Better Dey Come
2025-09-18 12:00 - 2025-10-23 17:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Johansson Projects, 2300 Telegraph Ave, Oakland, CA, 94612, United States
Johansson Projects presents Better Dey Come, a solo exhibition by Nimah Gobir. Combining painting, photo transfer, fabric, and embroidery, Gobir blends memories across time and geography by drawing inspiration from her Nigerian heritage and upbringing in California. Peppered with personal ephemera such as handed-down cloth and family photo albums, Gobir’s work is rooted in domesticity and connection, sifting through the nuances of Black identity while referencing her specific familial experiences. Utilizing quilting cottons, and at times more ceremonial African wax prints, Gobir patches together a synthetic family history that is both widely recognizable and utterly specific. Compounded with the incorporation of personal photographs from the 1980s and 90s into her painted interiors, her work interrogates the nature of portraiture, memory, and nostalgia through intimate representations of family life. Gobir explores these thorough lines across generations, finding resonance among her current daily rituals, childhood, and family’s past: braiding hair, sitting for a meal, washing dishes, posing for a group picture. Her mixed-media work collapses time and space, leaving the viewer in a kaleidoscope of memories that diffuse into the present moment.
Better Dey Come runs from September 13th to October 18th with an artist reception on Thursday, October 2nd from 5-6:30 pm.
For all inquiries, contact Johansson Projects at 510-444-9140 or info@johanssonprojects.com

The Shape of Line
2025-09-18 12:00 - 2025-10-25 17:00 | Gearbox Gallery, 770 West Grand Avenue, Oakland, CA, 94612, United States
Featuring artists: Brian Caraway, Alexander Cheves, Stephanie Dennis, Laura Rose Komada, Joni Marie Theodorsen
Dates: September 18, 2025 – October 25, 2025
First Friday: September 5, 5-8pm
Reception: Saturday, September 20, 1-4pm
Closing Event: Saturday, October 25, 4-7pm Sound Performance by Plumes with video by Konrad Steiner
770 West Grand Ave., Oakland, CA 94612
Contact: info@gearboxgallery.com
Homepage
(510) 271-0822
Gallery Hours: Thursdays-Saturdays: 12-5pm and First Fridays, 5-8pm
GearBox Gallery is pleased to present the Shape of Line, a group exhibition of five
artists working in painting, drawing and sculpture. In her second show at GearBox
Gallery, member artist Joni Marie Theodorsen brings together four west coast artists who
explore line as an element of their work. Together with Theodorsen, Brian Caraway,
Alexander Cheves, Stephanie Dennis, and Laura Rose Komada create the Shape of
Line.
In this collective exhibition, there is a thematic insistence through the title, yet each artist
works within their own concerns and intentions. Line is a common denominator as a
vehicle, but the destinations are individualistic, with concerns such as weight, word, memory,
color and accumulation to name a few.
When organizing this show, Joni said, “I have a respect for each of these four painters’
work and wanted to create a show that would demonstrate this connection. Line has
always been an important and consistent element in my own painting but as a curatorial
theme, I feel it’s an elusive subject. It’s not always prevalent in our work, but it is always
primary. I wanted an exhibition that brings the idea of line to the viewer as an important
subject or building block to regard.
”
About the Artists:
Brain Caraway, is an Oakland based painter, printmaker and sculpture investigating a
calculated, geometric division of space through line and color. He received his MFA from
Mills College. Alexander Cheves is a Bay Area Artist working in oil, wood, plaster,
concrete and steel, looking at relationships between man-made, industrial structures and
the California landscape that absorbs it. He received his MFA from Pennsylvania
Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia. Stephanie Dennis received her MFA from the
University of Washington, Seattle in Painting. Her abstract drawings and paintings
investigate ideas about place, loss and belonging, and often depict tenuously-structured
forms that speak to our sense of vulnerability. Laura Rose Komada is a Seattle based
visual artist whose paintings begin with single words that dissolve into webs of line and
color. She received her MFA at the University of Washington in printmaking and
painting. Joni Marie Theodorsen, is a Bay Area artist assembling line in various media
into atmospheric spaces with an eye towards the horizon. She received her MFA at the
University of Washington, Seattle.
In addition to an opening reception on September 20th at 1:00, there will also be a
closing event on October 25th at 4pm with a sound performance by Plumes and video by
Konrad Steiner. All are welcome.
About Gearbox Gallery:
GearBox Gallery is an artist-run contemporary art gallery dedicated to showcasing the work o its member and a broad range of regional contemporary guest artists, fostering community and education through intellectual and cultural exchange focused on the visual arts. We are located at 770 West Grand Avenue in Oakland, California.
