This year, we received 600+ individual submissions, more high-quality pieces than our gallery can hold, making selecting the final pieces for the exhibition a difficult process. Our selection committee saw high merit in each of these honorable mentions and wanted to show appreciation for the thoughtfulness and skill of each artwork. Although these students aren’t exhibiting artists in this year’s exhibition, we wanted to feature their artwork and statements on our blog to honor their effort, talent, and perspective.

This year, we received 700+ individual submissions more high-quality pieces than our gallery can hold, making selecting the final pieces for the exhibition a difficult process. Our selection committee saw high merit in each of these honorable mentions and wanted to show appreciation for the thoughtfulness and skill of each artwork. Although these students aren’t exhibiting artists in this year’s exhibition, we wanted to feature their artwork and statements on our blog to honor their effort, talent, and perspective.

This year, we had a record number of 810 individual submissions and many high-quality pieces. As we only have one gallery for ArtNow that holds a limited number of physical pieces, selecting the final pieces for the exhibition is a difficult process. Our selection committee saw high merit in each of these honorable mentions and wanted to show appreciation for the thoughtfulness and skill of each artwork. Although these students won’t be exhibiting artists in this year’s exhibition, we wanted to feature their artwork and statements on our blog to honor their effort, talent, and perspective. Scroll to see this year’s honorable mentions. 

What a year! We were blown away by the thoughtfulness of submissions across the board, and our team was faced with the difficult task of narrowing down the hundreds of submissions we received to the small percentage of pieces that can physically fit in our gallery. This year, we received 810+ submissions from 45 high schools across Santa Clara County and will be exhibiting the work of 82 student artists from 26 high schools…

Meet Ellie Lin, an emerging young artist who just won the Best in Show AND People’s Choice awards for NUMU’s ArtNow 2023 Annual High School Juried Exhibition Unarmed Truth. Ellie graduated from Los Altos High School this year, and will be attending Rhode Island School of Design this fall, to pursue fine art and illustration. In this post Ellie shares some reflections on her involvement in ArtNow and her own art practice. Follow Ellie on Instagram @dynojelatoe to stay up to date on what she creates next!

ArtNow is an annual juried Santa Clara County high school art exhibition and educational program, presented by New Museum Los Gatos (NUMU). The ArtNow Exhibition and supporting programs offer opportunities for high school student artists, from Palo Alto to Gilroy, to gain real-world experience in participating in a juried museum exhibition.

Each year, a new theme is chosen for the exhibition and students are asked to submit works based on that theme. $10,000 in scholarships and awards are given to participating students. Students have the opportunity to win awards in 8 artistic categories as well as an overall Best in Show award and a People’s Choice award. The categories are Painting, Drawing, Mixed Media, Printmaking, Sculpture, Photography, Digital Art & Video/Animation. The awards in each category and the Best in Show award are determined by a panel of guest judges, who are local university faculty and established practicing artists. NUMU intentionally recruits a diverse array of jurors from different cultural and artistic backgrounds who can all speak to specific medium categories in ArtNow, depending on their own professional art practices. Our judges for the 12th annual ArtNow Exhibition Unarmed Truth are Kathy Aoki, Binh Danh, Mitra Fabian, James Morgan, and Rupy C. Tut.

During the second call for interns this Spring, we received over 70 applications from students across Santa Clara County, and onboarded 7 new interns to join 2 from our first cohort, for a total of 9 members of the Teen Council for the Spring of 2023. This group of interns will be working on some special social media projects, helping with big events like the ArtNow 2023 Award Ceremony and Celebration, and learning how to give exhibition tours! Scroll through this blog for some updates on what they’ve been up to in the last few months.

Hello all, my name is Toby Britton. I am almost 20 years old and I am currently pursuing my bachelors degree in Art at UCLA. Interning at NUMU this summer has served as a very informative introduction into the behind-the-scenes operations of a museum and an even greater step towards my aspirations of being a full-time artist. I am very grateful for this opportunity to become more involved with the museum that, through my past participation as an exhibiting artist, pushed me to pursue art more professionally.

For the first time ever, New Museum Los Gatos (NUMU) has launched an ArtNow Teen Council composed of 6 high school interns who are helping to elevate the ArtNow program to be more widely accessible and more relevant to teenagers living across Santa Clara County. Through establishing the ArtNow Teen Council, NUMU hopes to build a stronger partnership with student artists so that they aren’t just the recipients of the ArtNow program, but the architects. The dream is to establish this internship as a key feature of the ArtNow program. We received over 33 applications to the internship this summer, and we look forward to being able to offer more professional development opportunities to teens across the County in the months and years to come. This blog features our first ever 6 ArtNow Teen Council Members, representing different schools across the county, and gives a peek into what they’ve done so far, and what they are working on currently.

We’ve partnered with Counseling & Support Services for Youth (CASSY) to create this toolkit for you to explore healing through art making and reflection. CASSY partners with Bay Area schools to provide resources and professional, on-campus mental health services to students free of charge. We hope to connect the NUMU community to CASSY as a mental health resource, and provide some inspiration for youth, families, and adults to turn to art making in difficult moments of life. Through art we can reveal how we feel, take steps to heal, build empathy, and share our experiences with others.

Meet Gina Bae, an emerging young artist who just won the Best in Show award for NUMU’s ArtNow 2022 Annual High School Juried Exhibition Brave New Worlds. Gina is graduating this year, 2022, from Palo Alto High School and plans to attend Rhode Island School of Design this fall, to pursue fine art and illustration. In this post Gina shares some reflections on her involvement ArtNow and her own art practice. Follow Gina on Instagram @baegullart and check out her website portfolio!

ArtNow is an annual juried Santa Clara County high school art exhibition and educational program, presented by New Museum Los Gatos (NUMU). The ArtNow Exhibition and supporting programs offer opportunities for high school student artists, from Palo Alto to Gilroy, to gain real-world experience in participating in a juried museum exhibition.

Each year, a new theme is chosen for the exhibition and students are asked to submit works based on that theme. $10,000 in scholarships and awards are given to participating students. Students have the opportunity to win awards in 8 artistic categories as well as an overall Best in Show award and a People’s Choice award. The categories are Painting, Drawing, Mixed Media, Printmaking, Sculpture, Photography, Digital Art & Video/Animation. The awards in each category and the Best in Show award are determined by a panel of guest judges. Our judges for the 11th annual ArtNow Exhibition Brave New Worlds are Kathy Aoki, Henry Chambers, Mitra Fabian, Tony May and James Morgan.

Kyle Harter is an illustrator from San Jose, California. Their techniques and mediums range from pen and ink line drawings to prints, paintings, murals, comics, zines and art books. Embodying themes like humor, queerness, self-care, and empowerment — it’s clear that Kyle’s goal is to inform, encourage, and cultivate happiness with their audience.

In our new blog series Life of an Artist, local Bay Area artists share their experience and insight in balancing their art practice with other jobs, commitments and life obligations. I had the pleasure of sitting down and interviewing these artists and invite you to listen to their audio responses to questions about identity, balance, success, sacrifices, and their advice in navigating the art world. I hope that this series can provide valuable insight to emerging young artists into the vast and varied experiences of practicing artists and careers in the arts.

-Michèle Jubilee, NUMU’s Education Programs Manager

Meet Toby Britton, an emerging young artist with a love for portrait painting who has been involved with three NUMU exhibitions! Most recently, Toby won the Best in Show award for NUMU’s ArtNow 2021 Annual High School Juried Exhibition. In ArtNow 2020 Toby won 1st Place in Painting, and just this past year one of Toby’s paintings was included in NUMU’s group exhibition Art in the Time of Corona. Toby is graduating this year, 2021, from Los Gatos High School and plans to attend UCLA in the fall, majoring in Art. In this post Toby shares some thoughts on his involvement in NUMU exhibitions and his own art practice. Follow Toby on Instagram @tobythetoasters and check out his portfolio!

Meet Akshay Thakur, the ArtNow 2019 winner of Best in Show for his mixed media piece America Behind Bars. Akshay attended Prospect High School in Saratoga and graduated in 2020. He now attends UC Berkley and is double majoring in Economics and Data Science. Art is still a big part of his life. In this blog post, Akshay shares what it was like to be a part of ArtNow and how it has impacted his life and art practice.

In this blog post, our Executive Director Ami Davis shares some thoughts on the ArtNow 2021 theme Good Trouble and situates highlights from the exhibition into a larger conversation about activist art in our nation over the decades. We pause to reflect on the role of art as a vehicle for social change in the past and present moment.

Chieko Shimizu Fujioka, a glass mosaic artist based in San Jose, California, specializes in public installations and private residential commissions. Born and raised in Japan, Chieko established her career after moving to the Bay Area and is now entering her pre-mid-career phase as a professional artist. Here, she shares her journey, along with the mindsets that have helped her maintain resilience and a healthy balance between her demanding career and personal life.

Hello everyone, My name is Cesar Villanueva; I am a 24-year-old master's student born and raised in Woodland, California. A few things about me are that I am currently in the Applied Anthropology program at SJSU (San Jose State University). I am also an archaeologist/field tech and have experience working for the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, Far Western Anthropological Research Group, and Kleinfelder. Lastly, I enjoy football, basketball, hiking, and exploring new foods and cities. As I worked for the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe, I was inspired to aid in their goal of receiving federal recognition. I wanted to pursue a graduate project that educates young learners about the tribe's past and present while bringing awareness to their presence and struggle.

Hello everyone! My name is Alexandra A. Garcia; I am a 23-year-old graduate student born and raised in San Jose, California. I am currently in the Applied Anthropology program at SJSU (San Jose State University). I wear many hats, both academically and professionally. I am a Research and Evaluation Assistant at the Exploratorium, a Research Assistant at both SJSU and its research foundation, an intern at NUMU, and I also have worked as a tribal monitor for the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe. In my free time, I enjoy watching tons of movies, taking long drives up the Santa Cruz mountains, spending time with my very hyper Border Collie, and traveling to new places. Because of my work for the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe and a previous project working on StoryMaps with Mosaic America, I was inspired to aid in any way I can to join the efforts of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe to reaffirm their federal recognition. I wanted to pursue a graduate project that educates the broader public on their rich history, culture, and places of significance in an educational and interactive way.

Hello all, my name is Toby Britton. I am almost 20 years old and I am currently pursuing my bachelors degree in Art at UCLA. Interning at NUMU this summer has served as a very informative introduction into the behind-the-scenes operations of a museum and an even greater step towards my aspirations of being a full-time artist. I am very grateful for this opportunity to become more involved with the museum that, through my past participation as an exhibiting artist, pushed me to pursue art more professionally.

Kyle Harter is an illustrator from San Jose, California. Their techniques and mediums range from pen and ink line drawings to prints, paintings, murals, comics, zines and art books. Embodying themes like humor, queerness, self-care, and empowerment — it’s clear that Kyle’s goal is to inform, encourage, and cultivate happiness with their audience.

Hello everyone, My name is Kyle Detoro. I am a 22 year old college student born and raised in San Jose, California. A few things about me are that I am currently a student Csumb (California State University Monterey Bay) go Otters!!! I am also an environmentalist and have around 1 ½ years of Camera Trapping experience between working for De Anza Community College and serving as an intern for various environmental organizations down in Monterey. Lastly, outside of internships, classrooms, and work I enjoy going on adventures such as kayaking, hiking, and exploring new cities and state parks. This love of the environment in my community college days was ultimately the inspiration for me to pursue an education in the environment.

In our new blog series Life of an Artist, local Bay Area artists share their experience and insight in balancing their art practice with other jobs, commitments and life obligations. I had the pleasure of sitting down and interviewing these artists and invite you to listen to their audio responses to questions about identity, balance, success, sacrifices, and their advice in navigating the art world. I hope that this series can provide valuable insight to emerging young artists into the vast and varied experiences of practicing artists and careers in the arts.

-Michèle Jubilee, NUMU’s Education Programs Manager

Take a moment to enjoy this audio interview with artist Robynn Smith, where she tells us all about her practice and Print Day in May. Robynn Smith has been part of NUMU exhibitions and programs and is one of the many artists that make up NUMU’s vibrant community.

Print Day in May is coming up soon! It is a global event that takes place in both public and private spaces worldwide. Anyone can participate by making a print anywhere on May 1, 2021, Participants can post their work on a number of social media outlets and our website. In this strange time of social restrictions, Print Day in May is an inspiring and safe way to stay connected with thousands of people, all doing what they love to do, at the same time.