Artists | CreativeSonoma.org

Marsha Klein Painting, Recovery Fund Grantee, Sculpture, Visual Arts I have been making art for over 40 years, large format oil paintings and sculptural ceramics. Studied art in my native New York City and at the University of California, Berkeley: ceramics with Peter Voulkos and Ron Nagle, and Painting/Drawing with R.B.Kitaj. I have maintained my own art studio in Sonoma since 1973. My ceramics have been exhibited nationally, the paintings mainly in California. I have been an artist- in- the- schools and community for over 35 years, and designed /directed several large community mural projects.

Mirka Knaster Artisan, Fiber Art, Mixed, Visual Arts Natural environments, East Asian aesthetics, the places I've lived and traveled, 20th-century abstract art, and my meditation practice are the most important influences and inspirations for my art. Growing up cross-culturally, I am drawn to learn and appreciate how people around the world create with a wide range of materials--plants, clay, wood, stone, metal, glass, hides--and equipment, especially their own hands. After many years as a writer and editor using words to convey ideas and emotions to others, I began to also communicate with fibers because it's exhilarating to engage with color, texture, line, shape and space, pattern and design. I approach the creative process as an open-ended improvisation. Works emerge intuitively, even serendipitously, as I feel my way into each piece, choosing this color or that textile, dyeing cloth with indigo or rust, incorporating paper, metal or wood, adding another layer for transparency, working up texture, stitching another mark or brushing on paint or ink. Along the way, I embrace and celebrate the surprises.

Nao Kobayashi Artisan, Design, Fashion Design, Fiber Art, Folk Art, Performance Art, Puppetry, Technical, Theatre Nao Kobayashi designs and creates puppets and costume for theater, TV and film, museums, institutes, and entertainment. Originally from Japan and recently in northern California, she holds a MFA in Costume Design and Technology in Theatre, TV and Film from San Diego State University, a BA in Technical Theater from Sonoma State University. Over the past decade she has worked on various projects with dance, theater productions, fashion and entertainment companies, as well as artworks with independent artists, dancers, musicians and performers in Japan and artists from other countries. She currently works as a fabricator at Images in Motion a TV puppet company in Sonoma. In puppetry, she utilizes skills of sketch, sculpture, fabric modification and fabrication, and martial art and dance as movement and body understanding. She often works in creative teams with interdisciplinary characteristics, by expanding ideas to cross borders, as well as deepening and refining details.

DENNIS KOHN Photography, Recovery Fund Grantee, Visual Arts

DENNIS KOHN, professional photographer, teacher, world traveler, image maker, pioneer, environmentalist, and student of life, is as diverse as his background indicates.

Graduated with Honors from Pennsylvania State University in l969 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, Dennis continued his education through l971 with graduate studies in photography. In 1975, to follow his destiny, he left teaching to open the first DENNIS KOHN STUDIOS in New Hope, Pennsylvania. After a split in a business partnership, the first studio was closed and DENNIS KOHN STUDIOS in Laguna Beach, California was born. Several years later, Dennis would re-locate to the Bay area where he has been working for the past 30 years. In l982 through l985, Dennis returned to teaching by offering weekend photographic seminars to places as Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, and Monterey and Carmel. These workshops taught the "Art of Photographing the Landscape".

DENNIS KOHN currently sells Photographic Art worldwide to individuals and corporations through art consultants, galleries, and prestigious outdoor art shows throughout the western states, as well as his own studio/gallery in Santa Rosa. Dennis has won numerous awards for his images: from the white-washed villages of GREECE, the remote villages of rural CHINA; to the wonderful waters of TAHITI, and the history of two European countries SPAIN and PORTUGAL; and the Aegean and Mediterranean coasts of TURKEY. Dennis' latest collections include images of the Buddhist monks and remote villages of THAILAND, and the rich history and multi-religious temples of ISRAEL and images of the wonderful Himalayan Mountains of NEPAL, and most recently extensive travel through some of the most sacred places in INDIA.

In addition to his worldly travels, his renown work of the SAN FRANCISCO landscape as well as his work from YOSEMITE, LAKE TAHOE and the SONOMA and NAPA WINE COUNTRY have made him a prominent figure in the Bay Area's extensive photographic world. The latest ARCHITECTURAL ABSTRACT COLLECTION, sponsored by one of the countries premier photo labs, BAY PHOTO, has been a major departure for Dennis from his landscape work. The Dimensional Overlay images that he produces are unique and have been featured in many of the trade magazines. Awards have been received from Professional Photographers of America (PPofA), Travel and Leisure Magazine, as well as awards of recognition and purchase awards from shows as: LA QUINTA ARTS FESTIVAL, BEVERLY HILLS, AFFAIR IN THE GARDENS, CHERRY CREEK ART FESTIVAL and the prestigious SAUSALITO ARTS FESTIVAL.