About

About

Hi! I’m Monica Bryant. Welcome to my website, Mo Ni Kai Art Studio! My business name Mo Ni Kai Art Studio was inspired by the Chinese seal of characters (or chop) my Mandarin teacher in Singapore created for me. The experience of living in Singapore 1996 to 1999 was a big influence, it is where I began painting over found photographs of Singapore in the ‘60s. As an artist and teacher in Santa Rosa, CA, I create mixed media art and instruct in workshops in my studio, online and at local college spaces. My artwork is a creative response to the world around me. I create mixed media works using photography and painting. I have recently painted lemons in the spirit of “if life gives you lemons make lemonade”. It has been good to appreciate our beautiful world and the fruit it makes. I recently traveled to Morocco which has inspired new work influenced by the tiles and passageways of the Medina. Being in the awesome Sahara inspired new love of our earth. My creative process is having many ideas, putting them down in a sketchbook and making work with the materials at hand. See my work on Instagram and Facebook as well as my website.

I was born in Kansas, received my BA in Art from the University of Hawaii and my MFA from UC Berkeley. In 2004 I was awarded a fellowship at Skidmore College, Saratoga Springs, New York. I am a credentialed Art Teacher who chaired the Art Department at Ursuline High School in Santa Rosa, CA for nine years. After Ursuline closed in 2011, I instructed drawing and color theory at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising (FIDM) in San Francisco and other colleges and schools. I am a Sonoma County Art Trails artist and my work has been exhibited nationally and in Singapore.

My goal is to make beautiful meaningful work and to encourage the creativity in everyone. Creativity is in our nature. Let’s create!