Close to 25 years ago Carla Bratt attended her first gourd workshop in Berkely, California. Since childhood art had always held an integral role in her life, yet none of her past creative experiences would compare with the love affair she would eventually undertake with gourds. Gourds presented Bratt with an infinite number of shapes and endless numbers of sizes; complex curves, smooth surfaces and  the golden glows of each one challenged her imagination. She realized that working with an organic object had it's own unqiue soul, providing an unlimited number of creative posssibilities and potentials.

Cutting, carving, burning, painting embellishing and weaving-Over the years Bratt has employed countless techniques on her gourds, most self taught and even some self invented, such as  the use of encaustic  wax applications . Using pyroengraving, painting, carving and metal leaf as a center, Bratt couples her creative intellect with processes from collage work, photography and printmaking to guide her artistic journey.

Finding her inspiration in quiet thoughts, random reflections and charming epiphanies, an individual gourd by Bratt might offer the viewer the timelessness of a Navajo rug, a creature of the deep sea or the mysterious iconography of ancient and diverse cultures. Each piece she produces is an attempt to capture a moment in the mind's eye through a splash of color, the smoothness of polished abalone or the flash of a bird's feather. Bratt also finds her inspiration in the trueness of nature's beauty, never forgetting how fragile our earth home is, but also honoring it's strength and resilience.

Along the path of Bratt's creative journey, she discovered the tradtional art of Japanese fish printing or "gyotaku". Working in both traditional and non tradtional ways with her fish prints, she offers delicate, realistic prints and fish print collage work mounted on board and canvas. 

Recently, Bratt purchased an etching press and has set up a second studio, aside from her gourd art studio, to explore the world of printmaking. Her background in gourd design work has successfully transferred over to her print work. Eventually, Bratt's goal is to offer both fine art gourds and art prints, celebrating the exciting space between the heart and soul of human connectedness with nature, as well as with each other.

Now showing in West Coast galleries and retail stores, Bratt's work has also been published in two  Lark Publication books : Beyond The Basics: Gourd Art and Gourd Art: Southwestern Techniques. Her work has  achieved many awards and is found  in collector's homes and businesses, both nationally and internationally.

"It has been such a long and rewarding process, this gourd art trip of mine. Along the way I have discovered myself, acquired life long friends, branched out to new art processes and learned to look at life's never ending connections and reconnections-all the while valuing the journey that continues to delight and surprise me.. Thre is not a moment in my life that holds a whisper of boredom!" Carla Bratt; fine art gourd artist, printmaker and multi media collage creator.

My vehicle for self expression has always been through creating art and practicing interior design. I balance two creative careers equally as a visual artist and as a partner of INSTUDIO interior design. My contemporary aesthetic in art and design is shaped by my passion for art, architecture, craft and designs from global periods, styles and cultures.

Barry Ebner – Artist Statement

An idea transformed by a moment of observation into an image that signifies weight and contemplation.

A wall was constructed, why? For protection from the elements, from danger from the unknown. To construct shelter, to define what’s mine, ours and what is not. A wall is a way to keep the outside out and the inside, the private, in. It is a way to divide as much as it unities. A wall is a border, a boundary. The border that divides us from them, a boundary defines those limits. It defines limitations, how far we can go and where we should stop. A boundary in thought is as real as the Berlin Wall was, as the wall in Jerusalem is. A border can be a line in the sand south of Arizona, north of Mexico that defines who can walk in a region freely and who must present documentation.

I gaze at the walls constructed in our society, both real and through the image of the real to the walls constructed in our sociological interactions, through the illusions of transparency created by the massive availability of controlled information. I wander up and down their length, stare up at their height and ever so often test their strength, by pushing or blowing, running up against them or simply removing a finger from the hole.

I work in series; moving between drawing, monotype and intaglio. Often monochromatically or muted in palette.

Barry Ebner is an internationally exhibited printmaker and painter. He earned his MFA in Printmaking from CCA in 2001. He teaches printmaking at AAU and is in numerous public and private collections.

SMAart Gallery & Studio was founded in September 2012 and opened its doors at 1045 Sutter Street in San Francisco.

SMAart offers gallery exhibits, studio rentals and ceramic classes.  While the center primarily caters to ceramic artists, artists of every media are welcome.  Founder Steven M Allen opened SMAart to fulfill a longtime dream of having a gallery, a place to teach art to the community, and a place to create art in a creative open environment surrounded by other inspiring artists.  

Conveniently located in the Lower Nob Hill neighborhood with access to several major bus lines.  SMAart is also positioned in the heart of the Lower Polk Art Walk offering participating artists access to a burgeoning art scene.

My one-of-a-kind prints are primarily about shape, texture, and color. I have been accused of creating monotypes so that I have an excuse to mix color. For me color is about feeling. Very subtly, color evokes emotions in me as I mix and apply the color, and also as I view the color. I believe my audience feels the color as well, almost as an aura that emanates from the print. My patterns, textures, and colors tend to come from external stimuli, while the shapes I create come more from long-internalized aesthetic influences. I grew up in an Eichler and lived amid works by Zeisel, Noguchi, Arp, and other "modernists," and these early influences have affected the stencil shapes I create. It is these shapes that especially imbue my prints with a quality that is both modern and retro. Many of my shapes are biomorphic, tactile, simple, sexy, human, funny—even vulnerable. I feel that we, as a society, reject feeling vulnerable; my imagery embraces vulnerability by creating awkward, funny shapes, and by incorporating the cast-off item. At the same time, because the imagery is nonrepresentational, it still appears modern (in the quaintness of the "modern" of yesterday). I consider my prints to be modern-retro—in other words, modern in the sense of the painting of the last two centuries. This retro quality makes the monotypes somewhat nostalgic—nostalgic for a modern era that was about the future but is now about the past.

I make colorful mixed media paintings. The subjects vary from urban scenes to landscapes. I try to show a reality that might not be obvious but uses a combination of elements that are surprising.

I want to make an emotional connection with the viewer that will captivate your imagination, draw you into the story, and be memorable.

In my art work, both the prints and the sculpture, I capture the flow or motion of the object. Nature is my inspiration, although I have been including portraites in my recent work. Most of my work is an abstraction of a landscape or object in a landscape.  I have also been working with making paper and using it to create sculptures and art pieces.

Michael Murphy is an American artist and architect from San Francisco, where he practiced architecture for approximately six years before moving to London, UK. The experience of living abroad for ten years was instrumental in the formation of his current aesthetic tastes as well as the profound re-appreciation of San Francisco’s architecture upon his return in 2008. 

It is because of these renewed impressions of San Francisco that he created the series "Forgotten Modernism" which is the title of a visual exploration of San Francisco's rich catalogue of modern architecture.   Often overlooked, Modern architecture in San Francisco has played an important role in the ongoing Modernist Movement, and this work is an attempt to acknowledge the contribution that these stunning buildings make to the visual landscape.   Using bold colors and a stylized graphics, he portrays this architecture not as something that quietly blends into a background, but rather elevating achievements that embody the best and highest principles that Modern architecture has to offer all of us.

Recently, he has expanded his subject matter to include the architecture of cities outside of San Francisco, as well as his most recent work, an attempt to capture the essence of San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art and it’s surrounding context of 20^th Century architecture.

Michael has exhibited his work in London, Amsterdam, Valencia, Tokyo and within the US in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago.

I believe art changes our perceptions of the people and world around us, broadening our perspectives in ways that cultivate greater respect for humanity and nature.

I work mostly with acrylics, but lately I have been mixing photography and other media into my paintings, using real world subjects to create images of worlds I imagine. Currently, I find myself depicting humanity coming to terms with the immutability of Mother Nature: jungles overtake urban settings and cityscapes grow out of trees. 

In 2012 I returned to San Francisco after living in Costa Rica for four years where I opened an art gallery in an isolated village visited by international travelers drawn to the unspoiled  jungle and beaches. There I was able to immerse myself in painting, selling not only my originals, but also, more than a thousand travel-friendly reproductions. This has given me a good sense of what people like in my work. 

My studio is in the Mission District on Clarion Alley, a location covered with murals and frequented by art-loving tourists from around the world. I am almost always there Thursday through Sunday in the afternoon. Stop by and take a look.