Creative Growth Art Center
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Creative Growth Art Center is a nonprofit arts organization, based in
Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...
, that provides studios, supplies, and gallery space to artists with developmental, mental, and physical disabilities. It is one of the oldest and largest art center for people with disabilities in the world. It is currently located at 355 24th Street in Oakland, California.


About

The director of the program since 2000 is Tom di Maria, who previously worked as the assistant director at Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive. Roughly 160 artists work at the center.


History

In 1974, the husband and wife pair of Florence Ludins-Katz and Elias Katz founded Creative Growth in their garage in Berkeley. Ludins-Katz was an artist and Katz was a psychologist. The center moved in 1978 to a former auto-repair shop in downtown Oakland, where it currently operates. Between the 1950s and 1960s, the mass closure of psychiatric hospitals in California caused many patients to be deinstitutionalized. And in 1967, the
Lanterman–Petris–Short Act The Lanterman–Petris–Short (LPS) ActChapter 1667of the 1967 California Statutes, codified aCal. Welf & Inst. Code sec. 5000 et seq.) regulates involuntary civil commitment to a mental health institution in the state of California. The act set ...
was signed and it blocked involuntary hospitalization for many former patients. There were not enough accommodations made after the release of the former patients and many ended up homeless or imprisoned. The Creative Growth Art Center was founded primarily with the goal of supporting former state-hospital patients with therapeutic support, artistic/creative support, and vocational training. Creative Growth was featured in
Elle Decor ''Elle'' (stylized ''ELLE'') is a worldwide women's magazine of French origin that offers a mix of fashion and beauty content, together with culture, society and lifestyle. The title means "she" or "her" in French. ''Elle'' is considered the wo ...
(October 1990 issue) in an article tilted "Aimed Straight From The Heart" written by Susan Subtle. Subtle reviews the organization and compares the style of art made at Creative Growth to
Outsider Outsider(s) may refer to: Film * ''Outsider'' (1997 film), a 1997 Slovene-language film * ''Outsider'' (2012 film), a Malayalam-language Indian film * ''Outsiders'' (1980 film), a South Korean film featuring Won Mi-kyung Literature * Outside ...
, Primitive, Naive, Brut, and early-American folk art. In 2010,
Matthew Higgs Matthew Higgs (born 1964) is an English artist, curator, writer and publisher. His contribution to UK contemporary art has included the creation of ''Imprint 93'', a series of artists’ editions featuring the work of artists such as Martin Creed ...
, Director/Chief Curator at White Columns, curated a show titled "Everyone!" that featured over 130 works made by Creative Growth artists and included each and every artist currently enrolled in the studio program. In 2018, a segment in the ninth season of television series Art21, talks to some of the artists and administrators involved with Creative Growth.


''Beyond Trend'' (2010 – present) fashion show

Beyond Trend is Creative Growth's runway extravaganza that started in 2010 as a small in-gallery showing of fashion. The 2018 show, its largest yet, opened at the 1,250-seat Scottish Rite Center, where it was chaired by
Paper magazine ''Paper'' (also known as ''Paper Mag'') is a New York City-based independent magazine focusing on fashion, popular culture, nightlife, music, art, and film. Initially produced monthly, the magazine eventually became a quarterly publication, and a ...
co-founder Kim Hastreiter and
Target Target may refer to: Physical items * Shooting target, used in marksmanship training and various shooting sports ** Bullseye (target), the goal one for which one aims in many of these sports ** Aiming point, in field artillery, f ...
Chief Creative Officer Todd Waterbury.


Notable artists

Thousands of artists have come through Creative Growth's doors over the years and a number have reach national recognition. Creative Growth artists have had major exhibitions at the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC (with artist Judith Scott, 2018);
Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...
(with artists Dan Miller and Judith Scott, 2017); Brooklyn Museum (Judith Scott, 2015);
Museum of Modern Art The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
(Dan Miller, 2008); and White Columns (with artist William Scott, 2009, 2006).


References


External links

* {{Disability art, state=collapsed 501(c)(3) organizations Arts organizations based in the San Francisco Bay Area Non-profit organizations based in the San Francisco Bay Area Outsider art Autism in the arts Deafness arts organizations Deaf education Disability mass media Disability organizations based in the United States Summer camps for children with special needs Charities for disabled people Intellectual disability organizations Educational institutions established in 1974 Art schools in California Social welfare charities based in the United States