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About the Athenaeum's School of the Arts

Rivian Bütikofer earned a BA in painting and printmaking from SDSU and an MA in education from Point Loma Nazarene College. As an artist and longtime educator, Rivian combines her educational experience and extensive background in art, drama, and art therapy with an enthusiastic and encouraging teaching style. She has been an artist in residence and a visual arts resource instructor for the San Diego Unified School District and has taught at the secondary level in several area schools. Rivian has also taught at her own art school, the magic of art, UCSD, MCA, SDMA, and was a consultant to centre George Pompidou, Paris. Her work is in collections in Germany, France, U.S., Israel, and Canada. www.rivianbutikofer.com, www.rivianbutikoferphotography.com, rivian-shareart.blogspot.com

Carol Curtis, originally from the South, studied architecture at Auburn University. She traveled with Hyatt Hotel Corporation, using her experience in management, hospitality, and visual arts to open new Hyatt locations around the country. Carol launched a successful catering company and for the past ten years has built a textile design business. Having studied drawing, pastel, oil, and watercolor, Carol always returns to watercolor! Some of her instructors include Burton Silverman, Charles Reid, Daniel Greene, Robert Johnson, Nelson DeMille, Joshua Fallik, David Leffel, and Donna Howell-Sickles.

Natalie Fiocre was born in Vailly-sur-Sauldre, a small village in the Loire Valley. After moving to San Diego in the 1980s she received her AA in Photography from San Diego City College and her BA from SDSU with Arthur Ollman as her advisor. Natalie worked as an editorial photographer for the San Diego Reader, Corporate magazine, and Vanity Fair. For five years she was on staff at the San Diego Museum of Art, scanning and photographing art for patrons and the library. She has exhibited her work in Tijuana, Mexico, and in Southern California.

Amber George received a BA in 1994 from UCLA, where she studied drawing, painting, sculpture, and installation. Since graduation, she has worked in a variety of capacities in the art field, including as an instructor at the San Diego Museum of Art since 2001 and in several school districts across San Diego County. Her artwork is represented nationally through several galleries and was featured in solo and group shows in New York, Boston, and San Francisco.

Ken Goldman studied at the National Academy of Design, the Art Students’ League, and New York Studio School, New York City. A recipient of numerous awards, Ken has exhibited widely in various group shows and solo exhibitions in galleries and museums in Holland, Paris, Mexico, New York, Boston, Washington, D.C., and San Diego. Ken is the author of six books on pastels, acrylics, charcoal, and artistic anatomy. In addition, his work has been featured in various magazines such as The Artist’s Magazine, International Artist Magazine, and American Artist Magazine. www.goldmanfineart.com

Stephanie Goldman received a BA and MA from the University of Humanistic Studies in Del Mar. She began her professional art training with artist Ken Goldman and enhanced her skills through intensive studies of Renaissance art while living in Europe. Since then, Stephanie has studied with noted landscape colorist Wolf Kahn and nationally known figure and portrait painter Nelson Shanks at Studio Incamminati. The Riverside Art Museum invited Stephanie to exhibit her portrait series I Am a Child. Previous bodies of her work have been published by Frontline,Ramprod.com,and Eastmeetswestco.com. www.goldmanfineart.com

Catherine Grawin is an award-winning oil painter of plein air landscapes, studio still life, and abstract work. A true colorist, her bold and loose brushwork is the signature style that appeals to her collectors in the United States and abroad. Grawin’s art education includes a BA in graphic design and communication from SDSU, with postgraduate work in architectural design and rendering. Some of her noteworthy teachers include Sebastian Capella, John Asaro, Joe Garcia and Pat Kelly. Grawin’s work can be seen in the art book Land of Sunlight (a copy of which is in the Athenaeum’s circulating collection). She is one of seven artists featured in the documentary film Plein Air Painters of Santa Ysabel, California. Grawin teaches painting alla prima at the La Jolla Athenaeum and plein air painting at UCSD Extension. Her work is represented at the Santa Ysabel Art Gallery and Colosseum Fine Arts in Los Angeles. Find out more about the artist and see collections of her work at www.catherinegrawin.com

Irina Gronborg is very enthusiastic about the color pencil medium and uses it almost exclusively to create her nationally exhibited and published botanical works. Her work is exhibited locally at J. Dewers, First Street Gallery, and the Leucadia Art Gallery. Irina earned a BA and an MA in fine arts at Stanford University and several horticultural certificates from the State of California. A member of the San Diego Horticultural Society, Irina cultivates a spectacular garden, which continues to be her inspiration. She also teaches at Mira Costa College. www.irinagronborg.com

France-Marie Haeger is a skillful instructor whose enthusiasm and talent will inspire students to go beyond their expectations. She received her MA in fine arts education at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Lausanne, Switzerland. Art instructor, artist/designer, and art therapist, she has taught fine arts in Switzerland, Canada, and the United States. She has developed seminars, which she regularly leads in Europe and San Diego, in art and expressive arts therapy, color therapy and awareness, and art and the creative process. Her European background and her exposure to many cultures enliven her teaching and enrich the experience of her students.

Elaine Harvey paints in watercolor, acrylic, and a mixture of watermedia. A graduate form SDSU, she has won many awards in local, national, and international exhibitions. She studied watercolor with painters including Millard Sheets, Virginia Cobb, Robert Wood, and Edward Bates, from whom she learned a wide variety of approaches and developed a broad understanding of watermedia painting. Her paintings and writings can be found in publications including Splash, The Artist’s Magazine, and several watercolor books. She has taught for the Artist’s Council of the Desert Museum, San Diego Watercolor Society, and UCSD Extension.

Patricia “Pat” Kelly graduated with a BA in visual arts from UCSD and has studied with David Leffel at the CAA Montana Workshops. An accomplished oil painter, Pat has been showing her paintings professionally for more than sixteen years. Most recently, she has turned to painting the landscape in the plein air style. She currently shows her work at the Santa Ysabel Gallery. Pat has been teaching painting and drawing classes for Palomar College, the Ramona Art Guild, and Outdoors Painting Workshops for several years.

Lori Mitchell graduated with honors from Art Center College of Design in Pasadena in 1987, and has been doing freelance illustration ever since. She wrote and illustrated the award-winning children’s book Different Just Like Me (Charlesbridge Publishing) featured on The Oprah Winfrey Show and the Today Show. She has illustrated eight books since. Lori is also an accomplished mosaic artist whose whimsical and thought-provoking mosaics are shown at Art N Soul gallery in Encinitas. The gallery features artwork that uses recycled materials and gives all profits, once the artist and utilities are paid, back to the community. Lori teaches drawing and composition at Palomar College, San Marcos. www.lorizstory.com and www.differentjustlikeme.com

Thia Nevius grew up in Studio City, California. After receiving an MFA from Colorado State University, she painted sets for the Santa Fe Opera and taught art at Santa Fe Community College. Since moving to San Diego, she has taught art for many years, including at The Bishop’s School in La Jolla, UCSD Extension, the San Diego Art Department, ARTS —A Reason to Survive, and the Athenaeum. Thia has traveled extensively in Europe, South America, and Asia, including living in the Philippines for two years as a Peace Corps Volunteer. Her work has been featured in numerous solo and group exhibitions, where she has won awards of excellence and best of show. Her work has been featured in Art and the Creative Process and in the volume on light in The Davis Visuals, as well as in UC publications and books for art education. She is an active member of the San Diego art community, and her work has hung regularly at the San Diego Art Institute and the San Diego Art Department. Her work can be seen in important private and corporate collections including McDonald’s corporate offices in Japan, the Hilton Hotel Collection in California, and the Permanent Collection at Colorado State University.

Susan Osborn has extensive experience as an arts educator, lecturer, and consultant as well as an award-winning visual artist. She received an MA in both visual arts and education from SDSU. Susan began teaching in 1973 and has since taught drawing, painting, photography, and design at SDSU, Southwestern Community College, and from 1987 to 2005, The Bishop’s School in La Jolla. Her grand-scale paintings, colorful oil pastels, and photographs have been shown in more than forty solo, group, and invitational exhibitions, including Artists Guild Presents in 1999 at the San Diego Museum of Art and Small Images at Gallery 21. Susan is listed in Who’s Who of American Women.

Jeffrey Pollack (OUR NEWEST INSTRUCTOR!) began his art studies at the age of 13, under the private tutelage of a noted Old Master painter in Germany, where he studied for 5 years the techniques of the European, and particularly Dutch Master painters.  He pursued his college degree at UCLA with an extensive focus in Art History and Studio Arts.  His painting career spans over 40 years and his works belong to many private collections in the United States and Europe.  Over the years, his works have been featured in various galleries in Los Angeles and San Diego.  The artist's passions are portraiture and architectural landscapes.                                                                           

Barbara “Bobi” Postelnek is a versatile sculptor whose works range in style from realistic to impressionistic as well as serious to humorous. She received a BA in behavioral science from the University of Maryland in 1975 and has since studied art at the Art Students League, the Sculpture League, and the National Academy of Design, all in New York. Her clients have included GTE and Saturday Night Live. A professional sculptor since 1988, Barbara has shown her work in numerous exhibitions, including the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts juried show, and has received several awards and art scholarships. Barbara has been teaching figurative study classes in San Diego since 2004. www.sculpturehome.com

Sibyl Rubottom holds a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design, where she became a European Honors Program student and studied in Rome, and an MFA in painting from Yale University. For over twenty-five years Sibyl made fabric art for the commercial and residential interior trade. She is currently proprietor of Bay Park Press, in San Diego. Bay Park Press is a small fine arts press specializing in limited edition artists’ books and fine intaglio prints. Sibyl’s books are in the special collections of the John Hay Library at Brown University, the Sterling Library at Yale University, UCSD’s Geisel Library (in the Mandeville Special Collections Library), SDSU’s Malcolm A. Love Library, Occidental College (Los Angeles), Brigham Young University, Dartmouth College, the Athenaeum (in the Erika and Fred Torri Artists’ Books Collection), and other public and private collections.

Jean Shen was the first teacher of Chinese brush painting in San Diego. She has taught privately and at UCSD Extension for more than twenty-three years. Jean continues to train many students, from beginning level to award-winning artists, at her studio. She also continues to paint and show her own work, most recently at the UCSD Faculty Club. Jean is the author of the book His Garden, Story and Paintings and Dance of the Brush, a nontraditional approach to learning Chinese brush painting. www.danceofthebrush.com

Neil Shigley is a painter, printmaker, and sculptor. He concerns himself with the abstraction of form, in many cases the human figure. His work has been shown internationally. His one-man show of his woodcut prints at the Earl & Birdie Taylor Library Gallery in Pacific Beach was the focus of the television interview series for City TV entitled “San Diego Profiles”. Along with his painting, printmaking and commercial work, Neil also teaches drawing and illustration at SDSU and figure drawing at the Art Academy of San Diego.

Elizabeth Washburn grew up in Kansas, where she began painting at the age of thirteen. She received a BFA in Drawing and Painting from the Academy of Art University, San Francisco. Since 1996 her talents as a freelance muralist, portrait and landscape painter, and designer have led her to receive numerous commissions in San Diego, San Francisco, Las Vegas, New York, and Egypt. Her vibrant, narrative work is included in collections at Thunderbird Country Club, Palm Springs; Merck Research Laboratories; and the San Diego Airport Commuter Terminal, as well as several other local sites. www.ewashburn.com

Duke Windsor originally served as a U.S. Marine Corps combat illustrator and drill instructor.  Duke has also worked as a technical and graphic illustrator, architectural draftsman and editorial cartoonist; he is also a 4th Dan Black Belt and former martial arts teacher. Duke opened his first art studio in San Diego’s Gaslamp Quarter in 1986.  Duke’s paintings have been exhibited at numerous juried and solo exhibitions in San Diego and Southern California, and they are held in many private collections throughout the U.S. and the U.K. As an art teacher, Duke has taught drawing, portraiture and cartooning to children at the San Diego Museum of Art School and as an adult instructor at San Diego Art Department and the Bravo School of Art. Duke’s Urban Series is represented by Sue Greenwood Fine Arts in Laguna Beach, CA. Duke’s new body of work explores the world of abstract expressionism and the style of intuitive and process painting methods.  His new work premiered at Art San Diego Contemporary Art Fair in the Fall 2010. A museum professional for the past twelve years, Duke is currently Director of Exhibits for the USS Midway Museum. 

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