Oil Painting by Jennifer Lugris
Nineteen women artists from the San Francisco Bay Area will be exhibiting their work as a celebration of Support Women Artists Now Day/SWAN Day, and as a fundraiser for WomenArts on Saturday, April 11 from 4 p.m. – 10 p.m. at Firehouse Art Collective’s “Lottie Rose House”, 6117 San Pablo Ave, Oakland, CA.
Curating the SWAN Day exhibition is Jennifer Lugris Park, an Oakland-based fine artist who specializes in oil painting. Her work provides an alternative view of some of the most controversial issues in our society. In her current series, Forgiven, she unveils an unconventional interpretation of the death penalty. Lugris Park has curated two successful fundraising art exhibitions previously – Compassion, in Alhambra, CA, raised funds for Typhoon Haiyan victims in the Philippines, and Pacha Mama in Oakland, supported the California redwoods.
To celebrate Support Women Artists Now Day/SWAN Day, Lugris decided to reach out to local women artists to showcase their creativity. There will be a mixture of visual arts, crafts, and small gift items for sale, and 30% of the proceeds from all sales will be donated to WomenArts. This will be a great opportunity to support Bay Area women artists. The exhibitors include Jennifer Lugris, Jamee Crusan, Kat Bing, Heather Fairweather, Sarah Lee, Thuy Linh Kang, Kat Elise Mergens, Catherine Kiwala, Ivy Avila, Barbara Bingley, Jasmin Marie Alconcher, Gwynne Stoddart, Lee Grygo, Melody Chin, Elisabeth Giselle Avila, Silvia Ledezma, Lady Red, Jennifer Adair Stejskal, and more. The alternative band, Iris, will perform.
During the exhibition, Jennifer Lugris will be exhibiting pieces from her series Forgiven, which is focused on the death penalty and women on death row. Forgiven is inspired by the idea of restorative justice, an alternative approach in which criminals apologize to those they’ve harmed and ask for forgiveness. In each painting in this series, the last words of a death row inmate are written under an image of an innocent child. By examining the prisoners’ childhood, crimes, and final moments, she invites viewers to explore their feelings about death row inmates and their executions.
About Firehouse Art Collective
Firehouse Art Collective is a non-profit project, directed by Tom Franco, providing spaces for artists of all disciplines to co-create community and culture, and for art patrons and collectors to buy cutting edge art of lasting value. The organization has converted five buildings into artist galleries, music studios, performance spaces, and live-work accommodations in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Lottie Rose House is a converted Victorian building with 16 renovated live-work rooms that were opened last year.