SF Civic Pride Festival: Meet the Artists
This Saturday join us and Paint the Void with a talented roster of local, diverse artists who will lead and host 11 Community Arts Activation projects! We want you to help us bring 11 unique murals to life in collaboration with these amazing artists. Each artist will sketch a mural outline in their style specific to one of the 11 San Francisco districts, and volunteers will follow the easy paint-by-numbers format to fill the rest in. Meet each artist below!
Orlie K.
Orlie K. is a San Francisco-based illustrator, printmaker, and muralist. Born and raised in the Bay Area, Orlie finds inspiration where our natural spaces meet residential and city life. These spaces are what she believes makes our cities so special. She’s worked with many incredible Bay Area businesses including Andytown Coffee Roasters, As Kneaded Bakery, and the SF Parks Alliance.
Katie Benn
Katie is a multidisciplinary artist from San Francisco. She is a designer, painter, muralist, illustrator, textile designer, and creator of zines and various art products. Her artwork has been exhibited in galleries internationally. Her past clients include Facebook, Google, Slack, Masterclass, Condé Nast, and Live Nation. Fueled by all things mysterious, colorful, and absurd, she explores themes relating to the human condition and her inner world.
Bianca Marie Rivera
Bianca is a Black Puerto Rican illustrator and muralist in San Francisco, CA. Continuously inspired by the City, her practice utilizes bold, crisp lines and a vibrant color palette to visually explore themes of community, mental health, and all of the moments of joy, quiet, and contemplation in between.
Jordan Herren
Jordan is a mixed-media artist and muralist born and raised in San Francisco. He obtained his Marketing degree at SF State. It was during college that he discovered a passion for painting, which he continues to pursue today. His work is a reflection of various inspirations: from nature, pop art, and everyday life, to his upbringing in the Bay Area. Best known for his colorful cityscapes, Herren aims to encapsulate the spirit and energy of the city.
Messy Beck
Messy is a San Francisco-based painter, illustrator, and muralist. Her work showcases narratives that explore themes of identity, mental health, and community. The contrast between her inviting color palettes yields paintings that are constantly navigating a fine line between celebratory and disturbing.
Ayesha Rana
Ayesha is an independent artist. From organic whimsical characters to geometrically composed designs, each piece is a celebration of creativity and an invitation to explore the vivid realms of Ayesha’s imagination. Her work is colorful, and vibrant and exhibits her absolute love for worms in both digital, analog, and spatial mediums. These creatures represent the curiosity and wonder she has carried since her younger years. Whether it was their physical form, patterns, or movement, that fascination remains paramount to this day.
Seibot
Seibot is an extremely queer, trans non-binary visual artist and muralist based in San Francisco. They work mostly in latex house paint, metal leaf, and ink, occasionally experimenting with glitter additives and high gloss finishes. A dedicated and passionate creative individual with a B.A. in Art History from UCLA, Seibot is a Co-founder of Moth Belly Gallery – an artist-run space committed to amplifying underrepresented voices and offering a nurturing and empowering platform for local and emerging artists.
Serge Gay Jr.
Serge is an American visual artist and creative designer in San Francisco, California. Beginning his practice of painting as a youth and then initiating his formal study at a Magnet Arts High School, Serge was on a steady trajectory for an art college of his choosing. The College for Creative Studies in Detroit became the campus where he refined his illustrative skills and emboldened his voice. Relocating to the Bay Area to pursue an art career, his skill and experience have grown to span a broad range of engagements including graphic design, art directing, gallery exhibitions, event art, and murals throughout the city.
Monica Magtoto
Monica is an artist and energy worker from San Francisco. Having graduated from Otis College of Art and Design in 2009, Magtoto returned home to San Francisco to earn her teaching credential in Art. Magtoto taught every grade from K-12 while developing her art practice. After leaving SFUSD, she transitioned to working full-time with her art practice. For the past decade, Magtoto has worked with non-profit organizations, schools, as well as corporate clients, and individual clients to execute a wide variety of murals and signs. From small installations in galleries or on and in homes to small businesses, and even seven-story murals for large housing complexes including Glide Memorial housing and the Rockwell Apartments in San Francisco, Magtoto has dedicated her practice to bringing light, color, and life to the ordinary and the mundane.
Josué Rojas
Josué is an SF-raised and bred artist. He has over two decades of experience in fine arts, muralism, community arts, and arts leadership in the SF Bay Area. As a migrant and child refugee born in El Salvador, he was fortunate to have been raised in San Francisco's rich, diverse cultural ecosystem. His work is characterized by conversations with the community and engagement and turning those values, concerns, and stories into aesthetic expression. The intention behind his work is to bring critical consciousness and aesthetics to the same conversation while delivering beauty, subtlety, and mastery of the craft of painting –– paying respects to decades of California muralists that have come before him.
Matley Hurd
Matley is a San Francisco-based visual artist who mainly works in mixed-media painting, digital illustration, and large-scale murals. Incorporating elements from comic books, anime, graffiti, sci-fi, and mythology, his work mainly consists of vibrant ethereal beings he calls “Star Goddess”. Accompanied with bold abstract flowing shapes giving an immense feeling of levity and elegance. Matley got his first breakthrough in 2020 during the pandemic. With the sudden influx of public art at that time, there was an opportunity to showcase his work with hopes to become a full-time artist. What started with one small mural has now turned into many all throughout the Bay Area. He hopes his work can provide joy and inspiration for all who come across it.
