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Creativity Explored

Formation	1983
Founders	Florence Ludins and Elias Katz
Type	Nonprofit
Location	Studio 1: 3245 16th St, San Francisco, CA Studio 2: Studio 2: 1 Arkansas Street St # E, San Francisco, CA
Website	https://www.creativityexplored.org

Creativity Explored (CE) is a non-profit organization in San Francisco that hosts a day program for developmentally disabled adult artists. Located in the Mission District, CE functions as a studio-based collective, currently offering over 130 artists supplies, training, exhibition and sales opportunities. The organization's trademarked motto is “Art Changes Lives”.

History

Creativity Explored was founded in 1983 by Florence Ludins-Katz and Elias Katz, an artist and a psychologist. The couple also founded Creative Growth in Oakland, CA and NIAD (Nurturing Independence Through Artistic Development) Art Center in Richmond, CA. The Katz’s founded the three, independently operated, although similar organizations in response to statewide cuts in services for adults with disabilities. In America in the 1950s and 60s, there were mass closures of psychiatric hospitals in California which left many patients deinstitutionalized, unhoused, or imprisoned. The Katz’s organizations functioned as a place for artistic vocational training and community in an era of uncertainty. Creativity Explored artists have gone on to exhibit their work in museums, galleries, and art fairs in over 14 countries and have earned over $2.2 million from their art. Creativity Explored serves as a model for disability arts organizations worldwide, with participating artists earning 50% of all sales of their artwork.

General Structure, Practices, and Accolades

CE is considered a Progressive Art Studio, a fine arts studio where adults with developmental disabilities can create art and community. In a Progressive Art Studio, artists are facilitated by a staff of teaching artists in their independent work. It is not art therapy.

The general structure of CE’s programming includes teachers providing advice, suggestions, and support to artists in an individual work area, equipped with the necessary supplies. The artists rotate in groups, leaving ongoing work at a specific teacher’s station, and moving to another. CE’s teachers come to the studio with a background in fine arts, with many having active studio practices in a wide range of mediums.

In 2020 CE, along with Creative Growth and NIAD, switched its programs over to online courses due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2018, CE was recognized as a San Francisco Legacy Business. In 2019, in the SF Bay Guardian’s Best of the Bay Awards, CE was voted Best Nonprofit.

CE hosts an annual gala, Art Changes Lives, featuring a silent auction.

Generating Income for Disabled Artists:

CE has a gallery in its 16th Street location where art is sold and exhibitions are curated around five times a year. Creativity Explored artists have gone on to exhibit their work in museums, galleries, and art fairs in over 14 countries and have earned over $2.2 million from their art. Additionally, Creativity Explored sells artwork online, both via their own website and Artsy. They also maintain a digital archive that is used for licensing projects. Artists can further earn income through partnerships and grants that CE manages on their behalf. They also maintain a digital archive that is used for licensing projects. Creativity Explored serves as a model for disability arts organizations worldwide, with participating artists earning 50% of all sales of their artwork.

Types of Artmaking

Methods of creating artwork at Creativity explored include a range of mediums including oil pastels, painting, sculpture, digital media, textiles, printmaking, drawing, and collage.

Notable Collaborations

San Francisco Public Library: From February to March of 2023, more than 2,700 people voted for 5 CE artists' work to be turned into library cards. The voting took place online and in-person at the SFPL Main Branch, where entries from 30 CE artists were displayed until April 30th, 2023.

Oakland Museum of California: Beginning in May of 2023 and on view through January 21, 2024, CE contributed art “of incredible power, exuberance, humor, complexity, and joy” for Into the Brightness.This was the largest museum exhibition in over a decade featuring artists from the three Ludins-Katz founded organizations. The show reflected disabled artists’ experiences of the world from their perspective. Featured CE artists include: Peter Cordova, Tranesha Smith-Kilgore, Isaac Haney-Owens, and Marilyn Wong.

Recology: An exhibition taking place January 20, 21, and 24 of 2023 at the Recology 503 Studio entitled Become Like Life Golden: Creativity Explored at Recology displayed the work of 27 artists comprised of materials collected from the Recology Transfer Station. Some words used to describe the exhibit include, “lucious” “expressive” “energetic” and “playful”. A condensed version was then displayed at the CE Gallery from January 26-March 25th of 2023, titled RELOVE: Creativity Explored at Recology. Some artists included in the project include: Ian Adams, Julien Borromeo, Ada Chow, Kevin Cordoba, Peter DeLira, Samedi Djeimguero, Ricardo Estella, Allura Fong, Isaias Gomez, Daniel Green, Joseph “JD” Green, Jesus Huezo, John Iwaszewicz, Lakeshia King, Loren King, Angel Lara, David Li, Taneya Lovelace, Jason Monzon, Ayanna Wirsha Norwood, Joseph Omolayole, Musette Perkins, Roland Record, Ethel Revita, Clementina Rivera, Anne Slater, Tranesha Smith-Kilgore, Gerald Wiggins.

Blackiful: The Blackiful Collective was established in the summer of 2020 in response to "an on going need for Black sanctuary space" and consists of six Black artists from CE. The collective is dedicated to creating “Black social and aesthetic space at the Creativity Explored art studio and beyond” which included publishing Wonderful Blackiful People: Bay Area Changemakers from A to Z.Members include: Adrianna Simeon, Alissa Bledsoe, Joseph “JD” Green, Joseph Omolayole, Laron Bickerstaff, and Vincent Jackson.

Mail Art Club: At the beginning in the COVID-19 pandemic, CE artists, staff, and volunteers began exchanging handmade postcards through the US Postal Service. Over the weeks spent traveling from mailbox to mailbox, each recipient added new art and stamps. Hundreds of collaborative postcard sized artworks resulted, spanning mediums and styles. Featured artists in the Mail Art Club: Ada Chow, Joseph “JD” Green, James Nielsen, Joseph Omolayole, Yukari Sakura, Amani Swalim, and Miyuki Tsurukawa. The project was opened up to the public and people were encouraged to send their own postcard projects to CE’s gallery on 16th street in the Mission District of San Francisco. The works received were part of the Mail Art Club exhibition in the gallery show featuring the pandemic artifacts.

Chronicle Books: in 2023, for the organization’s 40th anniversary, CE and Chronicle Books partnered to produce Art is Art: Collaborating with Neurodiverse Artists at Creativity Explored. The book includes hundreds of original artworks, ranging from paintings to sculptures, accompanied by quotes and stories from the artists themselves.. The book is organized into thematic chapters, including, “Yes I Do Think About Sex,” “Fears,” and “Blackiful.”.

Museum of Craft and Design: Ran from September 4, 2021-January 23, 2022 the Museum of Craft and Design presented fashion designs by over 50 Creativity Explored artists in Mode Brut.The show was curated by Cléa Massiani and Ariel Zaccheo and brought CE artists together with additional artists, designers, and brands to explore “their practices through textile-based work.”The exhibition utilized recycled materials to reinforce a questioning of fashion. On display were textiles intended to propose shifting concepts of gender, accessibility, adaptive clothing, identity, and the role of the outsider in art.

SFO Museum: From March 12, 2016 - December 04, 2016 in Terminal 3, Departures Level 2 of SFO, CE had an exhibit titled Celebrating a Vision: Art and Disability. The exhibition also included work from the sister organizations of Creative Growth and NIAD. Eight artists were chosen to represent their respective institutions, with work ranging from textiles to collage.

Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive: From May 11 - September 25th, 2011 Create, a show displaying the work of CE artists, was on display at BAMPFA. The show was curated by BAMPFA Director Lawrence Rinder, with Matthew Higgs, director of White Columns. CE artists included: Mary Belknap, Daniel Green, Michael Bernard Loggins, John Patrick McKenzie, James Miles, James Montgomery, Bertha Otoya, Evelyn Reyes, and Lance Rivers.

Comme des Garcons: For the Autumn/Winter 2013-2014 show, founder Rei Kawakubo commissioned work by CE artist Dan Michiels. Kawakubo initially saw Michiel’s work in Raw Vision Magazine, a journal showcasing Outsider Art.

Sakura of America: Sakura provides art supplies for CE on the shared belief ”in a world of possibility powered by human creativity.” In their partnership with CE, Sakura posts interviews with CE artists to their website to highlight the use of their products in the studio.

CB2: Beginning in 2008, CE and CB2 have collaborated on home goods, with CE’s art first making an appearance on CB2 products in December of that year for an auction of 6 chairs, with 10% of sale proceeds going to CE. Since 2009, “CB2 has featured the work of more than 30 artists in 40 limited-edition releases of signed prints, rugs, pillows, dinnerware and holiday ornaments.”

Creativity Explored's gallery door

Creativity Explored in San Francisco's Mission District gallery front, 2023