Cynthia Spillman is an American painter, actor and voice artist living and working in the San Francisco Bay Area.
She spent several years in Hawaii as a designer, farmer and radio DJ.
In 1990, both her home and studio were destroyed by the Kilauea Volcano lava flow.
Relocating to San Francisco, she began a career in Acting and Voiceover. It wasn’t until a later move to Los Angeles that Cynthia resumed painting and the visual arts.
She was invited to attend the distinguished Santa Monica College of Design, Art and Architecture, a school centered in an idiosyncratic “free rein” approach and immersion into the study of several disciplines at once.
At the DAA, Spillman was able to pursue a way of working that unfolded from an energetic relationship to color and scribbly drawing skills, developing an ethos of directness and sincerity as paramount to artistic communication.
A fundamental thread is woven through her work and process- an instinctive mandate to express truth above all else.
CYNTHIA SPILLMAN
b. 1959, Manhattan Beach, CA.
Education
2022 Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Master Class Advanced Painting: Making and Dialogue, Aspen, Co.
2001 College of Design, Art and Architecture (DAA), Santa Monica, Ca.
2000 UCLA, study in Paul Klee: Psychic Improvisations, Los Angeles, CA.
1998 Santa Monica College / Painting, Photography, Santa Monica Ca.
1981 California State University, Chico / American Studies, Religious Studies
Selected Solo Exhibitions
2020 The Self/The Eye, Monterey Museum of Art, Currents Gallery, Monterey, Ca.
Selected Group Exhibitions
2021 Magical Thinking, Ivy League Gallery, Minneapolis, MN
2021 Zip Us Up, Baldwin Public Library, Birmingham, MI. (collaborative public art project)
2019 No Creative Boundaries, Museum of Encaustic Art, Santa Fe, NM
2019 Encaustic Art, Santa Cruz Mountain Vineyards, Santa Cruz CA.
2018 The Whole Ball of Wax, Felix Kulpa Gallery, Santa Cruz, CA.
2018 The Year of the Dog, Sebastopol Center of the Arts, Sebastopol, Ca.
2017 Hopeful Darkness, Atlantic Gallery, New York, NY.
2000 Synopsis, Julie Rico Gallery, Venice, Ca.
Grants
2022 Develop Grant, Arts Council Santa Cruz County, CA.
2017 Develop Grant, Arts Council Santa Cruz County, CA..
Commissions
2016 Gentes residence fresco, Olive Grove Enfresco, Soquel, Ca.
2016 Shepherd-Smith residence, Nandi and Lupe, San Bruno, Ca.