SLATE is pleased to present works by Sarah Blaustein, on view in Oakland City Center's lobby through July 7, 2022. Visiting Hours are Monday–Friday from 8:30am–5pm

Location:

Oakland City Center

555 12th Street Oakland CA, 94607

Sarah Blaustein is a visual artist currently living and working in the San Francisco Bay Area. Blaustein creates paintings and prints from an exploration of moments in time, jacquard tapestries constructed by weaving 212 threads per inch and iterations of ex-urban, domestic scenes. She looks to her familiar, ex-urban life. Blaustein utilizes non-traditional household tools to apply the medium, including garden rakes, brooms, buckets or tablecloths. Ink, acrylic or oil is applied to canvas or paper. Time plays a key role in her process: Blaustein is focused on iterating on a single work and uses the time between applications to gather additional stimulus, visual perspective and self-reflection. The work is a manifestation over her process that can span months. The art reflects Blaustein’s experiences, generating a self-portrait and the response she has to her domestic environment. 

Recently, Blaustein’s work focuses on developing, exploring and expanding a personal visual language through a series of ink on canvas works. Blaustein’s process in this series involves extensive materials and mental preparation and deep concentration. The ink application process is instinctive and decisive: Blaustein applies ink indelibly and irreversibly. Blaustein finds similarities between the mental process to prepare to create these pieces with competing athletically at the highest levels: she finds, enters and explores a deep meditative state. 

Blaustein was born in 1982 and grew up in Orinda, California. She studied at the New York Studio School, Art Students League of New York, Syracuse University in Florence, Italy and the University of Michigan School of Art and Design. Some galleries that she has exhibited at include the Paul Thiebaud Gallery (San Francisco, California), Berry Campbell Gallery (New York, New York), Prince Street Gallery (New York, New York) and Hackett Mill Gallery (San Francisco, California).