London, UK
Host organizations: Ohio City Incorporated/Hingetown
David Shillinglaw is an artist whose work includes a variety of disciplines, ranging from small drawings and hand made books, paintings on canvas, and large scale wall murals and installation. David has also worked as an illustrator and designer for a range of clients.
Since graduating from Central Saint Martins in 2002 he has exhibited his artwork in galleries in Japan, China, Holland, New York, Beijing, Berlin, and Istanbul. He has also engaged in a number of community projects and artist residencies.
David will be working with young people at St. Malachi Center as part of his residency process in Cleveland.
Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Host Organizations: Ohio City Incorporated/Hingetown
Glen Infante is an Asian American artist, painter, illustrator, graphic designer, product photographer, design consultant and founder of iLTHY (clothing). He is well-known for his digital portrait style.
Berlin, Germany
Host Organization: SPACES Gallery
Michela Picchi is an Italian cross-disciplinary artist, born in Rome and now based in Berlin. Living in Hong Kong after receiving her degree in graphic design allowed her to explore, experiment and develop her own distinctive style. With a remarkable color palette, her artworks dive into pop, surrealism, and jungle themes, giving her works a vibrant pop twist, as seen in a variety of public and private murals and art pieces.
Michela has exhibited her work in solo and group shows in London, Milan, and Bologna, as well as through a TEDxTalk in Taipei. Her work is globally recognized through artistic collaborations withAdidas, Converse, Nike, Fendi, and Pull&Bear, among others.
Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Host Organization: SPACES
Ryan Jaenke is a Cleveland-based artist whose early encounters with graffiti art, railroad tracks, and alleyways have led to a life-long pursuit of finding inspiration in all corners of the city. Ryan creates paintings, murals, installations, and short films that reflect a deep fascination with the visual language of urban life.
Ryan’s work has been exhibited in Cleveland, Chicago, Miami, and San Francisco.
Vienna, Austria
Host Organization: Transformer Station
Rainer is an installation artist who has assembled boats, semi-functional furniture, and community dinners. He often uses found materials or cheap, ubiquitous building materials, secured together with ratchet straps that provide bright color and emphasize the temporary, improvisational nature of the work.
Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Host Organization: Transformer Station
There is a very pleasing story about photographer Donald Black Jr. and his desire to be an artist. At a young age, Black instinctively recognized there was something missing from art. He felt disconnected from art because he didn’t see himself in the works that surrounded him. Black often wondered where was the art that represented the world in which he was experiencing – a world filled with dysfunction as it relates to being black. This seemingly haunting instinct and disconnection would follow Black upon graduating from Cleveland School of the Arts in 1998, and throughout his studies at Ohio University where he studied commercial photography. During his senior year at Ohio University, a close friend asked Black the following: “Do you see yourself or where you come from in your work?” The question forced Black to face his childhood thoughts about the links between art and self-discovery. Instantly, it all connected for Black. In response, he went to the local hardware store and purchased four feet of metal chain – an object (along with bars and cages) that would serve as a reoccurring symbol in his work to represent imprisonment, captivity and the desire to be free. In 2007, Black was awarded third place in Nikon’s International Competition for his photograph, “Self-Imprisonment”. Black spent five years living in New York after his years at Ohio University. In New York, he discovered there was still a striking absence in his work. His attraction to permanency, history, legend and black culture is what returned Black to his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. Returning home has positioned Black to reunite with all things familiar and imperative to him. He is most concerned with creating art that reveals truth and fills the voids he experienced as a child.
Rio De Janeiro, Brazil
Host Organization: Cleveland Public Theatre
Ananda Nahu was born in Juazeiro, Bahia, Brazil, in 1985. She attended Faculty of Design and Fine Arts of the Federal University of Bahia. During this period,she studied photography, engraving, lithography, silkscreen, etching and usedthese techniques in creating posters. She developed techniques withstencils and created artwork influenced by elements of contemporary art andworldwide culture. This mixture of styles, colors, visual aspects, painting techniques and diversity of materials is a striking feature in Ananda's work. The process of creation and execution of her paintings unites digital manipulation with the physical creation of the artwork, adding a modern process in producing a traditional handmade artwork. With this as a foundation you can see the integration of cultural references and the diversity of cultures, harmoniously working and interacting together in the same composition, which transmit messages of strength, beauty and the divine nature of the human being. All this is informed by Ananda’s own history and country where the diversity of nature and races is the main characteristic.Ananda was recently selected by CNN Style as one of "Seven creatives redefining Brazilian art and design."
Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Host Organization: Cleveland Public Theatre
Gary Williams attended Cooper School of Art but is largely a self-taught portrait/fine artist. He tries to find the truth and emotional honesty in his subjects using oils on canvas, mixed media (pastels and cloth) and watercolors to bring them to life. A winner of numerous “Best of Show” awards since 1996, Gary Williams has exhibited in juried shows as far east as Philadelphia, PA and as far south as Atlanta, GA. In 2013, he was awarded the Creative Workforce Fellowship by the Community Partnership for Arts and Culture and Cuyahoga Arts and Culture.
In 2013, he studied under Kent Twitchell and, together with several other artists, installed the Ruby Dee mural on the historic Karamu House. Since then he has installed several murals. His vision is to follow the lead of Mural Arts Philadelphia and paint Cleveland with beautiful monumental sized murals that reflect the spirit and aspirations of the community.
As co-founder of Urban Renaissance with heART, Robin is sharing her talents on a monumental scale. She and studio partner Gary Williams have been painting community driven, socially relevant outdoor murals to bring awareness to neglected neighborhoods while giving a voice and sense of pride to the residents.
A native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (City of Murals), Robin has always been artistic resourceful, and imaginative. Dedicated to public art and community activism, she never settles for easy answers.
Loreto Greve was born in 1982 in Santiago de Chile. Studied in Finis Terrae University (Santiago de Chile). She got a degree in Visual Arts in 2013 with a specialization in engraving. Since 2014 her focus was in lithography work on German limestone with emphasis in draw and print experimentation. This year a residency in Mexico allowed her to know lithography on marble and onix stone, in order to get to know the process. Apart of the mentioned technics Loreto is always in a constant search of new processes and materials within work in the development in her own language. Her artwork was through a process that started with figurative and ended in geometric abstraction, in which she found a more concrete representation language that was closer to composition and movement of living forms inserted in the space around us. The Universe, geometry and music have been the source of inspiration for her work. In her work se combines the spiritual and the rational, white and black, being opposite forms a constant in her compositions. “The workshop work, the experimentation, in etching as well as in photography with different processes and materials, help me do research and find new forms and possibilities in drawing and graphics; fate and intuition mix with the technique and the method."
Her participation in different international etching contests has given her awards and recognition in countries like Japan, Germany and Spain.
Amber N. Ford is a photographer based in Cleveland, Ohio. She was born in 1994. Ford received her BFA in Photography from the Cleveland Institute of Art ‘16. While attending CIA she also explored video and printmaking. Her work focuses on race, gender and identity.
Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Host Organization: Ingenuity
Leila Khoury (b. 1993) is a native and current inhabitant of Cleveland, Ohio. After receiving her BFA in Interdisciplinary Sculpture from the Maryland Institute College of Art, Leila opened ZAINA Gallery in Cleveland’s largest fine arts complex, 78th Street Studios. In addition to her curatorial work in the gallery, Leila is also a practicing artist, art teacher, and upcoming studio assistant for Sadeer General Trading & Contracting Company (Kuwait City, Kuwait).
My background is a combo of academic and self taught experiences, Being born and raised in Tijuana, Mexico, and after completion of my education in Mexico City, the City of Guanajuato, Mexico and in Victoria British Colombia, Canada. In 1995, I returned to Tijuana to do some of my most important work. I started a program called “Bajo El Mismo Sol” (Under the Same Sun) between the cities of Los Angeles, California and Tijuana, Mexico. In this project we exchanged artists, poets, dancers and curated seven exhibits that grabbed international attention. In 2003 I founded Consejo Fronterizo de Arte y Cultura (COFAC)/Border Council of Arts and Culture, a non-profit organization dealing with border issues and the environment. Under the umbrella of COFAC, I transformed a house where a trafficking tunnel was discovered and Co-Founded La Casa del Túnel: Art Center in 2003 right on the border between Mexico and the USA. In 2008 I founded Mariposa Artist Residency & Gallery, located across the street from La Casa del Túnel: Art Center. In 2013, I turned both of these thriving projects over to a non-profit organization because I wanted to concentrate on my artwork.
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