9/21/26 ACGA Board Meeting

• Present: Cheryl Costantini, Sean Alcala, Barbara Prodaniuk, Iver Hennig, Vicki Gunter, Britt Jensen, Pierre Bounaud, Tamara Danoyan, Julie Taber, Piper Christine, Mari Emori, Jan Schachter, April Zilber, Chris Johnson, Susie Rubenstein, Ren Lee, Emil Yanos
• Absent: Lee Middleman
• The meeting began at 5:15 PM and ended at 7 PM.

Welcome (Mari) 

• Mari welcomed everyone
• Congratulated Britt on her wedding
• April spoke about her father’s passing and thanked the Board for the flowers and cards.
  • He was an avid supporter of ACGA artists’ work and helped answer questions about legal nonprofit matters 
• Katie Morris joined as a guest thanks to Barbara’s invite. She gave a short intro 
  • She has done the ACGA Festival for 4 years and she loves it
  • She thinks it’s a great festival with many serious buyers in attendance
  • She’s interested in the board, but not sure given other responsibilities

Festival Eligibility Jury (Tamara)

• Tamara and Britt are meeting with the jury tomorrow to do an introduction to the jury process 
• As soon as the application process closes, we’ll have the jury start filling out individual score sheets and then meet October 15 to review and make decisions
• Tamara plans to send out acceptance and rejection letters the week right after the meeting
• Right now we have 10 submissions, all clay, no glass unfortunately 
• Ren will post (and boost post) on Instagram to get more applicants in this final week
• April suggests doing another Google Group announcement – especially encouraging people to tell their friends who they think might be ready to apply 

Exhibitions

Santa Cruz (Iver)

• The show is officially open until January 3 and the opening had a great turnout
• Iver says the team at the museum has been great to work with
• Thanks to all the ACGA members who came for the opening 
• There will be an open mic with some of the artists and people who have been part of ceramics in the area in November
• Mari thanked Iver for all his hard work
• Every 1st Friday is free admission to the museum
• Susie brought up that there’s a binder with all the artists talking about where they got started – nice to have personal history
• Iver has done some interviews with artists in the show and will post on YouTube shorts 

Sebastopol (Cheryl)

• Application window is closed (over 200 submissions) and notifications have been sent out
• Sebastopol Center for the Arts has been in touch with Ren about marketing the show
• Based on her experience and Iver’s experience, Cheryl thinks there’s a lesson learned to try to find exhibition partners who are organized and have mutual interest – she feels their experiences with these two exhibitions have been a lot easier than some others in the past where partners were less bought-in

NuMu (Vicki)

• The museum is still mulling on this, so we don’t know anything yet, but Vicki is still in touch 

Festival Report 

General updates (April)

• April acknowledged the suggestion to do away with valet parking – she brought up that this is supportive for older/more mobility impaired visitors 
  • They discussed this at the last Festival committee meeting and Sean had a suggestion to staff the parking lot ourselves – we wouldn’t valet, but we would monitor the lot so folks who need the proximity can use it – to be discussed further 
• Annie suggested changing artist check-in/load in time to officially start at 9AM Friday to allow opportunity for rental tables to arrive in time – people would be able to start before, but no tables before 9AM
• 4 individuals were interested in talking at length about the festival and April will be doing phone “interviews” with them – she’ll bring feedback to the committee
• The festival committee will not meet this month since there’s no pressing agenda and need for some time to do individual work

Festival treasurer’s report (Piper)

• Festival finance from this year is almost done: 
  • 1 person needs to provide receipts for reimbursement 
  • 1 artist needs to confirm their sales amount
  • 1 artist needs to pay festival commission
    • Piper will remind them about eligibility in future – April confirmed the contract says they would forfeit participating for 1 year
    • April will also get involved in communications with this person
• Piper suggests we maybe add late fees for next year
• Piper will use the ACGA logo in future festival-related communications with participants so that the emails do not come across as scam emails

Financial Report (Julie)

• Assets: $183K (including what’s in PayPal) 
  • $43k in Fidelity
  • $5k in PayPal
  • Rest is in bank accounts
• We lost money in August, but that’s because we had a lot of festival expenses coming through and all the income from the festival was in previous month
• Net revenue for 2026 = $20k 
• We are under budget on membership by $12k – that’s because a lot comes in in December 
• We made $5k more in revenue than we budgeted on the festival 
• We were $2.5k under budget on expenses for the festival 

Report on Madhvi Subrahmanian’s Artist Talk and the Global Ceramic Heritage Stamps Exhibition (Mari)

• Madhvi Subrahmanian’s artist talk took place at Atherton Library on September 15, in collaboration with Atherton Library, Atherton Arts Foundation, and ACGA 
  • Madhvi is a member of the Geneva-based International Academy of Ceramics (IAC), a large international ceramics organization
  • Originally ACGA was asked to help with live streaming, but after reviewing the statistics from last year’s artist talk and considering the lecture’s length, we thought this maybe wasn’t the best way to promote the event – in the end we helped them promote through the ACGA newsletter and Google Group
  • Atherton Library is a great venue for small educational events
  • Mari pointed out that hosting artist talks is a great way to introduce visiting international artists and their work to our community while they’re in the Bay Area 
• The Global Ceramic Heritage Stamps Exhibition was a traveling exhibition of the IAC and was held at the Santa Clara Asian Art Center from September 12 to 20. It was curated by ACGA members Guangzhen “Po” Zhou and Yilin “Rebecca” Sun. 
  • We’ve previously featured Po’s article about his journey around the world collecting stamps in our newsletters, and we helped promote Po’s exhibition this time

Define ACGA’s Role in Events and Set Logo Use Guidelines (Mari)

• Mari put together guidelines for when/how to use the ACGA logo
• We will discuss the guidelines at next month’s meeting since not everyone has had a chance to review them

2027 Leadership: Presidential Succession Without a VP and New Board Member Recruitment (Mari)

• Jan explained that the vice president typically steps up to become president, though this year presents challenges since there is no current vice president and several board members are planning to step down.
• Mari encouraged someone on the board to step up to the president role and that we should definitely have a VP so future succession is more clear
• Barbara is going to step down from the board/festival committee this year, but has already invited a number of members to attend board meetings and see if they’re interested in joining the board (Katie Morris who was in attendance was one of these people) 
• Vicki is wondering if it’s a good idea to invite someone who has never been on a board, there was discussion that this is okay as long as they’re committed and here for the right reasons
• Katie Morris mentioned James Aarons as a potential board member – Cheryl spoke up and said she has asked him in the past and will try to reach out to him again 
• Ren mentioned that several people said they were interested during the festival and Britt recorded their names so we can follow up
• Mari suggested we post in the newsletter/Google Group. After some discussion it was decided that the Google Group was most appropriate 
• Emil asked about whether board members needed to be members of ACGA – Julie clarified that it is a requirement, but anyone interested in the board could easily become a member, they don’t need to be an artist
• Chris is wondering if we can find people who are experienced professionals who have been on boards and grown nonprofit orgs 
• How we speak about the board
  • Ren brought up that it’s important that we specify this is a position focused on service, not prestige 
  • Julie brought up that this is “working” board
  • Cheryl brought up that this is NOT a “fundraising” board
• Britt will draft a letter that we can send to the Google Group 

Other Topic – Glass Artist Interviews for Newsletter (Ren)

• Our newsletter has interviewed every single glass artist who responded to our request for an interview, and we’re now struggling to balance our newsletter with glass coverage
• Chris offered to follow up with some people and can also make a visit to BAGI 

Date of next meeting is October 19, 2026

Minutes prepared by Britt Jensen, ACGA Secretary.

8/17/26 ACGA Board Meeting

• Present: Cheryl Costantini, Sean Alcala, Emil Yanos, Barbara Prodaniuk, Iver Hennig, Vicki Gunter, Britt Jensen, Pierre Bounaud, Tamara Danoyan, Julie Taber, Piper Christine, Ren Lee, Lee Middleman, Mari Emori, Jan Schachter
• Absent: April Zilber, Chris Johnson, Susie Rubenstein

The meeting began at 5:15 PM and ended at 7:10 PM.

Welcome (Mari) 

• Mari welcomed the group and congratulated everyone who participated in the festival 
• Mari reminded everyone that the formal name is “ACGA Clay and Glass Festival,” not “Palo Alto Clay and Glass Festival” – this is important because there’s one with a similar name 
• Our guest Dan Osorio introduced himself – He’s a ceramic artist who used to live in Santa Cruz and now lives in Palm Springs. His work involves porcelain thrown pieces and underglaze illustration. He’s shown at the festival for two years and is interested in getting more involved with the board, potentially with a focus on social media! 

Board Leadership and Succession Planning (Mari)

• Mari reminded everyone to reach out to anyone who might be a good fit for the ACGA board. She noted the best way to learn about how the organization is run is for interested folks to join a board meeting. 
• Mari reminded everyone that this is her last year serving as president. She thinks it would be good to select someone who has been a board member to step up because they understand how it works. 

Financial Report (Julie)

• Currently have $202,330.51 in assets 
  • Clarification on undeposited funds line item (~$17,510.03): there are checks that were received in July, but not deposited until August 
• Julie is moving money over from PayPal and into the bank
• Currently have $39,554.90 in income so far this year (mostly from the Festival)
  • A big chunk of income will also come in December from memberships 
• Julie projects that our income will exceed our expenses this year
  • We’re about half way through what we budgeted on our expenses ($140k for whole year and we’re almost to $80k) – Note: we still have a few expenses that need to come through for the festival 
• Note: Piper has written a $32k check to Messenger Events since July books closed – this is not currently included in the financials, but we’re still under budget 

Festival Report 

General updates (Piper presented April’s notes)

• Critiques and potential changes for next year
  • Consider doing away with valet parking – it’s been progressively less fruitful 
    • This year we lost $1290 on valet service (similar to last year, but 2x as much as 2024)
      • ACGA pays $3890 
      • Cost to people parking = $13 per person (and expected to leave a tip)
      • 200 people utilized this service
    • Lee asked about cost to break even – we would need to charge about $20 to break even if we paid $3890 and had 200 people utilize it
    • Festival committee will discuss this further
  • On Friday some tables aren’t there by the time people are setting up, would it make sense for check in to start at 9am (So check in windows would be 9-11am, 11am-1pm, 1-3pm)
    • Barbara said she likes early time because it gets so hot, she suggests that people who need tables should sign up for later time slot
  • Jan brought up that check-in tent wasn’t staffed for several hours on Friday – not sure if this is a Messenger Event issue or a festival job issue
    • Piper will bring this up with April and Messenger events
  • We need to remind artists that if there’s an emergency, artists can call 911 themselves rather than go find someone in the art center
  • Thinking of raising food truck fee (it’s currently $500) to $550 
    • They’ve been paying by check and one check got lost and some are late → would be nice to have them pay online and this increase would cover our processing fees
  • Demo artists were running over
  • Throwdown sound system could use improvement 
    • Vicki clarified that the mics that Iver worked hard to get wouldn’t work unfortunately → it would be really great to have a cordless mic set up in the future 
  • Job waiver program 
    • 25 artists paid to get out of doing a job and allowed Messenger events to hire extra staff, especially to help during Sunday evening crazy time 
    • Messenger Events complaint – non-festival participant volunteers were taking hours away from Messenger event staff 
• How it went
  • 10,000 estimated attendees (from Laura giving intuitive sense based on what she’s seen at other festivals)
  • Moving artist party to Historic Courtyard seemed to go well and PAAC is happy to let us use that space again next year
• Throwdown 
  • This year we had 2 volunteers from Cobb Mountain who helped Vicki and Iver and it worked really well
    • No one signed up originally, so Laura asked Cobb Mountain – wasn’t an official job for them 
  • Thanks to Iver for making trophies, we should figure out who will make them next year 
  • Great to expand geographic area – we had more contestants from Santa Cruz Mountains 
  • Jennifer Hennig, a new throwdown coordinator, did a great job
  • Vicki had a fun celebrity moment and was recognized at Clay People a few weeks later as the pottery throwdown MC!!
  • Mari is wondering how we can better promote Clay People as throwdown sponsor – festival committee will discuss this further 
• Piper thinks there were about 60 responses to the festival artist survey so far and someone will share feedback soon 
• Mari asked if it would be possible to get feedback from members who attended the Festival but were not participants
• Ren has an idea to offer local supply stores a table space to promote their business at the festival (maybe a 5×10 booth) – Mari clarified that they were already offered this – we should revisit this, festival committee will look into it

Festival treasurer’s report (Piper)

• Still some expenses coming in – we are over and under in a few places
  • Security was under budget 
  • Office supplies/misc is over budget, but that’s because we stocked up on water bottles, tote bags, and pens (so this is 2-3 years of expenses)
• Clarification on some budget items
  • Festival producer = contract fixed fee to Messenger Events
  • ME staff = people they hire for day-of
  • Maintenance = janitorial services
  • Sanitation = porta potties + renting extra trash cans 
• We are currently slightly under budget, but will likely have a few expenses roll in 
• Reconciliation is about 95% complete.  With current artist sales totals, ACGA’s income from commissions will be $71,961.35.  This is almost $4K more than 2025
• There was approximately $540k in artist sales

Festival Jury (Tamara/Britt)

• August 18 info session
  • We have an online session tomorrow (Aug 18) night to provide more details on how to have a successful jury application 
  • Promoting: 
    • Tamara will post to Google Group
    • Britt will post to social media – will also send link so that we can all promote on our own social media 
• Updating festival jury webpage
  • 3 options for how we talk about jewelry, mosaic, and stained glass artists 
    • Option 1 – require all artists to create their primary clay or glass components
    • Option 2 – require only jewelry artists to create their primary clay or glass components
    • Option 3 – allow commercially manufactured components for all three categories
  • Discussion on whether to include fused glass in this list 
    • Ren suggests reaching out to jewelry artists so they can be part of the discussion 
    • Sean said there was an instance of an artist using decals (which can be considered commercial patterns), he’s not sure about the rules related to clay artists 
    • Ren is wondering why this would be added about fused glass artists, it’s still transformed by heat – Cheryl thinks it’s because it could involve less creativity, but not necessarily 
    • There’s general consensus that fused glass artists are covered under general guidelines 
    • Ren points out it has only been a few years since stained glass artists have been admitted and isn’t sure where the mosaic info on the website came from 
    • Vicki thinks we can leave a lot of this up to the jury’s discretion 
    • Lee is having trouble with option 2 because this has been discussed before – he’s worried about artists leaning more on technology and less on creativity 
      • Mari clarified that we still require an artist process statement which is good to prevent mass manufacturing or heavy technology utilization without creativity
      • Cherly points out that this is a slippery slope that could be extended to buying commercial glazes  – she wants to bring this back to the core about bringing people together who are authentic and passionate about what they’re making 
      • Vicki brings up whether we should say something about no work being accepted that was created using AI
    • Piper likes the line that work with minimal artistic transformation is not eligible
    • Tamara points out that etching on glass can be amazing, but there’s no heat involved
    • Lee proposes we stick with what we have given the proximity to the jury date, we reviewed what we have on the website currently 
    • We voted to take the two paragraphs out of the website titled “note to jewelry and mosaic artists” as well as “note to clay artists” 
      • Vicki proposed the motion this and Cheryl seconded
      • Passed unanimously 

Exhibitions Report

SILICA SiO2: Northern California Ceramics in Santa Cruz (Iver)

• Silica exhibition opening September 4 – the Friday night opening is free
• All pieces delivered to Iver have made it to the museum 
• Every first Friday is free until it closes in January 

FINELY CRAFTED in Sebastopol (Cheryl)

• Applications rolling in 
• Confusion about ACGA contributing money 
  • First we said $300, then we said more, then Sebastopol Center for the Arts said they didn’t want more
  • Where we’ve landed: $500 total ($250 for clay and $250 for glass) – ACGA will be credited, but the awards are being decided by people outside ACGA 
  • Ren moved we approve $500 for this exhibition and Piper seconded
    • Unanimously approved

Fresno Show “Standing on Their Shoulders” (Ren)

• Ren is participating in this October show
• She encourages anyone to apply if they have work that speaks to the contribution of their elders or struggle for equality
• Ren will be reposting about it and encourages everyone to share

Handwork (Barbara) 

• We got some coverage on festival from Handwork – not as much as she had hoped for, but it was well done
• Silica SiO2 show is up on the page, but Finely Crafted show is not yet up
• Handwork exhibit at Fresno Museum of Art is up right now showing from Forest Merrill collection 

Date of next meeting is September 21, 2026

Minutes prepared by Britt Jensen, ACGA Secretary.