Be inspired. Explore curated art and juried shows exhibited in four galleries.

Christina Jensen Vicente: Encoded

Artist Talk with Christina Jensen Vicente, Thursday March 27, 2025. Register here.
In her upcoming exhibition, Encoded, Christina Jensen Vicente will create an immersive installation of handmade textile and mixed media works. Jensen Vicente is a fiber artist and designer. She earned an MFA in interior design from Pratt Institute, followed by a 20-year career with CHANEL in New York, NY.

Jensen Vicente’s experience in design honed her sensibility for the significance of place and the power of materiality, light, texture and movement to elevate how and why we connect with our environment. She later turned to fiber as an artist, drawn to its humanizing qualities and the optimism of collaboration between the natural world and human hands. Today, she creates wall-hangings and sculptural works held in private collections throughout the United States. Jensen Vicente lives in Sarasota, FL, where she maintains her studio.

Bobby Aiosa: Eternal Landscape
Bobby Aiosa presents Eternal Landscape, an exhibition of sculptures that reflect on the relationship society has with the built environment. Our built spaces can have a profound influence on the quality of our lives and how we navigate day-to-day.

Since moving to Florida, Aiosa has found that natural forms are becoming intrinsic to his practice. Aiosa was born in Smithtown, NY and currently lives and works in Orlando, FL. He earned his MFA from the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 2015. His work has been shown throughout the United States and was included in the Skyway 20/21 exhibition, the 2019 Florida Prize exhibition at the Orlando Museum of Art and the 2018 southXeast Contemporary Art Triennial. He is a recipient of many residencies, awards and fellowships, most recently from the Museum for Art in Wood in Philadelphia, PA. Aiosa joined the School of Visual Arts and Design at the University of Central Florida in 2022 as an Assistant Professor of Sculpture in studio arts.

Gale Fulton Ross: Divine Love

In Divine Love, Gale Fulton Ross recalls a genre of images of the Virgin Mary, reinterpreting a visual rhetoric within an African American context. In this work, her notions of race and familial cohesion are up for re-examination.

Fulton Ross started her art career during the Freedom Movement of the 1960s. She has been celebrated with many gallery and museum exhibitions including her solo exhibition My Museum at The Ringling Museum of Fine Art in Sarasota in 1998. Fulton Ross owned two galleries, one in Oakland, CA in the early 1970s, the other in Sarasota, FL in the late 1990s. She founded The Fulton Ross Fund for Visual Artists in Sarasota in 2000 and for five years, the foundation awarded an annual grant of $10,000 to mid-career committed artists. She delivered a TEDX - SRQ Talk in 2016 on “The Creativity Within and Without” and has been featured in two PBS specials and one documentary on powerful women in the arts.

Her art is held in private and corporate collections nationally and internationally including in the permanent collections of Harvard University, The Charles H. Wright Museum in Detroit, The Oakland Museum, San Francisco General Hospital, Carillon Imports for Absolut Vodka, NJ, The Maryland Historical Society, North Carolina Central University, Michigan State and West Michigan State Universities, The Seattle Library and The Converse Memorial Museum, Malden, MA. Fulton Ross is currently an Artist in Residence at Studio Channel Islands Art Center in Camarillo, CA.

Juried Show - Epoch of Change: Footprints of Humanity

Juror’s Critique with Dr. Lydia Wassink - Wednesday, March 26 @ 5:30pm in person at the art center or join us via Zoom.

Artists are invited to explore the interconnected relationship between humanity and nature while responding to our shifting earth and climate. The Anthropocene Epoch is an unofficial unit of geologic time, used to describe the most recent period in Earth’s history when human activity started to have a significant impact on the planet’s climate and ecosystems enough to constitute a distinct geological change. Possible markers of the Anthropocene include microplastics, heavy metals or radioactive nuclei left by tests from thermonuclear weapons. Epoch of Change calls on artists to pose ethical, political and spiritual questions about the implications of the Anthropocene and the future of our planet.

Juror: Dr. Lydia Wassink
Dr. Lydia Wassink completed a dual PhD in Integrative Biology and Ecology, Evolution and Behavioral Biology at Michigan State University
• Drop Off: Mar 4 & 5 | Pick Up: Apr 21 & 22
• On View: March 13-April 19, 2025
• Opening Night Reception: Thursday, March 13, 5-7 pm

Annual Juried Regional Show: Vice & Virtue

The Annual Juried Regional Show is Art Center Sarasota’s largest and most prestigious juried exhibition, spanning all four of our galleries. This year, we invite artists to delve into the dualities of the human condition—Vice & Virtue.

By definition, vice represents behaviors deemed morally wrong by society, while virtue embodies excellence and integrity. But in today’s world, where do we draw the line? Through this theme, artists are challenged to explore the shifting boundaries of morality, shaped by cultural norms, religious beliefs, and political landscapes. What defines good and evil in contemporary society? And perhaps more intriguingly, does a gray area exist between them?

Meet the Juror, Jessica Todd

Jessica Todd is a curator, writer and artist. She is passionate about building the creative infrastructures that support artists as well as studying and addressing issues of equity, access and inclusion in the arts. Todd has worked with a number of arts organizations, including Tempus Projects, Artspace Tampa Initiative, Crab Devil and the Morean Arts Center. In 2022, Todd opened Parachute Gallery in Ybor City, first serving as an exhibition space for national artists and later a retail gallery representing local artists. Todd has published articles, curated exhibitions, and exhibited her own artwork locally and nationally. She holds a BA in Art from Penn State University, a Diploma in Hispanic Studies from the University of Barcelona and an MFA in Jewelry/Metals/Enameling from Kent State University.

• Online Submission Dates: Tue, Feb 18 - Sun, Apr 27, 2025
• Drop Off: May 13 & 14 | Pick Up: Aug 4 & 5
• On View: May 22 - Aug 2, 2025
• Opening Night Reception: Thursday, May 22, 5-7 pm

Juried Show: Self Portrait
Self Portrait invites artists to turn the lens inward, becoming both creator and subject. This exhibition challenges artists to explore what they choose to reveal—about their inner world, their artistic identity, and the emotions that shape them.

Self-portraits offer an intimate glimpse into the artist’s soul, reflecting their cultural influences, personal history, and place in time. Whether crafted for self-promotion, personal discovery, a declaration of identity, or simply the joy of creation, self-portraits serve as a powerful bridge between artist and audience—a timeless expression of the shared human experience.

Meet Juror Odeta Xheka
Odeta Xheka makes art to claim her voice as a woman artist because art is the opposite of speechlessness. Her work has been juried into prestigious national and international competitions and has been featured in art magazines and literary journals.

Born in the UNESCO heritage site of Berat, Albania, Xheka currently lives in Tampa, FL where she is the founder/director of OXH Gallery. OXH is focused on a cross-generational, multi-medium approach to exhibiting which goes beyond the conventional white cube paradigm with the goal to evolve into a lasting hub for culture and community.

• Online Submission Dates: Tue, Apr 29 - Sun, Jul 20, 2025
• Drop Off: Aug 5 & 6 | Pick Up: Sep 29 & 30
• On View: Aug 21 - Sept 27, 2025
• Opening Reception: Thu, Aug 21, 2025, 5-7 pm