Exhibition Appreciations
from the Project Coordinator
The exhibition of Postal Collage Project No.15 at Berkeley Art Center featured 408 collaborative collages created between September 2025 and Spring 2026 by 459 collaborators working throughout the Bay Area, across California, all over the USA, and around the world.
The exhibition—open for 10 days, plus a preview party—attracted almost a thousand visitors, including quite a few from far away. If you were there, thanks for your time and attention. I hope you got something good from your visit. If you brought or sent friends, thank you for sharing the project and growing the audience.
Thank you to Berkeley Art Center Executive Director, Gisela Insuaste, and the BAC Board of Directors for making the gallery available, promoting the show, and partnering on a workshop. Gratitude to Gallery Manager, Marthe Benoit, for help and support throughout. Big thanks to Todd Kerr at Berkeley Times for getting the word out in print. Thanks, as ever, to the Berkeley Commonplace Board of Directors, Andrea Guskin, C.K. Itamura, Ingrid Ekstrom, Jan Kather, and Julie Marten, for support and guidance.
The exhibition would have been impossible without the organizational efforts of Ingrid Ekstrom and the installation assistance of Israel Forbes. Additional installation help from Dina Rubiolo, Teddi Haynes, Ben Hoz, and Johanna Lowenberg was valuable and very much appreciated. Thank you to preview-party volunteers and providers, Gina Gilbert, Kyrie Forbes, Lisa Ekstrom, Teddi Haynes, Andrea Guskin, C.K. Itamura, and Julie Marten. In the end, Dana McCutcheon made possible the return of the gallery to a clean, prepped, empty vessel in the two days allotted. Thanks for that!
The anticipated attendance of 100 for the Preview Party Fundraiser was exceeded by nearly 30. My heartfelt thanks to all. For me, your support reflects both appreciation and advocacy; I feel validated and encouraged—by the financial support, but even more so by the enthusiasm and positive energy in the gallery.
Among the party guests were a few public figures, including Berkeley Mayor Adena Ishii, who rolled into Live Oak Park in style on her bicycle. Councilmember Shoshana O’Keefe, Vice Mayor Igor Tregub, and Chief of Staff to Councilmember Ben Bartlett, James Chang, were on hand to share remarks and present a Mayor’s Proclamation to “celebrate and honor Berkeley Commonplace and 15 years of the Postal Collage Project.” Thank you, City of Berkeley!
In our third annual auction—our first online—40 project collages were sold, surpassing our $2000 goal. Thank you to the many bidders and buyers, and to the more than 100 collaborators who made their collages available. This integrated, regenerative fundraising feels promising; last year’s creative product supporting next year’s creative production. Thank you to Johanna Lowenberg for planning and management.
More than 100 visitors were in the gallery on the exhibition’s final Sunday. Many were there for a second time, some for a third or fourth visit. I’d been in the gallery every day and every hour, and still there were ‘new’ things to see.
The scale of this year’s collection continues to amaze me. The time invested in creating these 400+ collaborative collages measures in thousands of hours—if not tens of thousands. The self-expression instilled in them is diverse, complex, and often deep. Bottom-of-my-heart gratitude to the collaborators for their generosity and commitment, for bringing life to an idea. When participants make the project meaningful for themselves, they make the project meaningful—period. Ten thousand thanks are not enough.
Marty McCutcheon
Project Coordinator
Berkeley, June 2026
The Postal Collage Project is supported, in part, by a Civic Arts Grant from the City of Berkeley, and a grant from the Alameda County Arts Commission’s ARTSFUND.