidi Hardin was the In-Schools Visual Arts Programming Director for the Bayview Opera House, a position she held for fifteen years. In 2010, she received the KCBS News’ prestigious Jefferson Award for her work as a community artist. She was recognized by the United States Environmental Protection Agency in 2001, receiving their Environmental Achievement Award for Region 9 for “outstanding leadership in protecting the environment and public health for this and future generations,” for her Children’s Mural Program, a Bayview Opera House In-School Arts Program that has served more than 4,000 community children.

She retired in 1999 as a Museum Artist at the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco where she supervised the Doing and Viewing Art and Big Kids/Little Kids arts programs for four years to pursue her career as a fine artist, creating The Human Family Tree/A Walk Through Paradise...seven installations (Paradise...).

She served on the Mayor’s Citizen’s Advisory Committee for Reuse of Hunters Point Shipyard for twelve years and on the Southeast Community Facility Commission from 1999 to 2003.

All of Ms. Hardin’s work as a community-based artist and as a practicing fine artist are now held in trust in the vision, mission, and objectives of Think Round, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, which she formed in the summer of 2004. The mission of Think Round, Inc. is to demonstrate life’s fullest potential through the arts and sciences especially where environmental concerns meet neighborhoods. Think Round, Inc. will also expand programs offered to children, teens, and seniors of Bayview Hunters Point and the Bay Area related to healthy environments, as well as accommodate the funding and creation of her vision: The Human Family Tree/A Walk Through Paradise...seven installations and The Center for the Human Family.

Think Round, Inc. offices and Think Round Fine Arts, relocated in 2012 to expanded facilities including exhibition, studio and teaching spaces with a modest art and science library. The gallery space, Think Round Fine Arts, at Think Round, Inc.'s new offices, hosts Ms. Hardin's own artwork, as well as the fine artworks of many San Francisco contemporary masters of paintings, prints, and sculpture, especially those whose art aligns with the gallery’s code of ethics: Earth is home. Humans are family. These artists, particularly include those from Hunters Point Shipyard who helped served as our artists/instructors in Think Round, Inc.’s Children’s Mural Program. In addition to directing Think Round and Think Round Fine Arts, Heidi Hardin is focused on the completion of her “birth vision,” The Human Family Tree/A Walk Through Paradise...seven installations and the creation of The Center for the Human Family.

In 2017, Think Round, Inc. board of directors has expanded to bring on a new program called Turning the Tide on Trauma for individuals and families who are suffering from current and past adverse childhood experiences.

Heidi Hardin just recently completed the Human Family Tree Project, Part III: Art of the Family (The Four Muslims) that was exhibited from October through December 2017. Other activities associated with this installation included: school tours, Human Family Suppers, Family Art Making classes, UCSD Alumni Association event, and guided meditations. She is currently working on Part II: Families in Paradise (The Four Jews) that will be completed and displayed from October through December 2018 at Think Round Fine Arts, San Francisco, CA. In 2019, Parts I, II, and III: The Families of Abraham (The Four: Jews, Christians, and Muslims) will be on display at venues throughout the city with panel discussions, family art making, school tours, salons, and Human Family Suppers.

RACHEL LEIBMAN

For my collages, I use small pieces of paper as my palette and “paint” colorful, detailed and elaborate pictures. They are composed from images of ancient illuminated manuscripts, totems, murals, urban graffiti and even scraps of left-over paper. 

The collages pay homage to those who came before and celebrate the uniqueness of our varied heritages. At the same time, they illuminate the human interconnectedness and cultural melding that define our global society.

I love the medium of collage because it provides a vehicle for presenting many layers of meaning. It allows me to choose the source materials, as well as the subject matter, in order to impart my point of view.

JONATHAN SACKS

Originally from the Boston area, Mr. Sacks studied composition at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, with graduate studies completed at the University of California. His teachers included Kenneth Gaburo, Pauline Oliveros, and Pulitzer Prize winner, Roger Reynolds. He was awarded an Artist in Residence from the California Arts Council, and an HEW grant from the for the composition of three touring musicals. Mr. Sacks has won numerous composition competitions, including the Independent Composers Association and the Pacific Composer's Forum.

His concert works  have  been  performed  in  New  York  and  Los Angeles by members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, XTET, and the California Ear Unit. He is currently composer-in-residence for the Classical Theatre Lab. In addition, Mr. Sacks has composed incidental music for productions of "Hamlet", "Much Ado About Nothing", "Macbeth", and "Cymbeline", Chekhov's "The Three Sisters", Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", Brecht's "Mother Courage", Euripides' "Elektra" and Mark Medoff's new play "Stumps". He is currently at work with internationally-produced playwright Robert Auletta on a musical theater piece "Full Lunar Light".

 As a member of The Contemporary Arts, Music, and Performance Alliance, he co-produced multi-media productions at the John Anson Ford Amphitheater as part of the L.A. County "Summer Nights at the Ford" series, the Ruth Bachofner Gallery, and Mount Saint Mary's College.

 Jonathan Sacks is active in film music as arranger and orchestrator. Jonathan Sacks is active in film music as arranger and orchestrator. He has orchestrated film scores by Randy Newman, Michael Kamen, Mark Snow, Harry Gregson-Williams,Christopher Stone, and William Goldstein [including “Monsters, Inc.”, "Toy Story 2", "A Bug'sLife",  "The X-Files” (movie) and “Seabiscuit "]. Additionally he has been an arranger for the rock group KISS, for David Foster, Barbra Streisand, and for commercials.

Jonathan Sacks and Heidi Hardin have been friends and collaborators for the past twenty-five years creating performance artworks and installations including Stardust, Incantations: Book 1/Parsifal and Self Discipline, The Human Family Tree Project: Parts I, II, and III, Part III: Art of the Family will be on display at Think Round Fine Arts in San Francisco’s trendy Fillmore District in October, November, and December 2017.

Mr. Sacks is affiliated with BMI.

* * *

A press kit with press release, artists' statements, resumes/bios, and images are available at this link: 

Elizabeth Guheen

Habitats
Recent Paintings (2018)

Elizabeth Guheen
Habitats
Recent Paintings

Think Round Fine Arts
2140 Bush Street, Suite 1, San Francisco CA 94115
(between Fillmore and Webster. Gallery entrance is on the driveway.)

Opening Reception: Saturday, July 7, 2018 from 5-8PM
July 7 - August 31, 2018
Gallery Hours: 8AM-12PM Tuesdays and Thursdays and by appointment

* * *

Think Round Fine Arts is pleased to present Habitats, an exhibition featuring recent paintings by a new TRFA artist: Elizabeth Guheen. The exhibition will open on July 7, 2018, with a public reception from 5-8PM. The exhibition will be up through August 31, 2018.

Elizabeth Guheen, Director and Chief Curator at the Charles M. Bair Family Museum, states, "A painting is an investigation of a way of looking, seeing, and thinking. As a painter I believe that there is an intensity of vision that is channeled when one looks at the same 'thing,' scene, subject…over a long period of time. For me, landscape in the broadest sense has been a refuge of expansiveness I have always been drawn to as both subject matter and experience. The painter Bridget Riley once called painting 'place making.' When I paint grasses and weeds underfoot, or a single bird disconnected from any visual reference to its environment, I am making a place."

Think Round Fine Arts will host this exhibit through August 31st, with gallery hours from 8AM-12PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and by appointment, at 2140 Bush Street Suite 1B, (between Fillmore and Webster) San Francisco CA, 94115. Gallery entrance door is off of the garage driveway. For information, call: (415) 602-9599 or email: heidi@heidihardin.com

ELIZABETH GUHEEN’S ARTIST'S STATEMENT

A painting is an investigation of a way of looking, seeing, and thinking. As a painter I believe that there is an intensity of vision that is channeled when one looks at the same “thing”, scene, subject…over a long period of time. For me, landscape in the broadest sense has been a refuge of expansiveness I have always been drawn to as both subject matter and experience. The painter Bridget Riley once called painting “place making.” When I paint grasses and weeds underfoot, or a single bird disconnected from any visual reference to its environment, I am making a place.

I am not a plein-air painter. I work in a studio, but I spend a great deal of time out–of- doors, taking photos, filming, walking, looking. I use a camera as a sketch tablet, to take notes. In my studio I sort the results to paint transparent, semi-transparent, and opaque layers of the debris of the seasons accumulated over time. I freeze a moment that is partly of my own invention by editing, adding, subtracting. Each painting moves between its materiality, the stuff that is paint on a surface, and its capacity to invoke the illusion of some thing. I strive to have each painting seem both factual and ambiguous – like nature. When I began to paint birds they felt completely different and at the same a natural extension of my underfoot investigations. For the birds I hit pause, I freeze the frame. The bird is not moving, singing, sitting on a branch. It just is - in space.

Birds: pollinators, dispersers, scavengers and recyclers - Egyptians saw them as winged souls. The earliest post offices, pigeons and parrots delivered messages between villages. Interconnected with their habitats in every way, some have disappeared, some struggle, some thrive. Throughout history birds have stood out and apart from the earthbound–they fly. This alone gave them access to the mysterious, sought after landscape of the sky, what is “above.” Human flight and space exploration did not change that core fascination, but it did re-focus us as to how birds were treated on earth, no longer “winged souls.”  Setting aside the roles of Woody Woodpecker, Daffy Duck and Big Bird to entertain us, it turns out they have had an earth-bound assignment all along, keeping ecosystems in balance. And considering their “displays” -- usually classified according to their apparent function - courtship, aggression, begging, greeting, and so on – they have more in common with humans than humans once thought. I do not paint them specifically for any of these reasons, but I believe it is in human DNA to be curious and in awe of them for all of these reasons. I find them all beautiful and all curious and funny and interesting and, well, I just like them. In my bird portraits the background is intentionally flat and non-organic in effect, although even a lime green and a turquoise blue may suggest ground and sky. There is some synthesia going on—when I paint a black crow or raven, I often just “see” the background as a bright pink or orange. They are, simply, portraits of birds, silent.  Most are birds found in the west of the Rocky Mountains, and that tends to include many (but not all) birds found in California and the Pacific Northwest. Some migrate from the intermountain regions to the south and back, other stick out the winters. While male birds are almost exclusively the more colorful of the sexes – not all males promote their physical beauty. Many advertise themselves to the opposite sex with skills: singing, dancing, catching fish, or constructing nests. I paint birds with these sorts of things in mind, but mostly I paint birds because they are interesting creatures that have been on the earth for a long time, and because they can fly.  –2018 

Peculiar Institutions (2018)

Josefa Vaughan, ArtSeed, Featured Artists,
and their Partners

For Immediate Release: May 10, 2018

Peculiar Institutions
Josefa Vaughan, ArtSeed, Featured Artists,
and their Partners

Think Round Fine Arts
2140 Bush Street, Suite 1, San Francisco CA 94115
(between Fillmore and Webster. Gallery entrance is on the driveway.)

Opening Reception: Saturday, May 19, 2018 from 5-7PM
Reading and Book Signing: Author Christopher Webber at 5:30-6PM
May 19 - June 30, 2018
Gallery Hours: 8AM-12PM Tuesdays and Thursdays and by appointment
Closing Reception: Saturday, June 30, 2018 from 5-7PM

* * *

Think Round Fine Arts is pleased to present Peculiar Institutions, an exhibition featuring current ArtSeed artist and student works plus related earlier pieces from founder Josefa Vaughan’s childhood and her Houston artist friends. The exhibition will open on May 12, 2018, with a public reception on May 19 from 5-7PM. The exhibition will be up through Saturday, June 30, with a closing reception from 5-7PM.

ArtSeed artists and children have concerns: Together we are grappling with tough subjects such as the evolution of slavery and its various contemporary manifestations. After studying history, and looking at the challenges faced by democracies around the world, what might be our own enslavements and aspirations?

This exhibition at Think Round Fine Arts serves ArtSeed as a curriculum-building tool for our upcoming Summer Intensive activities. In addition, it seeks viewer response to help guide our choice of works to be included in ArtSeed’s upcoming larger Fall exhibition at Tides Converge in the Presidio, Thursday, September 6 – Saturday, October 6, 2018.

ArtSeed is an artist run, 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization with a mission to connect the most resourceful and gifted with the youngest or most vulnerable citizens of the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond through projects that explore links between classical and cutting edge fine arts disciplines. 

Partners and Featured Artists include...

Pamela Blotner
Derek Boshier
Stacey Carter
Raoul Martinez
Linh Ha Khanh Nguyen
Paola Perez
Ann Reesman
William Scott
Jacob Spies
Josefa Vaughan
Students of Saint Brigid School
Students of San Francisco Montessori Academy
ArtSeed Spring Intensive participants
and more...

Proceeds from sales of art at this event will benefit ArtSeed’s disadvantaged youth and Think Round Fine Art’s art projects for families.

To find out more about ArtSeed and their partners and featured artists, please visit: http://www.artseed.org/ & https://weadartists.org/artseed

Think Round Fine Arts will host this exhibit through June 30th, with gallery hours from 8AM-12PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and by appointment, at 2140 Bush Street Suite 1, (between Fillmore and Webster) San Francisco CA, 94115. Gallery entrance door is off of the garage driveway. For gallery information, call: (415) 602-9599 or email: heidi@heidihardin.com and visit: http://www.thinkround.org/index/#/our-artists/

ABOUT THE ARTISTS
 

Stacey M. Carter is a San Francisco artist and artist advocate who has maintained a studio at Hunters Point Shipyard since 1998.  She is a Board Member and former Vice President of The Shipyard Trust for The Arts (STAR) a California 501c3 nonprofit corporation dedicated to conserving affordable San Francisco art studios and work space, supporting Bayview/Hunters Point community art programs, and creating educational and exhibition opportunities. Stacey, an artist-advocate, has maintained a studio at Hunters Point Shipyard since 1998.  She is a graduate of Temple University’s Tyler School of Art having studied in Rome, Italy.  She is an accomplished visual artist with a 20-year career in painting and printmaking. She is an urban archaeologist, conjuring up lost or forgotten visions of time and humanity in the Bay Area. Stacey Carter has shown work at the George Krevsky Gallery, the Lancaster Museum, the Oakland Museum of California, the National Steinbeck Center, and the New Museum of Los Gatos (NUMU). Her clients include the NFL football team Baltimore Ravens and the San Francisco Metropolitan Transportation Commission.
 
Linh Nguyen, illustrator, animator, and photographer was born in Vietnam. Her artworks illustrate emotion, imagination, and reality from daily life. While studying illustration/animation at City College of San Francisco, she has been volunteering and is an Arts Administration Apprentice with ArtSeed since September 2017. Her goal is to develop her skills and use them to help the Bay Area community through art.
 
Paola Perez is 14 years old. Her hobbies are sports, art, singing, and playing piano. She started off sketching animals from her obsession with the pattern of their fur and their movement/behavior and how they react to things in their environment. As an ArtSeed Apprentice for 5 years, she grew from a shy, timid girl who wouldn't talk to other people, to become a leader: smiling more, being energetic, and encouraging other people. She now teaches younger kids who are having trouble finding their inspiration and helps her mentor organize ideas for ArtSeed programs as a member of the Youth Council. Her goal, ever since 5th grade, has been to become an animator. She was awarded a position as a freshman at the Ruth Azawa School of the Arts to begin fall 2018 and is hoping she will be able to apply her talents and training to teach others some of the things she has learned.
 
Josefa Vaughan, Executive Director, credits free private art lessons that guided her through a tumultuous childhood and teenage homelessness for the success of the arts education nonprofit ArtSeed which she founded in 2000. Her formative classical art training in Houston resulted in two decades of exhibitions before 1989 when her art shifted into more collaborative projects connecting gifted and vulnerable communities. She has lectured widely, is a Djerassi Resident Artist Program alum, has won Awards from the San Francisco Arts Commission, and has been a juror for the California Arts Council. www.josefa.com, www.artseed.org 
 
William Scott is a self-taught artist who graphically renders his imagined public and private worlds with remarkable accuracy and meticulous detail. William draws, paints, and re-builds his native San Francisco in search of the elusive “normal life,” one of Baptist-sermon ideals and gleaming, safe, artistically franchised city centers. San Francisco re-emerges as “Praise Frisco,” a place where Scott’s public longing for wholesome, peaceful interactions take place within re-developed idealized neighborhood landmarks. Through a series of drawings and ceramic sculptures Scott recreates images of the women who attend his Bayview-neighborhood church, an expression of his social longings. The work communicates his desire for a romantic relationship with a “popular, tolerant woman,” one who will share a life with him in his re-imagined city. William Scott creates a complete and fantastical urban world. With sincere enthusiasm and a highly developed painting and drawing style the artist questions the hard edge that contemporary city life often creates, and offers us a convincing glimpse of an alternative future. Scott has had solo exhibitions at White Columns, New York and has been included in group exhibitions at the Hayward Gallery, London, Berkeley Art Museum, Gavin Brown’s enterprise, The Museum of Everything, London, Gallery Paule Anglim, Rena Bransten Gallery, San Francisco, and Ricco|Maresca Gallery, New York. Scott’s work is part of the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, and is included in the private collections of David Byrne, Cindy Sherman, Chris Ofili, Martin and Rebecca Eisenberg among many others.
 
Jacob Spies, an ArtSeed Teaching Artist living in San Francisco, is originally from Memphis, Tennessee.  He is currently attending the Academy of Art University where he is a student teacher working towards a degree in arts education. He is honing his skills in a number of media. These include painting, printmaking, lithography, sculpture, ceramics, bronze casting, and digital arts. Jacob’s latest works draw inspiration first from his life as a professional musician, who also painted scenes from his tours around the country with rock, hip-hop, and bluegrass bands. He is currently producing cityscapes and landscapes of Northern California. Some works are symbolic and satirical. Most recent works speak to current events with humor and with a deep concern over social and political issues.

Chris Webber is an Episcopal priest and author of books ranging from his own translation of Beowulf to a biography of fugitive slave and abolition leader, James W.C, Pennington.  He will give brief readings and discussion of both and offer autographed copies for sale for the benefit of Art Seed.