ESCONDIDO, CA — The San Diego region’s diverse art scene will be on display Sunday during “Art in the Garden” in Escondido.
Spearheaded by Stone and Glass, a glassblowing art studio in Escondido, Art in the Garden will feature 29 artists from across San Diego County and Southern California.
The biannual juried art show is a newer component of the Escondido Street Festival held on Grand Avenue in downtown Escondido. Festival attendees can shop from hundreds of vendors for hand-crafted gifts, imports and local art. There will also be international cuisine, live entertainment, hands-on art activities, games and rides.
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Presented by Museums and Arts Growing Escondido Culture, Art in the Garden will take place from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the corner of Grand Avenue and Juniper Street, on the east end of the festival, in Heritage Garden.
Patch talked with three San Diego area artists who are participating in the event to learn more about their work and get a sneak peak of Art in the Garden.
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James Stone
Glassblower James Stone has had a passion for art since he was a child. He created his first piece of award-winning art at just 13 years old and went on to earn a fine arts degree.
The New Jersey native, however, didn’t discover glassblowing until the early 1980s. That’s when he moved to San Diego and studied glassblowing at Palomar College.
In 2001, Stone opened Stone and Glass, a glassblowing art studio on Grand Avenue in Escondido.
“Glassblowing has a 6,000-year-old history. The material is magical,” said Stone, who moved to Escondido in 2004. “Whether you watch it being made or try it out for yourself, you are connecting with a very ancient art.”
Although he is a glassblower by trade, Stone most enjoys mixed media, combining glass and various metals.
He has a large sculpture on display at Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach. He has also created glass ceiling sculptures for L’auberge Del Mar in Del Mar and the Catamaran Resort Hotel and Spa in San Diego. Currently, he is working with UC San Diego on a student collaboration project to make 10 mixed media benches for the university’s new Eighth College campus.
Stone and Glass spearheaded Art in the Garden to shine a light on local and emerging artists. Stone’s handmade glass art will be available for sale at the event.
“We have recently been working on some new assembly sculptures and plan to debut them in the garden,” Stone told Patch.
“Art in the Garden is a wonderful place to visit inside the Escondido Street Festival,” he added. “You will find local and emerging artists, great music, hands-on activities and festival food.”
Brenda Townsend
Although Brenda Townsend has been an artist all her life, she has only worked as an artist full-time for the past three years.
Townsend earned her studio art degree from UCSD in 1992. She has also worked as an arts educator at the California Center for the Arts, Escondido.
In 2020, Townsend opened her business, Brilliant Spectrum Art. She now works as a freelance scenic artist, muralist and arts educator, hosting art classes for children and adults at her home studio in Escondido.
“My work is playful, colorful, joyous, exuberant and larger than life,” said Townsend, who is originally from the city of Orange and has lived in Escondido for 35 years. “I enjoy using watercolor and acrylic paint, as well as other mediums for mixed media artworks.”
Townsend has a piece on display in the exhibit at Esco Alley Art in downtown Escondido.
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Currently, she is working on seven murals for Juniper Elementary School and has been tapped to paint a mural on Grand Avenue later this year. She is also planning her six-week session of art classes for the fall.
Townsend will be at Art in the Garden sharing a booth with her husband Dan, who owns Weekend Records.
“Art in the Garden is always a fun and exciting day for event goers and artists alike,” Townsend told Patch.
“There’s always a lot going on at the booth that we share,” she added. “It will be crammed with new and vintage vinyl, in addition to all of my pieces of original art, prints and cards.”
Raul Valenzuela
After years of working in the building industry, Raul Valenzuela became a self-taught artist. The Arizona native and Escondido resident creates large-scale metal sculptures.
“His ability to design, engineer and fabricate just about anything got him started in creating garden sculptures made of stainless steel, iron, stone and glass,” explained his wife Lizz Lang. “He incorporates various types of metal, stone, glass and lighting to make anyone’s yard a garden fantasy.”
Valenzuela has also been involved in large-scale projects, including designing and fabricating the brackets for lighting the Tappan Zee Bridge in New York.
“He is very proud to put his name on this very special bridge project,” Lang said.
At Art in the Garden, Valenzuela will have three pieces of his Endangered Species series, including his lion, elephant and gorilla. His new Rock-N-Rusties sculptures with gemstone designs, as well as his Ant Garden Furniture line will also be at the show.
“The Escondido Street Festival is our favorite event of the year. It’s not too big or too small and has such a variety of vendors, music, food and fun,” Lang told Patch. “The newer addition of Art in the Garden is especially good for people to come into a park-like setting to enjoy all of the creativity that Escondido has to offer.”
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