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Jan Wurm

Jan Wurm is an artist, educator, and curator engaged in expanding the community forum for contemporary art
dialogue. Having lived in California, where she received a B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles,
and Europe, where she received an M.A.R.C.A. from the Royal College of Art in London, Jan Wurm has honed
an eye for social patterns and conventions. She currently divides her time between Berkeley and L.A. and her
hand between drawing and painting. As an artist, Wurm has been engaged by the familiar and challenged by
the unknown. Her paintings, drawings, and artist's books examine daily life to reveal aspects of contemporary
culture that inform our relationships. This graphic body of work has spanned time and geography in over a
hundred exhibitions in California, New York, Canada, England, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, and Italy.
Wurm has received five grants from the Center for Cultural Innovation and a commission from the Del Sol
String Quartet funded by Chamber Music America. Infused with warmth, humor, and an energetic line, these
paintings on canvas and mixed media works on paper invite the viewer to contemplate the moment. Jan
Wurm’s work is in collections including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Fine Arts Museums of San
Francisco, New York Public Library Print Collection, Monterey Museum of Art, San Diego Museum of Art, Archiv
Verein der Berliner Künstlerinnen, Berlin, Universität für angewandte Kunst in Vienna, and Tiroler Landesmuseen,
Innsbruck. Wurm taught for the University of California Berkeley's Art and Design Extension Program, ASUC Art
Studio, and Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. Wurm served eight years interviewing and mentoring Regents’
and Chancellor’s Scholars, served the Cal Art Alumni Group organizing and moderating seven annual
symposia, and developed programs for mentoring Alumni Artists. Wurm has juried exhibitions, been a visiting
artist, and lectured extensively for institutions including the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and the
Sonoma Valley Art Museum. Wurm organized and facilitated a Guest Artist Lecture Series for the Berkeley Art
Center for five years and is actively documenting the art community's work through catalog and book
publications as well as video recordings. As past director of exhibitions and curator of art at the Richmond Art
Center, Wurm has authored exhibition catalogs and curated major exhibitions focused on humanist traditions.
Her projects included Closely Considered: Diebenkorn in Berkeley; Mildred Howard: Spirit & Matter; David Park:
Personal Perspectives; Mapping the Uncharted; Joan Brown: In Living Color; Earth, Wind and Fire; and Face
Forward: Self-Image & Self-Worth. On the page or the canvas, Jan Wurm reflects our times through a visual
language that is forceful and direct. It is a voice that speaks of the personal and echoes the shared.

16 Leda I - Watercolor and conte crayon, 14'’x11'’, 2000