Art Guild of Pacifica 68th Members Show & 2026 Awards Exhibition

Art, Inspiration & Community: Art Guild of Pacifica’s Annual Members Show and Awards Exhibition Return

The Art Guild of Pacifica invites the public to celebrate and engage with local artists on Friday Oct 23, at an evening reception from 7 to 9 pm, when the 68^th Annual Members Show opens.  Live music will be provided by local musician and arts supporter Kevin Patrick McGee.  Nearly 100 entries, representing close to half of the Guild’s membership who create from San Francisco to Pescadero, down the Peninsula and even to the East Bay, submitted work for the Show.   A broad range of style and mediums is reflected with works including paintings in oil, acrylic and watercolor; fiber and textile; mixed media collage and print; various photographic processes and 3D sculptures.  Lorena Molina, Interdisciplinary Artist, Curator and Assistant Professor of Studio Arts Practice at San Francisco State University, will select this year’s prize awards.

The 67th Annual Awards Exhibition, opening concurrently, offers the work of four diverse artists: Chris Darst (mixed media paintings), Jeff Dikio (constructed paint swatch collage), Nancy Mona Russell (abstract acrylic paintings), and Darin Seinberg (contemporary wood sculpture).  Eileen David, Adjunct Professor, Studio Art, at Skyline College, selected the artists last year, and visited each artist to select works to present this year.   The Award Artists will be in conversation with David on Sunday, Nov 1 at 3:30 pm in the Main Gallery.

Having begun their visual art career in sculpture, Chris Darst has in recent years shifted their practice to painting.  The grounding for the work has been consistent though, steeped in social activism and equal justice.  The artist shares about the overall body of work, “is deeply driven by their own life-experience, the basis of their explorations both into the dark and the illumination with which they return.”

Darst’s paintings are loosely based on social problems people want to avoid.  Works move into a space of creative solutions to these difficulties, in complex multi-faceted ways, just as they are in life.  Delving into their subconscious, the resulting mixed-media paintings are whimsical, painlessly oblique, often surreal, and always in living color.

The colorful constructed collages of Jeff Dikio utilize repurposed paint chips to develop scenes that are both quirky and familiar to those in the Bay Area.  Angular shapes in vibrant color are transformed into the facades of Doelger homes, closeknit houses in the Sunset District as well as the oversized vehicles that can serve both recreational and housing needs.  Approaching his art and painting as a balance between observation and emotional response, Dikio notes that he “favors expression over direct representation”.

Dikio has an uncanny knack of creating shadow and depth from a static material that can’t be blended such one can do with paint or ink.  The intricate geography of layered color recognizes the form and shape of what surrounds us.  Creating as with building blocks, rooted in continual revision and reworking, Dikio deftly allows this surprising medium to develop structures and landscaping that are as realistic and they are playful.

Nancy Mona Russell notes, “My paintings are abstractions of visual memories, or, rather than being something remembered, the work is a process of discovery”.  Since she began her study at Scripps College it the 1960’s, and during her ensuing six decades art practice, Russell has been working in acrylic paint.  She experimented with the then new water-based medium, different from oil-based paint, discovering an appreciation for its thicker texture, resistance to her brush and rich colors.

Russell’s process for composing her abstract landscapes has been largely unchanged over the years.  Beginning with an intuitive drawing in charcoal on a gessoed canvas, shapes and lines begin to form the view.  At times the early rendering stays throughout the paintings journey to completion; alternatively, there are works where the drawing evolves into a less charted direction.  Both paths led to a style distinctly her own.

Contemporary wood sculptor Darin Steinberg first came across an obelisk when traveling. That encounter made an impression on his creative psyche, as seen in the various sized and adorned obelisks in his body of work. A lover of the humanities and literature, the aliveness of wood allows him to connect with nature and different cultures.

Wood is commonly viewed as a metaphor for the human cycle of life: growth, aging and decay, connecting the underworld, human realm and the heavens. Steinberg’s sculptures standing at different heights and widths impress upon the viewer the various growth rates of the wood or “life stages” with carved areas representing the first stage of life at the molecular level.

In addition to the two exhibitions, Art Guild of Pacifica members will also be sharing a variety of art cards and gifts in the Shop.

Sanchez Art Center is located at 1220 Linda Mar Blvd, Pacifica, about a mile east of Highway 1. Following opening night, galleries are open Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, 1–5 pm, and by appointment, through Nov 22. For more information:  www.SanchezArtCenter.org or info@SanchezArtCenter.org. Visit the Art Guild of Pacifica website (www.ArtGuildofPacifica.org) to learn more about AGP including how to become a member and the benefits.