Press Release, January 2008

Mothers Day at Gallery Concord
Leslie Wilson and Maggie Metcalf welcome you to Gallery Concord, 1765 Galindo Street, Concord on May 11 from 11 am to 4 pm. Treat yourself and the mothers in your life to a relaxing visit to our bright and airy gallery. With two shows running concurrently, there is much to appreciate. Light refreshments will be served. Ample parking and free admission.

Explosion of Color opens at the Gallery Concord Friday, April 4th with a reception from 6 to 8pm. Come meet the artists, enjoy wine and refreshments and listen to singer/guitarist Regina Wells. Margaret Fago is the featured artist for this show and Susan Matthews is the invited guest artist.

Margaret Fago from Alameda has spent 20 years being around boats, marinas, the bay and ocean as a Sailmaker and Boat Canvas Designer and Watercolor Painter. She now devotes herself, full time, to capturing images of those water scenes and moods that she loves in watercolor paintings. Come see the quiet reflections, the sailing, the boats, the people, the birds and the animals that hang out around our water places in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. Margaret has been a practicing artist since childhood. She began painting and drawing at a young age following in the footsteps of her Mother and Grandmother who were both accomplished artists. Her skills were developed with art classes in high school, continued with classes every semester at UC Davis where she was a Biology major, and then after graduation with night school and weeklong workshops. Now she teaches watercolor classes at the Frank Bette center in Alameda, CA.

Susan Matthews is a painter and percussionist who lives and works in Oakland, California. She has a BFA from The University of California at Berkeley, and an MFA from San Francisco State University. Her current paintings are based on experiences in the folkloric communities of Cuba and Niger. She has traveled to Cuba often to study percussion and folklore since 1995, and has done a large number of paintings on the subject of traditional Cuban music and dance. In the summer of 2004 she spent three weeks in a small village in Niger, West Africa. Her newest paintings are formal, renaissance style gilded portraits of Hausa and Fulani people she met in the Sahel, just south the Sahara. Susan has exhibited throughout the greater Bay Area, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and Havana. She teaches Drawing and Painting at the College of San Mateo, and at Maybeck High School in Berkeley.

Gallery Concord is located at 1765 Galindo St., Concord, CA 94520. Gallery hours are Thursday-Sunday, 11-4. Phone: 925-691-6140. This exhibit runs April 4, through June 29, 2008. Free parking is available off Clayton Road behind the gallery. Please join us for this very special event. Visit the Gallery website at www.galleryconcord.org.