Wearable art, also known as Artwear or "art to wear", refers to art pieces in the shape of clothing or jewellery pieces. These pieces are usually handmade, and are produced only once or as a very limited series. Pieces of clothing are often made with fibrous materials and traditional techniques such as crochet, knitting, quilting, but may also include plastic sheeting, metals, paper, and more. While the making of any article of clothing or other wearable object typically involves aesthetic considerations, the term wearable art implies that the work is intended to be accepted as an artistic creation or statement. Wearable art is meant to draw attention while it is being displayed, modeled or used in performances. Pieces may be sold and exhibited.
Jeremy Dan Fish is an American illustrator and artist. He lives and works in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco.
Ideas from mathematics have been used as inspiration for fiber arts including quilt making, knitting, cross-stitch, crochet, embroidery and weaving. A wide range of mathematical concepts have been used as inspiration including topology, graph theory, number theory and algebra. Some techniques such as counted-thread embroidery are naturally geometrical; other kinds of textile provide a ready means for the colorful physical expression of mathematical concepts.
Kara Maria, née Kara Maria Sloat, is a San Francisco-based visual artist known for paintings, works on paper and printmaking. Her vivid, multi-layered paintings have been described as collages or mash-ups of contemporary art vocabularies, fusing a wide range of abstract mark-making with Pop art strategies of realism, comic-book forms, and appropriation. Her work outwardly conveys a sense of playfulness and humor that gives way to explicit or subtle examinations—sometimes described as "cheerfully apocalyptic"—of issues including ecological collapse, diminishing biodiversity, military violence and the sexual exploitation of women. In a 2021 review, Squarecylinder critic Jaimie Baron wrote, "Maria’s paintings must be read as satires [that] recognize the absurdities of our era … These pretty, playful paintings are indictments, epitaphs-to-be."
Nemo Gould is an American artist and sculptor known widely for his kinetic found-object sculpture as well as two-dimensional graphic work. Much of his work presents whimsical aluminum and wooden robotic and sci-fi creatures of as-yet unnamed and threatening genus and species. He cites Clayton Bailey as an early and inspirational influence.
Recology, formerly known as Norcal Waste Systems, is a waste management company headquartered in San Francisco, California. The company collects and processes municipal solid waste, reclaiming reusable materials. The company also operates transfer stations, materials recovery facilities (MRFs), a number of landfills, and continues to spearhead renewable energy projects. Recology is the largest organics compost facility operator by volume in the United States.
Women Eco Artists Dialog (WEAD) is 501(c)(3) non-profit arts organization focused on environmental and social justice art by female identified artists and researchers.
Weston Teruya is an Oakland-based visual artist and arts administrator. Teruya's paper sculptures, installations, and drawings reconfigure symbols forming unexpected meanings that tamper with social/political realities, speculating on issues of power, control, visibility, protection and, by contrast, privilege. With Michele Carlson and Nathan Watson, he is a member of the Related Tactics artists' collective and often exhibits under that name.
Clare E. Rojas, also known by stage name Peggy Honeywell, is an American multidisciplinary artist. She is part of the Mission School. Rojas is "known for creating powerful folk-art-inspired tableaus that tackle traditional gender roles." She works in a variety of media, including painting, installations, video, street art, and children's books. Rojas lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Val Britton is an American artist, best known for her works on paper and installations. She creates abstract collage works using paper and other mixed media that reference the language of maps, network diagrams and astronomical photography. She lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for 14 years, and as of 2018, she lives in Seattle, Washington.
Ruth Laskey is an American artist known for her Minimalist weavings and grid paintings.
Jo Hanson (1918–2007) was an American environmental artist and activist. She lived in San Francisco, California. She was known for using urban trash to create works of art.
Anoka Faruqee is a Bangladeshi descent American painter, born in Ann Arbor, MI to Bangladeshi parents. In 2011 Faruqee was appointed associate professor of painting and printmaking at Yale University. She earned her BA from Yale in 1994 and an MFA from Tyler School of Art in 1997. Previous to her appointment at Yale, Faruqee taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the California Institute of the Arts, where she was co-director of the Art Program. Faruqee is known for her brightly colored Moiré pattern paintings.
Terry Berlier is an artist and sculptor whose work addresses themes of the environment and queer practice. Her work incorporates kinetic and sound based media to address these themes.
Josh Faught is a San Francisco-based fiber artist who creates sculptures, textiles, collages, and paintings. His work incorporates techniques such as knitting, crochet, and weaving, and addresses topics of craft and queer history. His fiber sculptures, influenced by both domestic crafts and art styles such as abstract and color field painting, are often either hung on the wall or stretched over scaffolding such as garden trellises; they are three-dimensional but forward-oriented.
Lori Kay also known as Lori Kay Stout, is an American artist, educator and activist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is known for her sculptures made of bronze, mixed media and recycled materials. Her work sometimes addresses issues of racial identity or mixed racial identity or issues of environmental awareness. She is also the owner of the Lupin Lodge of Los Gatos, a clothing-optional resort.
Consuelo Jiménez Underwood is an American fiber artist, known for her pieces that focus on immigration issues. She is an indigenous Chicana currently based in Cupertino, California. As an artist she works with textiles in attempt to unify her American roots with her Mexican Indigenous ones, along with trying to convey the same for other multicultural people.
Michi Meko is an American multidisciplinary artist based in Atlanta, Georgia. He is the recipient of the Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant and the Atlanta Artadia Award as well as a finalist for the 2019 Hudgens Prize. His work incorporates the visual language of naval flags and nautical wayfinding, combined with romanticized objects of the American South. Throughout his various platforms, his work engages contradictions and paradoxes that he uncovers through examining his personal history, African American folk traditions, and narratives that confront or circumvent established narratives.
Carrie Hott is an interdisciplinary artist, researcher, and educator based in Oakland, California. Hott’s multidisciplinary projects often take the form of multi-media installations that incorporate drawings, prints, books, sound, video or performance in sculptural settings.
Creativity Explored (CE) is a nonprofit organization in San Francisco that hosts a day program for developmentally disabled adult artists. Located in the Mission District and Potrero Hill, CE functions as a studio-based collective, offering, as of August 2023, over 130 artists art supplies, training, exhibition and sales opportunities. CE has a gallery in their Mission District location where they host shows and sell original artwork. The organization's motto is "Art Changes Lives". In 2018, the Legacy Business Program recognized CE as a "San Francisco Legacy Business". In 2019, in the SF Bay Guardian’s Best of the Bay Awards, CE was awarded Best Nonprofit.
