Arts & Events

Don't miss the cardboard turntable[1], the robot that speaks, or the Memorial Toilet[2] surrounded by flowers, candles, and remembrance cards. Don't miss the ethereal watercolors by one of Berkeley's most articulate advocates for more humane housing policy[3], the playful retrieved metal sculptures[4], or the subtle printed sheets almost obscured by garden leaves[5]. 

"Creativity Unhoused" is an Expressions Gallery exhibition in which artists, activists, and poets both with and without housing worked together to create a show full of humor, audacity, creativity, and sheer beauty using an outrageously wide spectrum of media, including film, weaving, shattered glass, monoprints on sheets, ultra-chrome prints, photography, lithography, scrap wire and stones, river rocks, and bathroom fixtures.  

Artists Rinna Flohr and Marcia Poole organized for months with an informal collective of artists and Berkeley residents to create this show. They collaborated with First They Came for the Homeless to provide access to materials and assistance in the presentation and submissions. The organizing group shared an interest in how the alchemy of mixing housed and unhoused artists might manifest in an exhibition about human survival and hardship, the camaraderie and humor built between people on the streets and neighbors, the inspiration and wild constraints that spring out of retrieved materials, and the brightest, most expressive colors of community building at its best. 

The show grew out of a similar exhibition a few years ago, where Flohr and Poole's efforts helped gallery newcomers get established as community artists. Both artists share a deep interest in reframing first impressions of class differences and eccentricities, and both have extensive backgrounds in creative outreach to marginalized communities. The gallery offers classes, poetry readings, and all the artists assist as docents throughout the show. 

Some of the artists would only agree to submit work on condition of anonymity, which was readily agreed to by both Flohr and Poole so that "Doc", "Mike", and "Anonymous Artist A" could contribute playful sculpture, intensely beautiful jewelry from found materials, and strangely human forms from river rock. Some artists are well-known, such as Doug Minkler, a printmaker who describes himself as making posters "for my own preservation, that is, planetary preservation. My prints are inspired not by rugged individualism, but by the collective humor, defiance and lust for life exhibited by those on the margins." 

But the Creativity Unhoused show is its own explosive, inspiring explanation. Celebrate spring by dropping by Expressions Gallery at 2530 Ashby Avenue, open Tuesday through Saturday from noon to 5:00 pm, and from Sunday noon to 3:00 pm (and by appointment at 510-644-4930) for an unforgettable sip of something wildly, wonderfully unexpected. 

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