Ancestor Portraits
A Minimalist collage workshop
with Iris Weaver
Thursday, June 18, 11-2
Join collage artist and photographer Iris Weaver (@irisweavercollage) for a workshop exploring ancestral portraiture through collage. Together, we will reflect on family history, memory, identity, and the visual traces left behind through photographs and personal imagery.
Participants are encouraged to bring photographs of their loved one(s) or ones that represent them as well as images that reflect their ancestors’ interests, landscapes, or daily lives. Some people find it easier to work with images that represent the person or copies of photographs versus the actual photos of the person. Participants may also email photos to Iris in advance to be printed for use during the workshop.
Using techniques such as cutting, layering, repetition, and juxtaposition, participants will create collage portraits that honor, reinterpret, and reimagine ancestral narratives. We will explore how fragments of photographs, textures, and found images can be combined to create visual stories that bridge past and present.
All materials will be provided, including collage papers, vintage imagery, and archival source materials.
All levels welcome. No prior collage or art-making experience is necessary.
About the Instructor
Iris Weaver studied art on weekends at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague and the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam while living and teaching in the Netherlands. Her work has recently been exhibited at Gallery 881 with Broad Magazine in Vancouver, British Columbia (2024) and Postales desde el Limbo in Zaragoza, Spain (2025). Her work has also been featured in Contemporary Collage Magazine, Kolaj Magazine, and Why Collage? Magazine.
at Tumbleweed Found
Limited to 8 participants (4 spaces left)
Workshop Rate: $45
Register with Tumbleweed Found to secure your space, 831-419-3130
A Biographer’s sketchbook:
Artistic Exchanges
Showing through June
This collaboration (part one in the Spring 2026 issue of Zyzzyva), began when Ian Everard accepted Carolyn Burke’s invitation to illustrate her stories about moments of aesthetic and moral choice. A series of exchanges ensued. Now, at Tumbleweed Found, a mosaic of images from the stories—an avocado, a lop-sided gravestone, hands enigmatically poised in the air, a gleaming art deco nude, a showjumper on horseback, meticulous paintings of books as objects —trace steps in what has become a back-and-forth between artist and writer. . . . to be continued.
Carolyn Burke’s LEE MILLER, hailed by The Observer as “one of the great books on an artist’s life,” has helped inspire the resurgence of interest in Miller as model and photographer. Having also published biographies of Mina Loy, Edith Piaf, and FOURSOME: ALFRED STEIGLITZ, GEORGIA O’KEEFFE, PAUL STRAND, REBECCA SALSBURY, Carolyn is writing non-fiction stories sparked by encounters with creative artists. After completing a Ph.D in English Literature at Columbia University, she lived in Paris before settling in Santa Cruz, where she reviewed art for the Santa Cruz Express. Her books are published in the U.S. (FSG, Knopf), the U.K. (Bloomsbury), various European countries, and her birthplace, Australia.
Ian Everard has exhibited nationally and internationally. Born in St. Ives, UK. he has degrees in painting from Stourbridge College of Art, UK, in Natural Science Illustration from UCSC and an MFA from SFSU. While primarily known for his reconstructions and paintings of books as objects, he has also illustrated books, journals and magazines. His work is in many collections, including The Achenbach Foundation San Francisco, The Crocker Museum ,Sacramento, The Oakland Museum, UCSC Special Collections, The Farhat Collection, Santa Cruz, and the Lawrence B. Benenson Collection, Connecticut. He has received a Rydell Fellowship, a Tree of Life Individual Artist Grant, and a George Sugarman Award. He is represented by Jack Fischer Gallery, San Francisco.
Limited copies of Zyzzyva will be available for sale.
This show will be up through June.
Gaza bowen: remembrance
Worn Histories & Transformative objects
Alongside a Historic Footwear Collection (private estate)
Gaza Bowen (1944–2005) was an internationally recognized sculptor and fine artist whose work is held in museum and institutional collections including The Getty Center, LACMA, Oakland Museum, the de Young Museum, Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, Australia, and the Deutsches Schuhmuseum in Offenbach am Main, Germany. As a pioneer in the wearable art movement of the 1970s and ’80s, Bowen used the motif of women’s shoes to examine femininity, gender norms, consumerism, and personal history. Often incorporating found objects and repurposed materials, her work invites viewers to consider the objects we live with, the marks we leave behind, and the marks they leave on us.
Working across sculpture, book arts, printmaking, and assemblage, Bowen created wearable shoe works, artist books, upcycled metal pieces, and lino and woodcut prints spanning different periods of her life and career.
Alongside Gaza Bowen’s works, Tumbleweed Found is presenting a rare private collection of historical women’s footwear dating from the 1830s through the 1920s. The collection includes Victorian bridal boots, Edwardian lace-up heels, early motor boots, Civil War–era riding boots, bathing shoes, boudoir slippers, and richly embroidered 19th-century court shoes from India. Together, these pieces trace changing ideas of fashion, mobility, ritual, and women’s lives across generations. Displayed in conversation with Bowen’s memory-filled assemblages and upcycled works, the collection offers a meditation on transformation, wear, beauty, and the stories objects continue to carry.
collage
at tumbleweed Found
Collage at Tumbleweed Found
Limited to 8 participants per session.
Sliding scale: $10–15 (cash preferred)
At Tumbleweed Found, we work with families navigating estate transitions and are continually surrounded by the paper trails of everyday life — maps, postcards, photographs, letters, books, magazines, stamps, sheet music, and other ephemera that often risk being discarded.
Through collage, we give these materials a second life, transforming fragments of history, memory, and printed matter into new works of art.
We provide everything — just bring yourself.
Materials include maps, stamps, postcards, vintage photos, handmade papers, broken books, magazines, artist magazine clippings, scissors, glue, 8×10 cardstock paper, and more.
Please note: no wet glues, Modge Podge, or 3D objects. Due to space and setup, this is a flat-paper /book collage gathering.
No food, please.
To secure your spot, text or call 831-419-3130.
Parking information is available on our Contact page.
Wednesdays;
6/24
11:00-2:00 (4 spaces available)
2:00-5:00 (5 spaces available)
JULY —Just Announced!
7/1
11:00-2:00 (5 spaces available)
2:00-5:00 (5 spaces available)
7/8
11:00-2:00 (7 spaces available)
2:00-5:00 (8 spaces available)
7/1
11:00-2:00 (7 spaces available)
2:00-5:00 (8 spaces available)
7/15
11:00-2:00 (7 spaces available)
2:00-5:00 (8 spaces available)
7/22
11:00-2:00 (7 spaces available)
2:00-5:00 (8 spaces available)
5:00-8:00 (6 spaces available)
7/29
11:00-2:00 (7 spaces available)
2:00-5:00 (8 spaces available)
Private Collage Gatherings
Gather up to 8 friends, family members, or co-workers for a private three-hour collage session at Tumbleweed Found. We provide the setup and all materials. This is a self-guided gathering and is not instructor-led. Contact us to learn more.
estate clearance sale
at tumbleweed found
NEXT SALE June 26-28, 9am-2pm
Estate Sales run Friday, Saturday and Sunday out of our garages on Chestnut St. (right by the back of @11thhourcoffee —look for the green garages and our pop up tent).
Books always 50% off. Sunday 50% off everything
(cash preferred, credit card and Venmo fees apply)
See parking options. Parking strictly enforced.
lasting letters
A letter writing workshop
with frish brandt
Saturday, July 11, 10-12
“I Miss You”
A Guided Letter Writing Workshop with Frish Brandt
At Tumbleweed Found, we are continually drawn to the stories people carry and the objects that help preserve them. Whether through family heirlooms, handwritten notes tucked into books, or collections passed from one generation to the next, we are reminded that what often matters most are the connections behind the things we keep.
This special workshop with Frish Brandt invites you to explore memory, connection, and the enduring power of the written word. As Frish often says, letter writing is to communication what slow cooking is to fast food. The process invites us to slow down, listen deeply, and find the words that matter most.
In this intimate workshop, Frish Brandt guides participants to explore one of the most universal themes in letter writing: “I Miss You.” These may be words we never found the right moment to say or words for someone we have lost or who lives far away, or perhaps a version of ourselves from another time.
Through reflection, conversation, gentle prompts, and dedicated writing time, participants will be guided toward a letter they have been wanting—or needing—to write. Whether addressed to a parent, child, friend, former partner, ancestor, mentor, or someone no longer living, letter writing creates the space for reflection and connection.
Writing in the company of others can reveal unexpected insights. While sharing is welcome, it is entirely optional.
This workshop is designed to be supportive, reflective, and accessible to both experienced writers and those who haven’t written a letter in years. Now is the write time.
About Frish Brandt
Frish Brandt is a Letter Midwife, writer, curator, and founder of Lasting Letters. After a forty-five-year career in the arts, including directing Fraenkel Gallery in San Francisco, she turned her attention to helping people write the letters that matter most.
Her work began in hospice and palliative care and has since expanded to include people of all ages and circumstances seeking to express gratitude, love, regret, remembrance, forgiveness, and connection.
Frish has helped midwife more than 700 letters and teaches Lasting Letters and the Art of Deep Listening at Stanford Medical School. She has led workshops at the De Young Museum, Harvard Divinity School, End Well, Sun Valley Center for the Arts, and numerous other organizations.
Frish's book, Unfinished Business: Writing the 5 Essential Letters of Your Life will be released October 27th and will be available at Tumbleweed Found.
Registration
Space is limited
$65 per person, non-refundable
For questions or to reserve your space, please contact Dana at Tumbleweed Found. (831) 419-3130