Profile Photo

Cheselyn Amato

  • 905 4th St, San Rafael, CA 94901, USA

About The Artist

Artist Statement

Cheselyn Amato is an interdisciplinary visual artist, global citizen and lightworker for justice and social transformation. She works across the disciplines – 2D, 3D and 4D – with an emphasis on enacting circumstances for the experience of sublimity, awe, wonder and delight in the midst of uncertainty and suffering in the world via the orchestration of visual props and cues, colored light phenomena, video projection, vocalization/sounding, and choreographies of gesture and movement. The work is made as instigator of experience, of presence, of all that is revealed when we pay close attention: look and see, listen and hear. Cheselyn’s work reflects and chronicles her lifelong spiritual, aesthetic and humanitarian journey. She has been teaching art students for decades and has recently added spiritual care and bereavement counseling to her toolkit as light worker and doula for personal, social, societal and global transformation and for the triumph of justice, love, beauty and abundance.

Biography

Cheselyn is a New Jersey girl with NYC at her core. She spent 20 years in Chicago where she lived and taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and in 2006, Cheselyn moved to Davis in Northern California for fifteen years until moving to San Rafael outside of San Francisco in 2021. Cheselyn has taught at American River and Sierra Community Colleges as well as AiCASAC and CCA. She earned her BA in studio art and comparative religious studies at Brown University, an MFA in drawing, painting and new genres at Tyler School of Art of Temple University, and an MTS at GTU/PSR in Berkeley in Interfaith Chaplaincy and Justice & Social Transformation. Cheselyn is currently serving as Spiritual Support Counselor/Clinical Team Manager at By The Bay Health. Her work is exhibited nationally and has been included in exhibitions at the Jewish Museum in NYC, the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco, and Spertus Institute of Judaica in Chicago with works in the permanent collections.

Art Medium(s)

Oil Paint, Drawing, Digital Art, Photography, Mixed Media, Sculpture

Studio Information

Building Name

Crome Architecture

COVID Precautions

Contact Information

Artist Full Name
Contact Email Address
Phone

847-840-6587

Exhibitions & Press

Group Exhibitions

2023

Genesis: The Beginning of Creativity, Curators: Richard McBee, Joel Silverstein and        Goldie Gross, NYC

Ingenium Creatives, Think Tank Symposium, organized by Cathy Allen and Suzie Khalil,   Las Vegas, NV

Altered Realities, MarinMOCA, curated by Chester Arnold, Novato, CA

2022

JADA Miami / JADA Paris, Online Exhibitions in in conjunction with live exhibitions in both locations

Chochmat Halev Community Exhibition, Berkeley, CA

Conney Project Online Exhibition in conjunction with the 2022 Conney Conference,          Madison, Wisconsin

2021

Jerusalem Biennale: Four Cubits, #Take Me Home, “World Shadow: Four Kinds of Cubit – Personal, Social, Public, Divine, 2021, Radiant Film/Silhouettes/Disk/Light

Hanukkah Lamp (in honor of Susan L. Braunstein, curator Emeritus, the Jewish Museum, NYC), acquired by the JM, June 15, 2021, Radiant Film/Silhouettes/Acrylic Disk/Light

Welcome Lantern, Chochmat Halev Community: Home for the Jewish Heart, Berkeley, CA, installation in conjunction with High Holidays 2021 presented via ZOOM, Radiant Film/Silhouettes/Acrylic Disk/Light

2020

JADA In Paris, Panel Discussion: The Death of Irony and the Birth of New Sincerity, October 24, 2020

Creativity in an Uncertain Time, JAS Open Studios Session presentation, October 13, 2020.   Covid19.The Art of Isolation, Curator’s Voice Art Project, Online Exhibitions

Thriving in Place: The Art of Resilience and the Twin Pandemics of COVID19 and Racism, Abrams Claghorn Gallery, Albany, CA

Sacramento Open Studios, sponsored by Verge Center for the Arts, Sacramento, CA

2019

Contingent Upon, Ridley Gallery, Sierra College, Rocklin, CA

2018

Big Issues: Time’s Up, JayJay Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Visions of the Chevra Kadisha, Chochmat Halev, Berkeley, CA

2017

The Golem Show, Brooklyn Jewish Art Gallery/CHL, Brooklyn, NY

The Speak Listen Milagros Project, organized by Roma Devanbu, AXIS Gallery, Sac, CA

Through the Lens of The Cured Romantic’s Telescope to Heaven, AXIS Gallery, Sac,

Love Life Chaya Chesed Codex: A Mini-Retrospective 1987-2017, AXIS Gallery, Sac, CA

2016

All The Love, AXIS East Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Sacramento Open Studios, Verge Center for the Arts, Sacramento, CA

Flat File Show, AXIS East Gallery, Sacramento, C

Uncontrollable Beauty|An Odyssey|Everything We Need Is Always With Us, AXIS Gallery, Sacramento, CA

2015

The Art Auction, benefitting Verge Center for the Arts, Sacramento, CA

The Jerusalem Biennale: Women of the Book Project, International Women’s Visual Torah, First Station Gallery, Jerusalem, Israel

The Preview Show, Sacramento Open Studios, Verge Center for the Arts, Sac, CA

Flat File Show, East Gallery, AXIS Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Swag with Love, AXIS East Gallery, Sacramento, CA

2013

The Pink Show, Contemporary Center for the Arts, Sacramento, CA

(Extra)ordinary Evidence, Chochmat Halev Gallery, Berkeley, CA

Visual Discourses on the Abrahamic Religions, Trio Interfaith Project, Islamic Cultural Ctr, Oakland, CA

2012

Flatlanders on the Slant, Nelson Gallery, UC Davis, CA

The End, Tangent Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Diverse Visions of Harmony, Islamic Cultural Center, Oakland, CA

2011

Women of the Book, International Visual Torah Project, currently online

Discourses in Color, Geometry, Swags & Swoons, Gallery A, Sierra College, Rocklin, CA

Sanctuaries in Time, JWAN, Kraft Center, Columbia University, NYC

2010

Dura Europos Project, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA

Reinventing Ritual, The Contemporary Jewish Museum, San Francisco, CA (travel from  the JM, NYC)

The Fear Show, Tangent Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Generation D: Identities, Flomenhaft Gallery, NYC, 12/14/2010

Seduced by the Sacred. JCC/Charter Oak, Hartford, CT

Emanating Stars, Friedman Gala Tribute Event, Sacramento, CA

Group Show, Rockridge Library, Oakland, CA

Liberation Garden: Healing and Redemption After Slavery, Afikomen Judaica, Berkeley

2009

Reinventing Ritual, The Jewish Museum, NY, NY

What Does It Say To You?, Spertus Museum, Chicago, IL

Faculty Exhibition, American River College, Sacramento, CA

Faculty Exhibition, Sierra College, Rocklin, CA

Old Story New Work: 80 Artists at the Passover Table, The Dorothy Saxe Invitational, The Contemporary Jewish Museum (CJM), San Francisco, CA

2008

Sierra College Faculty Show, Union Hall Gallery, Sacramento, CA

Flatlanders: Regional Roundup II, Nelson Gallery, UC Davis, Summer 2008

American River College Faculty Show, Union Hall, Sacramento, CA

2007

The New Authentics, Spertus Museum, Chicago, IL

Press

Books, Reviews, Journals, Catalogs, and Cover Art

Shoshana Gugenheim, Women of the Book, ongoing project

Z. Soltes, Tradition and Transformation, Three Millennia of Jewish Art and Architecture, 2016

Rami Ozeri, The Jerusalem Biennale, catalog, 2015

Elana Maryles Sztokman, The Men’s Section, Brandeis University Press, 2011, cover art

Sanctuaries in Time, exhibition catalog, 2011

The Dura Europos Project: An Ancient Site Revisited, exhibition catalog, 2010

Seduced by the Sacred: Forging A New Jewish Art, exhibition catalog, 2010

Promised Lands: New Jewish American Fiction on Longing and Belonging, Edited by Derek Rubin, Brandeis University Press, 2010, cover art

500 Judaica, Lark Books, 2010

Richard McBee, Reinventing Ritual, The Jewish Press, 10/7/2009

Daniel Belasco, Reinventing Ritual, Yale University Press, 2009

New Works/Old Story: 80 Artists at the Passover Table, The Dorothy Saxe Invitational, organized by the Contemporary Jewish Museum, SF, 2009

Flatlanders 2: Regional Roundup, UC Davis, The Richard L. Nelson Gallery, 2008

Diane Chin Lui, Dreamers and their Visions, The Davis Enterprise, August 11, 2008, A9

Sharon Cohen, The Arts: A Museum of Great Reflection, Hadassah Magazine, April 2008

Menachem Wecker, Post-Jewish Painting and Its Discontents, The Jewish Press, Jan. 23, 2008

Gloria Orenstein, Jewish Contemporary Women Artists, Nashim, Fall, Number 14, 2007

Alan Artner, New exhibit gives modern focus to Spertus tradition, Chicago Tribune, Dec. 5, 2007

Blair Kamin, Blades of Glass, Chicago Tribune, Arts and Entertainment, November 25, 2007

Kevin Nance, The 2007 Fall Preview: Visual Arts, Chicago Sun-Times, Sunday, Sept. 16, 2007

Staci Boris, New Authentics, catalog published in association with exhibition, 2007

Leslie Kaufman, On the Metaphysical in Art, Inside Magazine, Winter 2005, pp.50-53.

Harriet Goodheart, The True Mysteries, Not Celebrities, of Kabbalah, The Jewish Exponent, Vol. 219/No.13, 12/22/05

Miriam Seidel, The Hidden Garden: Three Artists Explore Kabbalah, exhibition catalog, 2005

Gloria Orenstein, Contemporary Jewish Women Artists Visualize the Invisible, FEMSPEC, 2005

Dan Bischoff, The Star Ledger, October 1, 2004, p. 52.

NEWS-RECORD of South Orange and Maplewood, NJ, September 9, 2004, p. 3.

Tina Wasserman, Dialogue, Arts in the Midwest, Sept/Oct 1996

James Yood, New Art Examiner, 23, 10 (Summer 1996), pp. 41-42.

Lisa Stein, New City, May 16-22, 1996, p. 22.

Lori Gray, The Chicago Tribune, February 24, 1995

Contemporary Art Workshop 1949-1989, designed & written by Alex Nelson, Chicago, IL

Garrett Holg, Departures from Architecture, New Art Examiner, 16,10 (June, 1989), pp. 45-46.

Cara Glatt, Leopold Bloom ate with relish…,Hyde Park Herald, 3/15/89, pp. 10, 20.

Michael Bonesteel, Pioneer Press, Evanston, IL, 3/19/89

Larry Lundy, Interiors, New Art Examiner, 15,4, (December, 1987), pp. 48-49.

Education

Description

MTS, Art, Spirituality, Spiritual Care and Social Justice/Transformation, PSR/GTU

CPE, Clinical Pastoral Education, UC Davis/UC San Francisco Medical Centers

MFA, Painting & Drawing and New Genres, Tyler School of Art of Temple University, Elkins Park, PA

BA, Visual Art, emphasis Painting & Drawing, Brown University, Providence, RI

Groups

MOS GALLERY

Sign up to get our emails.

Connect with us.

See You In Our Studios!