Visit our VAR table at the Richmond Art Center’s Holiday Arts Festival
Come say hi! We’ll be there the whole day recruiting new members, answering questions and taking preorders for a new batch of t-shirts! More info, hours, and directions here.
Join Our Call to Action!
We need every artist at the City Council Chambers on Dec 16. This includes not just visual artists but any other artist who has ever wanted to be funded by the City of Richmond. More info here
Why Support Your Fellow Artists?
Richmond will be losing even more of its artists, art commissioners-and the trust of its residents- if it neglects issues that can be addressed by working together.
This Call To Action is calling for more transparency and community participation as we solve these issues.
Our Public Art Program is only as good as our ability to participate in the changes we need
A grassroots community of artists in Richmond, California.
Our overall goal is to create opportunities to celebrate and promote our work, share resources, and support each other's art practices via two projects:
Six artist gatherings per year let us network with other visual artists, learn of new opportunities and discuss topics of relevance to artist living or working in this community.
An independent online directory, free to artists who live or work in Richmond. This directory serves as a single source of artists in our area, allowing potential clients, collectors, colleagues and organizations to learn more about the art made within our city.
An annual Richmond Open Studios, enabling almost 50 participating Richmond artists to sell directly to the public and giving art lovers in West Contra Costa the chance to learn about the visual arts thought studio visits and conversations with artists.
January Artist Gathering at Seaport Studios
2024 Preview Exhibition at the Richmond Art Center
E Bond. Letterpress Experiment.
Visual Artists of Richmond (VAR) brings together more than 132 visual artist members living in or working in Richmond, California. Our fiscal sponsor is Independent Arts and Media, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. We welcome, fabricators, muralists, animators, illustrators, photographers, filmmakers, ceramicists, sculptors, printmakers, painters and designers.
In our group there is cultural and ethnic diversity, various age groups, high and low socioeconomic levels and emergent as well as established working artists.
VAR was started to promote artists making their art in Richmond and its unincorporated areas, to expand the opportunities available to visual artists in Richmond, and to support such artists through advocacy.
Artists: Get Promoted!
If you have a profile in our directory, we’ll be happy to promote your shows or art classes! And if you are an artist but not a VAR member, listings are just $10. Listings are free for our community partners!
All you need to do is fill out our form and email us your images with captions:
Marvin Perry Mann. Cherry Tree. Oil on canvas.