Apply - Recology San Francisco

APPLY TO THE PROGRAM

Applications are accepted June 1 through September 1, 2024 for residencies beginning in February, 2025. Artists must first attend an on-site tour then complete and submit an online application in order to be eligible for a residency.

Selection

Our advisory board, which is composed of former artists-in-residence, arts professionals, environmentalists, and educators, reviews applications in October and selects eight to ten candidates to interview in November.

The board awards six residencies per year. Residencies run from February – May, June – September, and October – January.

The board evaluates application based on the artist’s submitted work samples and proposal, the ability of the artist to respond to the challenges that come with scavenging for materials, and how the residency can provide the artist with professional growth. The board also considers the artist’s use of materials and the types of tools available in the studio.

Eligibility

We accept applications from local emerging, mid-career and professional artists. Students currently enrolled at a local college, university, or other educational institution must apply to the student residency program (more information below). We do not accept applications from artists who reside more than a one-hour drive from the San Francisco Transfer Station (501/401 Tunnel Ave.).

Student Artists

The Student Artist in Residence Program is specifically designed for those studying art at local colleges and universities. Though similar to the professional artist in residence program, the time expectations and structure of the student program are more flexible.

The program provides students with a 40ft shipping container studio, access to materials, and an exhibition at the end of their residency. Student residencies run concurrently with the main residency program. Applications are accepted June 1 through September 1, 2024 for residencies beginning in February, 2025. Three student artists are selected each year. Student artists must first attend an on-site tour then complete and submit an online application in order to be eligible for a residency.

2024 Advisory Board

Michael Arcega
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Interdisciplinary artist Michael Arcega works across media to create art that is informed by language, history, and geography. In his most recent work he adopts methodologies used in the anthropological study of world cultures that often emphasize “otherness,” but Arcega turns the tables, positioning North America as ‘the other” whose symbols and rituals must be studied and understood. Though a socio-political critique, Arcega’s work also has a playful element, providing familiar entry points to alternative ways of thinking about the people who colonize the landscape. Arcega is an Associate Professor of Art at San Francisco State University. He received an MFA from Stanford University and a BFA from the San Francisco Art Institute. In 2012, he was the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. His work has been exhibited at the Asia Society in New York, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Honolulu Academy of Art, and the Orange Country Museum of Art in Newport Beach.

Charmin Roundtree-Baaqee
Owner, Founder of Art is Luv
Co-chair City of Oakland Public Art Advisory Committee
Charmin Roundtree-Baaqee is the owner and founder of Art Is Luv, which provides exposure for artists through marketing, social media, and branding. She is a writer and blogger and has over 10 years of experience as a curator for the East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD) Gallery, where she is now Art Committee Chair. She was appointed by the Mayor’s office to the City of Oakland Public Art Advisory Committee, where she currently serves as Co-chair. Most recently, she was appointed by Mayor Libby Schaaf as one of 11 Cultural Affairs Commissioners. As a mother, art curator, engineer, entrepreneur, and community steward, she aspires to cultivate enthusiasm and support of the visual arts and spark creativity in how people approach life experiences. She holds a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Clark Atlanta University, a B.S. in Environmental Engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology and an M.S. in Civil/Environmental Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.

JD Beltran
President, San Francisco Arts Commission
Artist and Faculty, San Francisco Art Institute
JD Beltran is a conceptual artist, designer, filmmaker, writer, curator, and educator. Her work has been screened and exhibited internationally, including at the Walker Art Center, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Getty Institute, The Kitchen in New York, ProArte in St. Petersburg, Russia, and in the 2006, 2008 and 2012 ZeroOne San Jose New Media Biennials. Also an expert in public art, she has been commissioned for public art projects worldwide, and her work has been reviewed in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, as well as in Art in America, ArtNews, and Art Papers. She has written columns on art and culture for both SFGate.com and the Huffington Post. A native San Franciscan, Beltran is the President of the San Francisco Arts Commission and is the author and curator for the downtown Yerba Buena District Art Master Plan. She also is faculty in the Film, New Genres, Design & Technology, Printmaking, and Urban Studies Programs of the San Francisco Art Institute, where she also directs the school’s City Studio arts education program for under-served youth. In addition, she is faculty in Design at the California College of the Arts.

Terry Berlier
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Terry Berlier is a former Recology artist-in-residence (2012). She is an interdisciplinary artist who works primarily with sculpture and expanded media. Her work is often kinetic, interactive, and/or sound based and focuses on everyday objects, the environment, ideas of non-place/place, and queer practice. She has exhibited at venues including the Contemporary Jewish Museum of San Francisco, Babel Gallery in Norway, Kala Art Institute Gallery in Berkeley, and the San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery. Her work has been included the book Seeing Gertrude Stein published by the University of California Press. She has received many residencies and grants including from the Zellerbach Foundation Berkeley, Michelle R. Clayman Institute for Gender Research at Stanford University, the Exploratorium in San Francisco, the Hungarian Multicultural Center in Budapest, Hungary, the California Council for the Humanities California Stories Fund, and the Millay Colony for Artists. She is Associate Professor and Director of the Sculpture Lab in the in the Department of Art and Art History at Stanford University. www.terryberlier.com

Kevin B. Chen
Curator, Artist
Kevin B. Chen has been involved in the Bay Area arts community for over two decades as a curator, writer, and artist. He currently serves as faculty at San Francisco State University’s School of Art and at Stanford University’s Department of Art and Art History, and a Curatorial Committee member of Root Division and Pro Arts Gallery. He recently served as co-chair for the City of Oakland’s Public Art Advisory Committee and managed the de Young Museum’s Artist Residency Program and Public Programs. He was the Program Director of Visual Arts at Intersection for the Arts for over 15 years, where he curated over 70 exhibitions and hundreds of public programs. He has curated projects for Headlands Center for the Arts, Minnesota Street Project, University of Nevada Reno, San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, San Francisco Art Institute, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco Arts Commission Galleries, and SOMArts Cultural Center. His writing has been published by Paper Museum Press, Light Work, The Third Line – Art Gallery in Dubai, and Kearny Street Workshop, and he has exhibited his own work at venues including the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art, Southern Exposure, and The Kitchen.

Jamil Hellu
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Jamil Hellu is a former Recology artist-in-residence (2014). Originally from Brazil, he is a visual artist based in San Francisco working primarily with photography, video, and installations. His work is a hybrid of self-portraiture and queer narrative, particularly exploring interpretations of identity. Hellu has been awarded for the Eureka Fellowship by the Fleishhacker Foundation, the Kala Art Institute Fellowship in Berkeley, the Graduate Fellowship Award at Headlands Center for the Arts, and a six-month residency at the Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris. He holds an MFA in Art Practice from Stanford University and a BFA in Photography from the San Francisco Art Institute. Hellu teaches photography in the Department of Art & Art History at Stanford University. www.jamilhellu.net

Jonathan Carver Moore
Gallery Owner
Jonathan Carver Moore is the founder and director of Jonathan Carver Moore, a contemporary art gallery that specializes in working with emerging and established artists who are BIPOC, LGBTQ+ and women. As an openly gay Black male gallerist in San Francisco, Jonathan is dedicated to advocating for the arts and is an active member in the Bay Area’s creative community. He is the Development Chair at arts education non-profit, Root Division and he also serves on the advisory board at Black [Space] Residency. www.jonathancarvermoore.com

Deborah MunkManager, Recology Artist in Residence Program
Deborah Munk has served as the Director of the Artist in Residence Program (AIR) at Recology San Francisco since 2007. She also manages the Environmental Learning Center where the company provides educational tours about resource conservation to over 4,000 children and adults annually. In collaboration with Metro, the regional government for Portland, Oregon; crackedpots, Inc., an environmental arts organization; and Recology colleagues, Munk was instrumental in establishing the GLEAN Program in Portland and assisted in the implementation of similar AIR programs at Recology facilities in Astoria, Oregon and Seattle, Washington. Prior to joining Recology as AIR Program Coordinator in 2000, she was the assistant editor of Art/Women/California 1950-2000: Parallels and Intersection, published by UC Press. She is a graduate of San Francisco State University and holds a Master’s Degree in Educational Technology focusing on art and media.

Advisory Board Emeritus

Catharine Clark
Gallery Owner
Catharine Clark is owner and director of the Catharine Clark Gallery established in San Francisco in 1991. The gallery represents contemporary artists working across media, and hosts changing exhibitions of both static and time-based media. In addition to presenting regular exhibits in San Francisco, Clark began quarterly programming of a pop-up exhibition space in New York’s Chelsea neighborhood in March of 2009. Clark is a San Francisco native, but ventured to Philadelphia in 1985 to attend the University of Pennsylvania where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree with honors in Art, returning to San Francisco in 1989. Since then she has guest lectured and taught at art schools, universities, museums and other institutions. In 2006 Clark authored an essay for and edited the monograph, Ascending Chaos: The Art of Masami Teraoka 1966-2006, published by Chronicle Books. She is a member of the San Francisco Art Dealers Association, and a trustee of ZER01, the art and technology network.

Josephina (Josie) Dominguez-Chand
Environmental Education Coordinator, SF Department of the Environment
Josie Dominguez-Chand is the Environmental Education Coordinator at the San Francisco Department of the Environment, where she oversees outreach to K-12 public and private schools that reaches more than 15,000 students annually. She also runs the Food to Flowers! school composting program, lauded as a national model. Before joining SF Environment in 2010, she was a volunteer English Teacher in China with WorldTeach. She received her Master’s Degree in Environmental Earth Resource Management. When she isn’t inspiring and motivating students to protect nature, she enjoys backpacking around the world.

Paul Fresina
Former Director, Recology Artist in Residence Program
Paul Fresina served as Director of the Recology San Francisco Artist in Residence Program from 2000 to 2007, and was Director of the company’s Hazardous Waste Programs from 2004 to 2007. Before coming to Recology, Fresina was the Business Program Manager at the San Francisco Hazardous Waste Management Program at the San Francisco Department of the Environment. He was an instructor of Instructional Technologies at San Francisco State University from 1991 to 2006. He currently serves as the Vice President of Operations at SCRAP (Scrounger’s Center for Reusable Art Parts) and is a self-employed handyman.

Diana Fuller
Curator
Diana Fuller is a free-lance curator, producer, editor, and arts administrator. Currently she serves as a consultant to artists and filmmakers and is researching a documentary film on the subject of garbage, recycling and landfill, RACING TO ZERO. She is the on-going, program director for the Squaw Valley Community of Writers Screenwriting Program. In 2003, Fuller produced Art/Women/California 1950-2000: Parallels and Intersections, which involved a book, published by University of California Press, and a traveling exhibition originating at the San Jose Museum of Art. She has served as the President of the Film Arts Foundation board, was a founding board member of the Headland Center for the Arts, and is currently on the executive board of the Roxie Theater. From 1960 to 1990, she owned and directed one of the foremost galleries in the West, in tandem with several partners: Hansen Fuller, Hansen Fuller Goldeen, Fuller Goldeen, Fuller Goldeen Gross and finally Fuller Gross.

Dee Hibbert-Jones
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Dee Hibbert-Jones is a former Recology artist-in-residence (2002). Her cross-disciplinary art projects range from participatory practice, installations, video and most recently an animated film project. Her work explores political feelings, social connectedness, and emotional affect. Hibbert-Jones is an Associate Professor of Art and Digital Art New Media at UC Santa Cruz and founder/co-chair of the Hub Social Practice Research Institute at UCSC.

Tamar Hurwitz
Environmental Education Manager, SF Department of the Environment
Tamar Hurwitz is the Environmental Education Manager at the San Francisco Department of the Environment, where she oversees outreach to K-12 public and private schools that annually reaches more than 15,000 students. Before joining SF Environment in 2003, Hurwitz was the Education Outreach Director at Rainforest Action Network for eight years, where she developed programs and curriculum, and produced an award-winning children’s video. Hurwitz has worked internationally in collaboration with the United Nations Environment Programme, and is an active Committee Member on the San Francisco-Bangalore Sister City Committee and San Francisco-Barcelona Sister City Committee.

Andrew Junge
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Andrew Junge is a former Recology artist-in-residence (2005). Junge grew up in Cheyenne, Wyoming, the son of a historian and a teacher. He earned his BFA in painting from Boston University in 1990 and twelve years later received an MFA in painting and drawing from California College of the Arts. He and his wife Ashley, a photographer, live in San Francisco with their son Walker, born in 2007. Junge enjoys a variety of artistic pursuits including, printmaking, sculpture, illustration, design, and murals. In the last few years however, the work that has occupied most of his attention is his current job as Chair of the Visual Art Department at Oakland School for the Arts.

Bette McKenzie
Co-chair, St. Vincent de Paul’s Discarded to Divine
Bette McKenzie is currently the co-chair of St Vincent de Paul’s Discarded to Divine and is an active volunteer at the Fund Development Office for Oakland School for the Arts. She served as VP of Special Events and Public Relations for Macy’s from 1978 to 2009 and was the creator of Passport, which brings together corporate sponsors, foundations, and major donors to benefit nonprofits and medical research. Passport has raised close to $30 million for HIV/AIDS organizations and has educated thousands of teenagers on HIV/AIDs awareness. McKenzie lives her life with the desire to reuse, recycle and repurpose and has helped contribute to a more sustainable community through art, fashion and education.

Hector Dio Mendoza
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Hector Dio Mendoza was an artist-in-residence at Recology in 2005. He has exhibited widely including at the Berkeley Art Museum, the 2010 ZERO 1 Biennial in San Jose, California, and the El Paso Museum of Art, as well as internationally in Spain, Mexico, Germany and Switzerland. He is a recipient of a Eureka Fellowship Award and his work is included in the di Rosa Collection in Napa, California. He holds an MFA from Yale University School of Art, and a BFA, Summa Cum Laude, from the California College of the Arts. He is currently a lecturer in the Visual and Public Art Department of the California State University, Monterey Bay.

Rachel Pomerantz
Environmental Education Coordinator, SF Department of the Environment
Rachel Pomerantz is the Environmental Education Coordinator at the San Francisco Department of the Environment, where she oversees outreach to K-12 public and private schools that reaches more than 15,000 students annually. She also runs the Food to Flowers! school composting program, lauded as a national model. Before joining SF Environment in 2007, Pomerantz co-founded and ran Nomad Backcountry Adventures, a wilderness adventure program for teens. She received her Master’s Degree in Postcolonial Anthropology with an emphasis on education and environmental justice and has worked in the education field for nearly two decades—from within gardens to Superfund sites and classrooms. Her highest ongoing achievement is parenting two children who love nature and inquire about the world around them.

Kate Rhoades (2019 guest advisory board member)
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Kate Rhoades lives and works in Oakland, California. Her videos, paintings, and publications employ humor to probe systems of power. Her work has been presented in the San Francisco International Film Festival and the Santa Fe International New Media Festival. Rhoades has participated in exhibitions at Trestle Gallery in Brooklyn, Southern Exposure in San Francisco, and various venues, publications, hotel rooms and alley ways across the globe. Since 2014 she has co-hosted the Bay Area’s number one arts and culture podcast, Congratulations Pine Tree. Rhoades was also one of the Fleishhacker Foundation’s Eureka Fellowship grantees in 2018.

Shawn Rosenmoss
Fundraising/Grants Manager, SF Department of the Environment
Shawn Rosenmoss is a Senior Environmental Specialist with the San Francisco Department of the Environment, where she oversees Development and Community Partnerships. In addition to raising funds for specific environmental initiatives, she is responsible for developing environmental partnerships with myriad entities not driven by an environmental mission, such as Greenstacks, an award-winning collaboration with the City’s Public Library system. Rosenmoss also oversees programming and exhibits for the Department’s EcoCenter and supports its annual grant-making process. Prior to joining SF Environment, Rosenmoss ran a Bay Area circus whose mission was to provide equitable access to the performing arts and use the arts as an avenue for social change.

Weston Teruya (2018 guest advisory board member)
Artist (AIR Program Alumnus)
Weston Teruya is a former Recology Artist-in-Residence (2016). He has exhibited at Mills College Art Museum, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Longhouse Projects & the NYC Fire Museum in New York, and the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center. He has received grants from the Creative Work Fund, Artadia, and the Center for Cultural Innovation and been an artist-in-residence at Montalvo Arts Center, Ox-Bow, the deYoung Museum, and Kala Art Institute. He is the producer & host of (un)making, a podcast through Art Practical, and one-third of Related Tactics, a collective of artists/writers/curators of color. www.westonteruya.com

Steven Wolf
Gallery Owner
Steven Wolf is a writer and an art dealer based in San Francisco. His gallery, Steven Wolf Fine Arts, specializes in art that questions its own right to exist; his blog, theoffbrand.com, covers the world of discarded objects that are resurrected at the flea market and elsewhere.