Armelle Le Roux
Born and raised in Brittany, Armelle Le Roux received her BA from Ecole Superieure des Arts
Appliques Du Perre, Paris. She studied environmental art, with special training
in mosaic, fresco, and design. From 1989-1992 she was glass painter and designer
for Atelier Charles Robert (Brittany),where she worked on restoring 18th and
19th century stained-glass windows from the churches of Melgven, Coray and Grace
Uzel, as well as designing windows for private residences and gallery
collections. Her extensive work in France and Canada also includes restoration
as glazier in association with Atelier Durant (Maison Alfort, France) of
18th,19th and 20th century stained-glass windows of churches in Marmoutier,
Musee de Cluny, and Eglise du Raimcy.
In the United States Armelle has worked for 13 years as staff glass designer and glass painter for internationally known Reflection Studios, Emeryville, California. Her work there has been extensive and included restoration and installation of stained-glass panels at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, Reno’s Washoe County Court House, and San Francisco’s City Hall and Court of Appeals. Armelle served as artist assistant to the internationally renowned stained glass artist Narcissus Quagliata, with whom she did cartoon design and glass cutting for the “The Gift” at Grace Cathedral. For Nzilani Glass, she managed conservation projects at the Pacific Union Club and Old St. Mary’s Church, both in San Francisco.
Since 1999 her main focus has been as project director and lead artist for the Mc Donald Windows. In 2003 Armelle established Atelier Le Roux in Oakland, California. Her glass studio work includes original pieces for galleries and exhibition, custom design for public and private spaces, illustration and painting.
Craig Clemens – Craig Clemens received his BA and MFA from California College of Arts and Crafts (CCAC) and has taught at East Bay schools, including ten years at Holy Names College in Oakland. He has served as a board member of 510 Magazine, an arts and culture magazine focusing on East Bay artists, and has exhibited extensively at shows and galleries throughout California, including San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco Art Institute, and the Oakland Museum. Craig is owner of a faux-finishing business in which he restores wood-graining on metal dashboards for classic cars. He also lectures on his techniques and serves as a judge on several panels for classic automobile shows and concourses. He immortalized the hot rods of the 1950s “Dream Era ” in an illustrated memoir.
Joseph Distefano – Joseph Distefano earned his BFA at Rochester Institute of Technology and his MFA from Yale University’s School of Art and Architecture. He has extensive teaching experience at Yale University, Virginia Commonwealth University, California College of Arts and in the Sculpture Department of University of California, Berkeley. Joseph’s works have been commissioned and collected by numerous public and private collectors including Eastman Kodak Corporation, Kohler Corporation, Voulkos Family Collection, Archdiocese of Oakland, State of California, and City of Sacramento. His Public Art Commissions include artwork for Hammer Lane Underpass in Stockton, California, “Your Memory Column ” at the General Services Administration in the Oakland Federal Building,and the 7 ’ x 90 ’ wall-mural at the Sacramento Metropolitan Arts Commission.
Peter K. Eichhorn – Born in Trier, West Germany, Peter Eichhorn apprenticed at Binsfeld Art Glass Company in his hometown. He won several European art-glass competitions before coming to the United States to supervise an art glass studio in Tulsa, Oklahoma. After serving in the U.S. Army, Peter started Fenestra Studios with another artist and later opened his own highly successful and renowned Peter K. Eichhorn Stained Glass Studio in Louisville, Kentucky. Since starting his own company, some of his commissions have included Grace Baptist in Brooklyn, New Castle Methodist in Delaware, and numerous other sanctuaries (Catholic, Buddhist, and Lutheran, among others), including several synagogues. Peter is proficient in all facets of the art glass industry – painting, staining, beveling, engraving, etching – as well as all aspects of repair and installation.
Misty Gamble – Early in her life Misty Gamble was immersed into her father’s world of puppetry and the performing arts. Traveling to many parts of the world as a young girl and later as an adult has made an indelible impact on her life. In 1998, Misty was honored as the first American to perform in Iran since 1979, at the 7th International Puppet Festival in Tehran. Misty earned her B.A. in Art from California State University Hayward, where she spent summers working in the bronze-casting foundry. In 2007, Misty will complete her M.F.A. at San Francisco State University, where she is currently the graduate and teaching assistant. She has taught figure sculpture classes and plans to teach at a university. Misty recently received the National Conference for the Education of Ceramic Arts Graduate Award in Excellence and the Ellice T. Johnston Scholarship for Ceramic Arts, awarded yearly to one ceramics student from the Northern California or Oregon area.
Marc Le Rest – Marc Le Rest studied textile arts at The Ecole Superieure des Arts Appliqués Duperre in Paris, France, and received his technical degree in 1990. As a freelance designer, he created textiles for Etro in Italy and fashion designs for Hermes in France. He was also a window stylist for Printemps Haussman in Paris. In 1993, he moved to New York where he excelled as a textile designer for major studios such as Y and Y Cosmo Int’l, Hanover Direct and Yosshi and Leo. In 2003 he moved back to Brittany in France to focus on his own artwork. His first book of illustrations, titled Delicieuses Obseques, was published in April 2003.
Constance Levathes – Constance Levathes received a BFA in drawing and design at the University of Michigan in 1987.She completed a certificate program in digital illustration in 2000. Since1991 she has been an artist and master craftswoman for Reflection Studios, a nationally renowned architectural glass studio. She was involved in the restoration of the leaded glass in City Hall and Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. She designed and managed the production and installation of the 25-foot diameter dome for the First Church of Christ Scientist in San Diego. She teaches stained glass and mosaic to adults and children.
Ariana Makau – Ariana Makau holds a BA degree in Studio Art from Scripps College, Claremont, and an MA in Stained Glass Conservation from the Royal College of Art in London. She has worked at the J. Paul Getty Museum, the Victoria &Albert Museum, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, supported by a Samuel H. Kress Foundation Fellowship for Advanced Training in Conservation.
She is the owner of Nzilani Glass Conservation, LLC, a San Francisco Bay Area based company specializing in glass conservation, restoration and commissioned works. The company’s goal is to educate and inform, resulting in a knowledgeable client who is an advocate for the conservation and preservation of artistic objects. The company’s client list includes: Architectural Resources Group, Bohemian Club, Fine Arts Museums, Hathaway DinWiddie Construction, Henry E. Huntington Library & Art Gallery, Pacific-Union Club, Olympic Club, Plant Construction, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Stanford University Memorial Church, and Stanford’s Iris Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts.
Narcissus Quagliata – Narcissus Quagliata’s studies began in Rome with the surrealist Georgio DeChirico and concluded at San Francisco Art Institute under two founding members of the Bay Area .figurative school of painting, Elmer Bischoff and Richard Diebenkorn. After graduating with a BFA and MFA in painting, he spent four years in a studio he built himself in what is now a National Wilderness Area on the coastal mountain range of Northern California. In that studio he made the unique artistic decision to use glass rather than canvas to capture the reality of light itself.
Twice the recipient of NEA grants, Narcissus believes in the ability of glass to manipulate light in ways that enhance the quality of life in an environment. His prolific .flow of work has resulted in over a hundred installations in private residences, large commercial buildings and public works, many of them documented in books, magazine articles, and museum and gallery exhibitions around the world. His work can be found in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institute, Washington DC.; Yokohama City Museum of Modern Art, Japan; Oakland Museum, California; Corning Museum of Glass, New York; and Glasmalerei Museum Izukogen, Shizuoka-Ken, Japan. Building commissions include the Public Library of Gainesville, Florida; Synagogue Acapulco Seventy, Mexico City; and in California, Oakland’s Alice Art Center, the Charles Schwab Building in San Francisco, City of San Leandro Civic Center, and Oakland’s Pacific Bell Building.
In recent years Narcissus has collaborated with the world renowned architect Ricardo Legorreta on an 8,000 square feet glass design for the renovated Hotel Reforma in Mexico City; completed a large scale public commission for the Yerba Buena parking structure in San Francisco; created a monumental glass installation, “Gate of Darkness,” for his retrospective at the Franz Mayer Museum of Mexico City; and worked on a design proposal for glass to be placed in the rotunda of the Basilica di Santa Maria Degli Angeli, designed by Michelangelo on the Roman ruins of Diocleziano. In 2005 he completed the commission of the Grace Cathedral’s final large stained-glass panel.
Alan Rhodes – Alan Rhodes is a second-generation glassblower who owns and operates a modern lampworking shop and studio in Emeryville, California. For nearly forty years, the broad range of his work has included the scientific, industrial, decorative, and experimental use of glass, in addition to fine art. His award-winning work has been published in glass-art periodicals, books of collectibles, as well as in the popular press. Alan regularly collaborates with artists in the Bay Area and elsewhere.
Robert Shank – Born in New York City in 1947 and raised in Kirkwood, Missouri, Robert attended St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota,1965-1967. In 1967 he was drafted into the United States Army and spent 1968 in Viet Nam. He returned to Missouri and spent two years at the University of Missouri at St. Louis. In 1971 he entered into a stained-glass apprenticeship with Robert Markert and Peter Eichhorn at Fenestra Studios in Louisville, Kentucky. He has been an artist/craftsman for over thirty years working with and for major studios and individual artists.
Irmigard Steding – Irmigard Steding was born in Luedenschaid, Germany, and received her fine arts training in Germany. Coming to the United States, she continued her studies at College of Marin Art Glass, Dan Fenton Studio, and Gordon Huther Studio Design. Her tutors have included David Arnold, Abinus Elskus, K. Wagner, Helen Stanley, and Johanes Schreiter. For over a decade she has worked professionally as a designer, restorer, and glass painter for Reflections Studios, Emeryville, California. Her professional experience includes: glass painting at Grace Cathedral, and restoration at Calvary Presbyterian Church, Villa Montalvo in Saratoga, and All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena. With Robert Shank, Steding/Shank Glass Design designed and fabricated three stained glass windows for the apse in the chapel at Bishop’s Ranch, Healdsburg, California.
Daniel Ziegler – Daniel Ziegler has lived and worked as an artist and designer in the San Francisco Bay Area since 1977.In addition to print media, he has produced work in .lm and video, architectural signage, interactive media and interface design. He currently works independently and professionally at his studio in Emeryville, California, producing graphic art for a wide range of clients, and teaching a class in design theory. Daniel is a painter, a cartoonist, a husband and a dad. He holds a BFA degree from the Fine Arts Department of the University of California at Berkeley.