From Glitter to Leather: Patricia Sweetow Gallery Brings Tactile Innovation to San Francisco

Jamie Vasta | In Praise of Venus (after Burnes-Jones) | glitter & glue on wood panel – Ramekon O’Arwisters | Black on Black #3 | leather, fabric, ceramics, metal clamps, zip ties, metal rings

Featuring duo exhibitions NEXUS 2026 and Sparkle, Splat, Spin, the October pop-up explores cultural memory, queer identity, and material resilience.

Los Angeles-based Patricia Sweetow Gallery is heading north for a month-long pop-up at San Francisco’s Minnesota Street Project (1275 Minnesota St., Suite 211) this October. The pop-up features two back-to-back, two-week exhibitions exploring heritage, identity, and the expansive boundaries of textiles.

Exhibition 1: NEXUS 2026 October 1 – October 10, 2026

Presented in celebration of MoAD’s NEXUS program, this show brings together four artists using textiles and found materials as vessels for heritage, personal history, and social politics:

Demetri Broxton (Oakland)

• Executive Director of Root Division and former MoAD Education Director, Broxton creates hand-beaded, sequined sculptures and tapestries—from embellished boxing gloves to ceremonial robes—that trace Black American struggle, healing, and mythos.

Ramekon O’Arwisters (San Francisco):

• Known for his iconic bound leather and fabric sculptures, O’Arwisters’ work navigates Black and Queer identity through coded abstraction and tactile resilience.

Reyah (Los Angeles):

• A self-taught photographer whose medium-format, staged self-portraits explore gender, childhood trauma, and religion. Reyah controls every aspect of the frame, from costume construction to lighting.

Jamele Wright Sr. (Atlanta):

• Drawing on the Black American vernacular experience and reverse migration, Wright constructs mixed-media “bundles” using Georgia red clay, rope, found objects, and hand-sewn Dutch wax cloth.

Events:

• Artist Talk & Reception: Saturday, October 3 | Discussion at 2:00 PM; Reception 5:00–7:00 PM (Featuring Broxton, O’Arwisters, and Reyah)
• Closing Mixer: Saturday, October 10 | 2:30–5:00 PM

Exhibition 2: Sparkle, Splat, Spin October 14 – October 31, 2026

The second phase pushes traditional media into bold new territories, weaving together themes of legacy, race, politics, and queer identity:

Pilar Agüero-Esparza (San Jose):

• Intersects woven leather, huarache sandal traditions, and color theory to create “racialized abstractions” probing skin-tone hierarchies and cultural memory.

Jen P. Harris (Cleveland):

• Animates canvas as a loom, stretching yarn to needle-weave across compositions in a fluid, non-linear exploration of painting and queer metaphor.

Uma Rani Iyli (San Francisco):

• Wraps remnant silk sourced from Southern Indian weaver communities around plexiglass tubes, translating 7-yard sari motifs into striking, meditative color fields.

John Paul Morabito (Ohio):

• Blends glass beads, hand-dyed wool, and cotton in intuitive, geometric woven tapestries that honor queer spaces, glamour, and historical memory.

Cornelia Schulz (San Francisco):

• A Bay Area treasure and UC Davis Professor Emeritus, Schulz crafts small, sculpted, high-relief oil paintings that challenge the structural limits of paint and form.

Jamie Vasta (Oakland):

• Reimagines 19th-century Pre-Raphaelite portraiture through composite glitter paintings that celebrate ballroom culture and lush, unapologetic queer representation.

Events:

• Artist Talk (Uma Rani Iyli & Pilar Agüero-Esparza): Saturday, October 17 | 2:00 PM (Discussing family legacy, tradition, and Agüero-Esparza’s historic San José mural project)
• Artist Talk (John Paul Morabito & Jamie Vasta): Saturday, October 24 | 2:00 PM (Exploring fiber, glitter, and non-traditional media in queer narrative art)
• Closing Talk (Cornelia Schulz in conversation with Patricia Sweetow): Saturday, October 31 | 2:00 PM (A celebration of Schulz’s multi-decade impact on the Bay Area art scene)