34th ANNUAL JURIED EXHIBITION

Exhibition Dates: August 1–October 9, 2026

Opening Reception: Friday, July 31, 5:30–7:30 PM

One of the most prestigious juried shows in San Diego, selected artists will exhibit their work in our galleries, receive excellent exposure, and mingle with both artists and art lovers at an opening reception. Prize winners, including the recipient of the Leslie Von Kolb Memorial Award, will be announced at the opening reception. Free and open to the public.

The Athenaeum Music & Arts Library has announced the 42 artists selected for its 34th Annual Juried Exhibition, one of the region's most anticipated showcases of contemporary art. Chosen by internationally acclaimed photographer and artist Paul Mpagi Sepuya, the exhibition features 48 works by artists from across the San Diego–Tijuana region and will be on view August 1 through October 9, 2026.

This year, 357 artists submitted more than 1,000 works for consideration. Sepuya selected the final group of artists, whose work reflects the breadth of contemporary artistic practice in the binational region. The exhibition brings together both emerging and established artists working across a range of media, perspectives, and approaches.

A Los Angeles based artist and photographer, Sepuya is internationally recognized for work that explores portraiture, authorship, race, sexuality, and the photographic medium. His work is held in the collections of major institutions including the Getty, LACMA, the Guggenheim Museum, the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, Tate Modern, the Stedelijk Museum, and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Sepuya also serves as an Associate Professor in Visual Arts at UC San Diego.

Artists in the exhibition:

Armando Aguilar, Tiffany Anderson, Stefanie Bales, Rachael Bertholino, Roni Breite, Carlos Castillo, Annie Claflin, Sheeva Davari, Kat Flyn, Christa Forrest, Lenny Gerard, Fritz Goeckner, Adrian Gomez, Abby Hanneman, Jill Marie Holslin, Barbara Inbody, Jessamyn Kaback, Aleya Lanteigne, Alejandro Leon, Alan Luna, Tina Mardan, Maya Grace Misra, Lori Mitchell, Benjamin Montag, Claudia Moreno, H.L. Myers, Ari Nathan, Milla Nelson, Phuc Ha Nguyen, Noelle Ocen-Odoge, Susan Osborn, Priyanka Pathak, Ana Maria Phelps, Jan Posvar, Nate Riedel, Ana Saad, Brandon Tani, Pasquale Verdicchio, Danny Warhole, Bay Weli, Helena Westra, and Cat Wilder.

Awards:

First place: Priyanka Pathak; second place: Carlos Castillo; third place: Tiffany Anderson; Leslie Von Kolb Memorial Award: Claudia Moreno 

Banner image - photo credit: Annie Denten

The exhibition can be viewed in the Joseph Clayes III Gallery at the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library (1008 Wall Street, La Jolla, CA 92037) during open hours, Tuesday through Saturday, from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Appointments are not required.

Selections from the Athenaeum’s Erika & Fred Torri Artists’ Books Collection

Exhibition Dates: May 2–July 25, 2026

Opening Reception: Friday, May 1, 2026, 5:30–7:30 PM

A selection of artists’ books on the environment in the Athenaeum’s Erika & Fred Torri Artists’ Books Collection will be showcased in the Max & Melissa Elliott North Reading Room.

About the Athenaeum’s Erika & Fred Torri Artists’ Books Collection

The Athenaeum’s artists’ books collection was initiated in 1991 when Joan & Irwin Jacobs Executive Director Emeritus Erika Torri received a generous donation from life member Hope Shipley with the advice “to use it for her dreams.” Artists’ books have been Torri’s passion for many years prior and it seemed a natural fit for the Athenaeum. She purchased Harry Sternberg’s limited edition A Life in Woodcuts, published by Brighton Press, and thus the collection was launched. The mission of the collection was established with a focus on regional artists and presses and on artists who emphasized art and/or music in their works. The collection has grown enormously through purchases, sponsored acquisitions, and generous donations—now numbering close to 2,200 books—and so has its reputation. It is sought out by artists, researchers and collectors and can be viewed by making an appointment with library staff.

The exhibition can be viewed in the Max & Melissa Elliott North Reading Room at the Athenaeum Music & Arts Library (1008 Wall Street, La Jolla, CA 92037) during open hours, Tuesday through Saturday, from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Appointments are not required.

Ess Whiteley: listening materials

Exhibition Dates: August 29–October 17, 2026

Opening Reception: Saturday, August 29, 5–8 PM

Athenaeum Art Center, 1955 Julian Avenue, San Diego, CA 92113

In Ess Whiteley: listening materials, speaker cones filled with organic and inorganic matter (rocks, gravel, clay, metal), fans and harmonicas, are hung and placed throughout the Athenaeum. The space itself becomes a self-sounding resonant body, absent of any visible human agency or "performer." Various materials are animated by sound waves that cause them to vibrate, producing different self-organizing behaviors. The frequencies generate beating interference patterns that activate the materials in distinct ways, tuned specifically to interact with qualities of the Athenaeum itself — the room's natural resonances, HVAC system, and ambient noise — and as the listener moves through the space, the sonic material shifts depending on location. 

Ess Whiteley: listening materials investigates the audible trace of various things meeting: frequencies, speaker cone membranes, matter, reeds, air, and room. Set into motion is a field of relations — wave meeting mineral density, wave meeting wave, air pressure meeting reed, ear meeting pressure wave — in which sound emerges only ever between materials: between frequencies close enough to produce interference patterns, between moving air and a still reed, between pressure waves and matter, between matter and force, between the room, matter, and listening subject. What reaches the ear is not only evidence of this meeting, this betweenness, but of matter's own capacity to act, resist, respond, and co-arise with the listener. Through this betweenness, the invisible agency of sound becomes visibly materialized, and matter’s vibrancy, agency, its being-there, made perceptible through sound. 

About the artist: New Jersey–born, West Coast–based composer and sound artist Ess Whiteley creates sonic worlds that combine electronics, acoustic instruments, multimedia, and repurposed materials to explore new modes of listening and the relationships between humans, technology, and the natural world. Their work has received the Martirano Composition Award and recognition from the MA/IN Matera Intermedia Festival, and has been commissioned by acclaimed ensembles, including Alarm Will Sound and Riot Ensemble. Whiteley’s work has been presented internationally at MATA (New York), Mixtur (Barcelona, ES), Dublin Music Current (Dublin, IR), Espacios Sonoros (Salta, AR) and has been featured on Pitchfork, The Wire, New Music Handbook, and Relevant Tones. They recently earned a Ph.D. in composition from the University of California, San Diego.

The exhibition can be viewed in the Catherine and Robert Palmer Gallery at the Athenaeum Art Center (1955 Julian Avenue, San Diego, CA 92113) during open gallery hours, Tuesdays through Saturdays, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., and every second Saturday from 5 to 8 p.m., during the Barrio Art Crawl, and by appointment.

La exposición se puede ver en la Galería Catherine y Robert Palmer en el Centro de Arte Athenaeum (1955 Julian Avenue, San Diego, CA 92113) durante el horario de atención de la galería, de martes a sábado, de 11 a. m. a 4 p. m., y cada segundo sábado de 5 a 8 p.m., durante el Barrio Art Crawl, y con cita previa.