Washington Studio School
40th Anniversary Gala
MEET OUR GUEST ARTISTS + FACULTY
Celebrate freedom of speech through art and support the artists who shape our future. By sponsoring a Civic Tongue artist’s or faculty member’s seat at our 40th Anniversary Gala, you ensure that the voices challenging us to grow and the mentors inspiring the next generation are present at the table. Click their profiles to learn more, or use the button below to sponsor directly.
GUEST ARTISTS
HANNAH
ATALLAH
Hannah Atallah is a multidisciplinary visual artist whose work sits at the intersection of art, community engagement, sacred knowledge, science, and design. Specializing in large-scale public art, she creates culturally resonant murals, installations, and sculptures rooted in collaboration with local creatives and community members. Drawing from research, textiles, and traditional patterns, her work reflects the histories and symbols of each site. As an Arab American artist from Washington, DC, Atallah’s studio practice explores migration, displacement, and the Arab diaspora, integrating Arabic calligraphy, weaving, marquetry, and sacred geometry. Her work has been exhibited across the US, Mexico, and Jordan, and she has received over 20 grants and awards, including from the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, the Baltimore Convention Center, Johns Hopkins, and DC Public Schools.
Click here to explore the works of Hannah Atallah.
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MICHAEL
CROSSETT
Michael Crossett is a mixed media artist with roots in photography. His early fascination with watching images emerge in the darkroom continues to guide his work today, now explored through silk screens. Beginning with his own photographs of urban life, both its familiar rhythms and fleeting changes, he layers imagery with historical references, icons, and symbols. Each hand-pulled screen adds depth and color, building vibrant, collage-like compositions that bridge past and present. His background in marketing and design informs his approach to composition and form, while his process resists convention, pushing the boundaries of screen printing. He is drawn to themes of urban living, cultural transformation, and technology, reimagining them into new visual structures that juxtapose photography with commercial iconography. Whether in murals or intimate works, his art aims to spark dialogue, connection, and new meaning through an urban collage aesthetic.
Click here to explore the works of Michael Crossett.
LOUIS-ANTOINE GILBERT
Louis-Antoine Gilbert is a French-American painter whose work explores the intersection of architecture and art, transforming urban environments into vibrant, surreal cityscapes. Raised in Paris, where he began as a street artist, his geometric abstractions draw influence from cubism, modernist and Art Deco architecture, and the playful energy of street art. His paintings integrate cultural architectural forms from Arabic flat roofs to brutalist slitted windows, infused with unexpected bright greens and pinks that challenge perceptions of the city as purely functional. Inspired by figures like Giorgio de Chirico and Robert Mallet-Stevens, Gilbert balances form and function while introducing surreal elements that evoke both precision and mystery. Through this synthesis, his work invites viewers to see the city not only as a built environment but as a living, shared work of art.
Click here to explore the works of Louis-Antoine Gilbert.
DEATH BY
NARWHALS
Death by Narwhals is a Washington DC born and based Korean American artist who earned a bachelor’s degree in studio art with a focus on oil painting. His career began in commercial art and television animation in New York City before he returned to DC in 2008. Known for his contemporary paintings, murals, trash sculptures, and freehand ink drawings, he has exhibited widely across the District and beyond, including solo shows at Lost Origins Gallery and Rhizome DC. A recipient of grants from the Awesome Foundation, DC Art Bank, and DC Arts and Humanities Fellowship Programs, his work reflects his experience growing up as a Korean American latchkey kid moving across the country. His art explores themes of identity, displacement, and the tension between urban life and the natural world.
Click here to explore the works of Death by Narwhals.
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SKYLER
KELLY
Skyler Kelly, known artistically as Hootie Hoo, is a D.C.-based graffiti artist and muralist whose work spans skateboards, walls, and public spaces across the DMV. With over ten years of experience in graffiti techniques, aerosol control, and typography, his practice centers on bold lettering, shading, shadows, and vibrant color. Kelly recently contributed to the Glenstone Museum’s group mural project Fear Eats the Soul and to the Smithsonian’s Folklife Festival. He is also the founder of Hootie Hoo Grip, a custom skateboard grip-tape company bringing hand-lettered graffiti art to the skateboarding community.
Click here to explore the works of Skyler Kelly.
ANDREA
LIMAURO
Andrea Limauro (b. Rome, Italy) is a political artist, muralist, city planner, and climate resilience expert whose work examines nationalistic and religious narratives, colonialism, gun violence, and climate change. He is currently an Artist in Residence at Georgetown University’s Earth Commons Institute and is leading The Climate of Future Past, a year-long public art and writing commission on climate change for the Washington Post. His work has been exhibited across the U.S. and abroad, including the Art Museum of the Americas, the American University Museum, the Painting Center in New York City, and the U.S. Ambassador’s Residence in Vienna through the State Department’s Art in Embassies program. Limauro’s paintings have been featured in New American Paintings and Studio Visit Magazine and reviewed by the Washington Post and Washington City Paper. Influenced by political graffiti and propaganda in Italy as well as American political and religious imagery, his mixed-media practice combines traditional materials like gold and copper leaf with screen printing, acrylic, spray paint, collage, and neon colors.
Click here to explore the works of Andrea Limauro
GUEST FACULTY
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RACHAEL
BOHLANDER
Rachael Bohlander, originally from Detroit, Michigan is a Washington, D.C.–based visual artist whose abstract, process-driven work spans painting, sculpture, and paper-based media. She holds an MFA from the New York Studio School and has served as faculty at the Washington Studio School since 2021. Her work has been shown nationally, is included in public and private collections, and she has completed murals in Denver and Apex.
Click here to explore the works of Rachael Bohlander.
COURTNEY
APPLEQUIST
Courtney Applequist is an interdisciplinary artist whose work centers on painting and drawing, using architectural frameworks to explore movement, time, and the traces they leave behind. Her practice incorporates portraiture and form to investigate identity, materiality, and scale. She has exhibited widely, including locally and internationally, and is represented by AdahRose Gallery.
Click here to explore the works of Courtney Applequist.
POOJA CAMPBELL
Pooja Campbell is a multidisciplinary artist and educator living in Chantilly, Virginia, and a 2024-25 Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Graduate Fellowship Recipient. Born in India, her work is influenced by her heritage, creating intimate spaces that examine everyday life through rich color and pattern. She is an MFA candidate at American University and has taught studio courses and seminars. Pooja's work has been featured in numerous shows, including the VA Biennial and the AXA Art Prize.
Click here to explore the works of Pooja Campbell.
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LAUREN A.
CRAWFORD
L.A. Crawford is a multidisciplinary artist based in Washington, D.C. and Baltimore, working in painting, printmaking, and sculpture to explore materiality, form, and the construction of meaning in space. They hold a B.F.A. from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and an M.F.A. from the Maryland Institute College of Art. Crawford’s work has been exhibited nationally, published in the *Museum of Americana* catalog, and included in residencies and installations such as the Art Institute of Chicago summer program in Siena and the Museum of Outdoor Arts in Denver.
Click here to explore the works of Lauren A. Crawford.
MARY
FREEDMAN
Mary Freedman works with various drawing media, focusing on Still Life, Plant Life, and the Figure. She internalizes her subjects to create work that reflects both their essence and her own sentiment. Freedman received a BA in Art History from Pennsylvania State University and a Certificate of Achievement from Washington Studio School, joining the WSS faculty in 2009. She previously worked at the Smithsonian American Art Museum and has volunteered as an art instructor in D.C. for 21 years. Her work has been exhibited in numerous group shows across the DC and Baltimore area, including a solo show at Washington Studio School.
Click here to explore the works of Mary Freedman.
MARIE B.
GAUTHIEZ
Marie B. Gauthiez is a French-American multidisciplinary artist whose work explores self-mapping, reconstruction, preservation, and identity. She holds an MFA in Studio Art from American University and has been a faculty member at Washington Studio School since 2023. Her work has been exhibited nationally, included in notable collections such as Soho House and GDIT, and she is a 2025 Kinetic artist with Hamiltonian Artists with an upcoming residency at the Vermont Studio Center.
Click here to explore the works of Marie B. Gauthiez.
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LINDSAY
MUELLER
Lindsay Mueller is a landscape painter whose work explores interconnection, perceptual ambiguity, and decay through tactile, layered compositions. Originally from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, she now lives and works in Arlington, Virginia. She holds a BFA in Painting and a BA in Psychology from Boston University, as well as an MFA in Visual Arts from American University. Her work has been shown in numerous group exhibitions, earned her the 2023 Bethesda Painting Young Artist Award, and led to recognition in publications and residencies.
Click here to explore the works of Lindsay Mueller.
JULIANA NETSCHERT
Juliana Netschert earned an MFA in painting from American University in 1987 after studying at the New York Studio School and Indiana University. Prior to this, she received a Master's in Teaching from Wesleyan University and taught art in Baltimore and North Carolina, where she developed a high school art program focused on Appalachian craft traditions. Since returning to the Washington area in 1985, she has concentrated on painting woodlands, showcasing her work in various solo and two-person exhibitions. In addition to her artistic practice, she worked at the Marsha Mateyka Gallery for 30 years and has been teaching at the Washington Studio School since 1989.
SAMANTHA
STOVER
Samantha Stover is a Bethesda-based artist with a BA in Literature and Art History from McGill University and an MFA, cum laude, from the New York Academy of Art. Trained in traditional drawing and painting techniques, she draws on her study of masterworks, figure drawing from life, and theatrical costume design to inform her practice. Her work focuses on figuration, capturing fleeting emotions, movements, and the expressive power of the human form.
Click here to explore the works of Samantha Stover.
TREVOR YOUNG
Trevor Young, educated at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, is a contemporary painter represented by galleries in DC, MI, and NY. His work transforms ordinary architecture and natural scenes into multilayered, luminous compositions that explore night, twilight, and the interplay of light through meticulous glazing and layering. Drawing on influences from Whistler, Rembrandt, and Ed Ruscha, he blends abstraction and realism to create atmospheric imagery that elevates the everyday.
Click here to explore the works of Trevor Young.
Join Us
Experience an unforgettable evening on September 20th, 2025 as we celebrate 40 years of Washington Studio School at our anniversary fundraising dinner! Join us for a night of cocktails, chef-curated Asian-fusion dinner, with intimate conversations among friends, featured artists and our beloved WSS faculty. This exclusive opportunity offers the chance to drink and dine, connect and be inspired. Afterwards, join us for a lively 80's themed dance party accompanied by specialty cocktails as we raise a glass and dance the night away in support of Washington Studio School!
Tickets are $300 per guest to benefit WSS
Other Ways to RSVP
You can also RSVP in person with cash or check payment,
or by sending your check payable to:
Washington Studio School
2129 S St NW, Washington D.C. 20008
United States
