Artist Jennifer Brazelton wants you to experience nationalism in new and unexpected ways. For the past three years she has been creating sculptures using maps of nations whose shapes are altered by human population data. These oddly distorted two-dimensional cartogram drawings were created by Benjamin D. Hennig’s PhD research.

Jennifer transforms these maps through research and her creative process into three-dimensional sculptures. She layers organic and patterned surfaces over the “bumpy terrain” in an effort to make the sculptures pulse with life. The countries she sculpts are topical and in the media. Often, just the act of sculpting a particular country becomes a political act. These population-distorted maps are a Trojan Horse for a different view on a country or culture.

Michael McConnell, a Michigan native, studied printmaking at Columbus College of Art and Design. After graduating from CCAD, he drove across country to the Bay Area, and has made a home in San Francisco.

Margaret Keelan’s influence in the Bay Area can be felt through her timeless dolls, which in turn show the progression of time and technology but also hearken to the unchanging rhythm of nature latest small sculptures recall the “Santos” figures of Mexico and Central America and incorporate a reproduced 19th century doll head.

Art and nature are a part of Irwin’s daily life, as she can be found artistically pruning someone’s garden, or studying shadows with paintbrush in hand.