Women Making Their Mark
Diana Greenleaf’s sculpture, Mobile Conversation, is part of the online exhibit, Women’s Work, Women Artists Making Their Mark 2026, August 17-October 31. The O’Hanlon Center for the Arts website: ohanloncenter.org.
Visions In Clay
San Joaquin Delta College 5151 Pacific Ave. Horton Art Gallery Shima Blding. Stockton, CA 95207
Exhibition & Event Dates
Gallery Exhibition: August 27 – October 2, 202
Opening Reception: August 27, 5:00 – 7:00pm
Online Exhibition: August 27, 2026 – June 30, 2027
August 27 • 12:30pm: Curator’s Talk with Cynthia de Bos: featuring the work of ceramic artist, Viola Frey (Delta Alum 1953-54).
Gallery Hours:
M – Th, 11am-5:30pm | Fridays, 11am-1pm
Saturday, August 29, 11am-3pm
ACGA Board Meeting Minutes (6/15/26)
- Present: April Zilber, Cheryl Costantini, Sean Alcala, Emil Yanos, Barbara Prodaniuk, Iver Hennig, Vicki Gunter, Britt Jensen, Pierre Bounaud, Jan Schachter, Tamara Danoyan, Julie Taber, Piper Christine, Chris Johnson, Ren Lee, Lee Middleman
- Absent: Mari Emori, Haley Tessler, Susie Rubenstein
The meeting began at 5:15 PM and ended at 6:45 PM.
Welcome (Julie)
- Julie welcomed everyone
Financial Report (Julie)
- Total Assets ~$164k
- Spent ~$23k more last month than we brought in, but that covers is a lot of up-front festival expenses including paying Palo Alto for the festival space
- Revenue ~$1.8k so far this year
- Cheryl asked about income from booth fees – did we lose any money by not having the larger premium booths? – Piper clarified that spaces that would have become 10×20 were converted to 10×10, so all the spaces should be paid for
Festival Report
General updates (April)
- This year we currently have 132 artists due to cancelations, last year we had 134
- Note: some of the cancellations were not on the lawn, so it doesn’t help us expand the spaces to the larger booth size
- 3 nonprofit booths (Marks Project, CERF, and Spiffy Pottery Studio) and 2 commercial booths
- Note from Vicki on Marks Project: She submitted to marks project a few months ago and it was quite difficult. Thanks to her suggestion, they did update their form, but are still updating their website, so she has not seen her submission posted.
- Participating festival artist grid is up on the website – April encourages everyone to check their info to make sure it’s right
- Ren is posting a lot about the festival
- Barbara submitted videos from April & Sean as well as a compilation video to Handwork, but they haven’t been posted by Handwork yet because they’re still showing June events
- Barbara will share the videos with Ren for her to share on our social media
- April wants to make sure we have enough volunteers (given the pay to opt-out option) and needs to get a spreadsheet from Annie to verify
Festival treasurer’s report (Piper)
- Everyone who needs to be paid has been paid
- Festival Swag – Piper was going to order it in 2 different orders (artist vs. throwdown) and asked Annie if she’d be willing to get all stuff shipped to Messenger Events, but hasn’t heard back
- Pens in particular need to be shipped to Annie so they can be put in packets during assembly
- Cheryl can order pens to Annie and other things to her house and bring them down
- New artists will get water bottles
- Vicki asked we are still getting things from Clay People for throwdown- April confirmed we are
Festival Jury (Tamara/Britt)
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- Jury process page has been updated on website
- We’ve scheduled a time (August 18) to have a Zoom info session for people interested in applying to the jury
- We will announce after festival so it doesn’t get confusing
- Britt is working on presentation for the call
- The jury is in place
- Tamara expressed concern about JotForm and April thinks unfortunately we’ll be in the same boat getting individual permissions like we did last year
- Separate conversation about festival info session (NOTE jury info session)
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- Unfortunately the recording from last year’s info session was not found in the Zoom archives, but April will send the handout that was created
- We have festival clay and glass mentor volunteers – Cheryl thinks people should be given a mentor when they get juried in, not right during festival
Festival Feedback (Tamara)
- One person agreed to be juror, but said she will not be doing festival because it wasn’t good for her – Tamara doesn’t know the reason
- Tamara also received feedback from another glass artist who did the festival for the first time last year and will not be returning because dues, fees, and festival job felt high, they didn’t like their location, and they did not feel welcomed at the festival
- To improve the experience of new artist and make sure they feel welcomed, Britt brought up the idea of formalizing a crew of board members who are each assigned to stop by a new festival artist’s booth
- Cheryl, April, and Mari have done this informally, but Cheryl agrees it would be nice to formalize
Exhibitions Report
SILICA SiO2: Northern California Ceramics in Santa Cruz (Iver)
- Starting to coordinate drop offs
- If anyone wants to bring pieces to festival on Saturday, Iver is happy to bring them to Santa Cruz
- Iver will also send out an email to help with generally carpooling work
FINELY CRAFTED in Sebastopol (Cheryl)
- It’s been a little quiet because there are other shows between now and the Finely Crafted show
- The art center does not want more money for awards because they are trying to make it equitable between the shows they’re putting on, so we’ll go back to original award prices
- ACGA will do more promotion closer to the date
- Vicki said she saw the communications that were sent out about the show and they seemed to imply that they were looking for all functional work – this wasn’t Cheryl’s impression, but the language they use is confusing: pieces should have “utility in their heritage”
- Cheryl will clarify what this means
Potential SoCal Exhibition Venues (Pierre)
- Pierre has been looking for venues that could be good partners for ACGA in Southern California
- Two venues showed interest
- Fallbrook Art Center – nonprofit art venue and art school
- They have a glass show in September with a currently open call for entry – would be great to have some ACGA artists apply and start forming connections with the venue
- Pierre spoke to the director about 2 shows we might want to be collaborators in that are already on their books
- “Carved and Thrown” – March 13 – April 24, 2027
- Wood and ceramics
- Call for entry in December
- “Home and Garden Show” – May 1 – June 12, 2027
- More open show
- Call for entry in February 2027
- We could help with curation, jury, or awards
- “Carved and Thrown” – March 13 – April 24, 2027
- We may also want to consider getting involved in their annual glass show next year
- Oceanside Museum of Art – museum, but also venue where they organize exhibitions that artists submit proposals for
- They sent Pierre guidelines for proposals and he noted that the theme or artists themselves need to be around Southern California
- Fallbrook Art Center – nonprofit art venue and art school
- Pierre thinks we should focus on Fallbrook for now since there are some imminent shows we could get involved in and they are less specific to Southern California
Date of next meeting is August 17, 2026 (no meeting in July)
Minutes prepared by Britt Jensen, ACGA Secretary.
Crystalline Disruption
The Barn Gallery’s Summer 2026 exhibition features contemporary work by nine artists that use glass as a material in their artwork. Art includes fused glass, stained glass, kiln cast glass, blown glass, mixed media glass installations, and more.
CLAY TALKS – CONVERSATIONS WITH THE MASTERS – BILL ABRIGHT
The Ceramic Art Center of Marin – Clay Talks – Conversations with the Masters
Bill Abright – A true California clay legend.
Bill Abright – A true California clay legend.
June 13th – 4:00m – 6:00pm – $25
Join us to meet Bill Abright for a casual, in-depth conversation full of stories and images.
Bill Abright is an artist who seeks to create beauty in the space between order and chaos. Based in San Anselmo, CA, his journey with clay began at Delta College in Stockton in the late 1960s, leading to a graduate degree in ceramics at San Francisco State in 1974.
For four decades he shaped the lives of countless artists as a beloved instructor of drawing, design and ceramics at the College of Marin, retiring in 2015 after an extraordinary 40-year tenure. Since retirement he has expanded his practice beyond ceramics and drawing to embrace steel, glass and found objects, assembling figurative sculptures from abstract shapes whose titles and content evolve organically throughout the creative process.
His work has been exhibited throughout the United States and is held in prestigious collections including the Oakland Museum of California and the Mint Museum in Charlotte, North Carolina. Bill shares his San Anselmo home and studio of 54 years with his wife and fellow ceramist Claudia Tarantino, a creative partnership that has produced not only beautiful art but two artist sons, sculptor Oben Abright and painter Guston Abright.
Free Event for Ceramic students ages 16 – 25
(High School, College, University) Student Reservation required email: info@cacm.studio
The CACM Clay Talks: Conversations with the Masters is a platform dedicated to bringing top-tier ceramic artists together with our community of makers and enthusiasts. Our goal is to provide you with a rare opportunity to hear directly and learn from experienced ceramic artists.
Learn more and get tickets at https://www.cacm.studio/store/p/9u70yv7zlu2qvmzow25deygm2zt850
ACGA Board Meeting (5/18/26)
5/18/26 ACGA Board Meeting
- Present: Mari Emori, April Zilber, Cheryl Costantini, Susie Rubenstein, Sean Alcala, Emil Yanos, Barbara Prodaniuk, Iver Hennig, Vicki Gunter, Britt Jensen, Pierre Bounaud, Jan Schachter, Tamara Danoyan, Julie Taber, Haley Tessler, Piper Christine, Chris Johnson, Ren Lee
- Absent: Lee Middleman
The meeting began at 5:15 PM and ended at 6:45 PM.
Welcome (Julie)
- Julie welcomed everyone
Phishing Emails (Mari)
- The phishing issue is frequent and frustrating, Mari urged everyone to be vigilant with suspicious emails – do not respond and report as spam
- Mari also reminded the board to add the ACGA logo at top or bottom of official ACGA board emails being sent in our roles as board members
- Note: do not use the ACGA logo when just sending emails as a member (announcing shows, etc.)
- Chris pointed out you can also often click on the name in the email and see if the email is their real email
Financial Report (Julie)
- ~$167k in the bank
- ~$22k in PayPal that Julie is moving it over to bank account as it comes in
- Year to date membership income ~$10k
- Budgeted $24k membership income for whole year (most membership payments come in in December)
- We are slightly lower than budgeted for booth income – some payments may still be coming in
- Revenue for festival is still under, but that’s because festival hasn’t happened
- Storage facility going up to $411/mo (we already downsized when we moved from Berkeley to Santa Clara)
- April was paid additional stipend for the 2025 Festival, but it wasn’t originally budgeted, Julie is wondering if she should redo the budget, no conclusion on how to best handle this
Update on RFP for Website/Membership System (Julie)
- RFP has been circulated and Julie has received some responses, but they’re a bit more expensive than we were hoping
- Julie asked Pam today if she’s planning on submitting, haven’t heard back
- Julie plans to extend the date
- Mari is wondering if Mega Jewell could redo the website – April will reach out to them directly
- Emil proposes we prioritize our wants and have those responding price accordingly so that we can cut off low priorities if the price is too high – Julie will plan to redo with priorities
- Susie is wondering if these proposals includes maintaining website, Julie clarified that this maintenance would be additional, but maintenance estimates are included requested in RFP
- Mari reiterated that the same person who built website should maintain
- Vicki is wondering how we’re getting the message out there – Julie clarified that we sent it in Google Group, in the newsletter, and on social media
- April brought up question of finding designer behind a studio whose website we liked – Julie clarified that she already reached out and the company they used is no longer in business
- April brought up that she believed a lot of our issues were due to cheap/free plugins in the past and wondered if we can just pay for better plugins now – Julie doesn’t think this is the issue, we have paid for some in the past and they did not work out
- April is concerned about taking ALL payments through our website – do we want to have every application form through our website – Julie clarified not all applications have to be created on the website, but could still link to the payment system on the website
- Mari had asked Haley to get info on Potter’s Studio in Berkeley and how they gathered payment – Haley said they just use a squarespace site and said there are often issues with it, but clarified that the issues were not actually with SquareSpace, but their class registration system which is a company outside of SquareSpace – Haley will still pass along the contact info of the person who does the Potter’s Studio website to Julie so we can ask them about the issues they face with Squarespace.
Festival Report
General updates (April)
- Slow trickle of booth cancelations, but show is still full because we had one person on waitlist
- Emil has been busy designing our ads
- April talked to Emil and Ren about creating some banners and images to share with artists to help promote, this is still in the works
- Jan is wondering if there will be a sharing table, but April doesn’t think it’s worth it given our previous experience, but offers to gauge interest by sending something in the Google Group
- Mari is wondering how festival job filling is going – April isn’t sure, but will check
- Barbara is wondering about SWAG – Cheryl is working on it and will bring SWAG options to next committee meeting for approval
- April asks about clarification for when to use Handwork logo – should we be using it casually as an individual – answer is you can tag personal event promotion posts with @handwork2026 and add #craftinamerica
- Mari updated everyone on throwdown – Mari had over 20 people on waitlist from last year and asked them about interest in participating this year, but some people are no longer available or have not responded, so we posted in the May newsletter to invite more contestants and just have a few spots to fill, shouldn’t be a problem to find the 12 contestants
Festival treasurer’s report (Piper)
- Piper has done some of the major purchases recently (like ads)
- Piper will soon send city of Palo Alto initial payment of $14k (and then may or may not have to add $2k more depending on how profitable the festival is)
- Still holding out on some refunds for premium booths to see if we should immediately refund or put people on waitlist
Festival Jury (Tamara/Britt)
- Britt & Tamara had a good meeting with Scott to understand his prep/feedback process
- This month we will decide on a date for the pre-jury zoom session
- Tamara has started reaching out to people she thinks would be a good fit for the jury
Exhibitions Report
NuMu in Los Gatos (Vicki)
- Heard back from Janet at NuMu and got some info, but still pretty vague about what they’re looking for
SILICA SiO2: Northern California Ceramics in Santa Cruz (Iver)
- Iver meeting again with the museum on Wednesday
- Jury happened last week, took about 3 days
- Had 180 artists apply and over 500 works of art (had to select 40 slots)
- Vicki asked why so few slots – Iver clarified there were 20 invited artists
- Acceptance letters have gone out
FINELY CRAFTED in Sebastopol (Cheryl)
- The organizing group is meeting tomorrow to finalize amount of money awarded
- ACGA previously agreed to give $100 prize for each category (clay and glass) and Cheryl is wondering if we’re interested in adding to this to try to elevate the event
- Vicki wondered about the main about award amounts – they are currently $300, $200, $100 (1st, 2nd, 3rd) – and thinks our ACGA award shouldn’t surpass the museums awards
- Cheryl confirmed there’s no ACGA revenue coming from the show, this is just a contribution
- Susie proposed $250 award for clay and $250 for glass and
- April clarified that we will approve up to $250 for each and Cheryl can take this to tomorrow’s meeting and she will see if the organizing group is interested in taking this amount of money
- Ren would like to make sure that the money goes towards ACGA award and not just into the general pot
- Ren asked if we get to pick the winners – Cheryl clarified that we (ACGA) will pick the winners
- Cheryl made a motion to offer to give up to $250 for an ACGA clay award and $250 for an ACGA glass award, Barbara seconded the motion and it passed with unanimous agreement
Glass Ambassador Update (Chris)
- Chris has been working on John Lewis to give us more money
- Chris was asked to give a talk at the American Physical Society World Conference in Denver – gave a talk on glass partnership project he did with physicist a few months back, he was able to promote the arts and ACGA to a room of nuclear physicists
- Chris has now been asked to write a paper for their journal
- Physicists work in very narrow areas, so the idea of coming up with an abstract concept and physicality of whole thing was fascinating to the audience
- Mari asked if the woman from the glass podcast got paid – Chris and Julie confirmed they were paid
Check in On Google Drive (Britt)
- Julie brought up that Zoom is getting quite full and we’re going to run out of space, she is wondering if we should download and move those to Google Drive
- Chris proposes keeping occasional recordings for posterity and Mari would like to permanently keep this year’s all member meeting recording
- Britt will download and keep 1-2 per year in Google Drive
Festival Listing on Handwork 2026 Website (Barbara)
- The ACGA festival is up on the Handwork website
- If you have a show you want to promote, you must send the info to Handwork by the 15th of the month prior to the show
Forest Merrill Gift
- Cheryl spoke with a friend of Forest who doesn’t think we should use his name for an award, this friend proposes we give him a gift certificate to Zut in Berkeley
- Vicki makes a motion to give Forest a $200 gift certificate and Cheryl seconds – the motion passes unanimously
- Julie will work with April to get this sent out
Date of next meeting is June 15th, 2026
Minutes prepared by Britt Jensen, ACGA Secretary.
