Category: Archive

En mi casa – meet painter Daisy Velasco

Claudia Pretelin

Daisy VelascoEn Mi Casa September 6 -October 4, 2025 Blue Roof Residency7329 S. Broadway Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90003 This summer, Claudia Pretelin, founder and curator of Instruments of Memory, was invited by the Blue Roof residency to participate in an inspiring mentorship program designed to support artist-in-residence Daisy Velasco. Velasco, a talented first-generation Mexican-American painter, creates evocative works “that explore the intricate intersections of family, tradition, and psychological drama.” She describes her artistic process by saying, “In my narrative paintings, I draw from the emotions stirred by a chaotic…

ARCHIVING ACTIVISM: A CONVERSATION WITH MONICA SHEETS

Sarah E Webb

Monica Sheets is a multidisciplinary artist whose work explores ideas of participation, authority, and the possibility of civil engagement beyond traditional forms of social activism. Through organizing events, developing archives, and conducting oral histories, she envisions spaces that welcome participants who might not identify as activists yet long to have a voice in the politics impacting their lives.  Sheets’ artistic practice is a product of the places she has called home—from her upbringing in the Rust Belt city of Toledo, OH, to years spent as an expatriate living in the…

CRAFTING MEMORIES: A CONVERSATION WITH HOLLY JERGER

Claudia Pretelin

Holly Jerger. Photo: Symrin Chawla *Special thanks to Sarah E. Webb for editing this interview For the past seventeen years, Holly Jerger has been the  Senior Exhibitions Curator at Craft Contemporary, founded as a museum to reveal the potential of craft to educate, captivate, provoke, and empower. Recently, she joined Cal State University, Northridge, as their new Art Galleries Director. In this interview, Jerger reflects on her first encounters with art, her time and collaborative work at Craft Contemporary, and her influences and ideas on memory.  As a curator, Holly…