On April 4, Dr. Roman Kräussl, Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and Professor of Art-Finance at the University of Luxembourg gave a standing room-only talk at The Battery on the True Value of Art.

After a successful career in the medical device startup world, Joan McLoughlin decided to take a risk and pursue her dream – to open up an art gallery.

For the past several years, the buzz about Oakland’s gallery scene has been growing. Downtown Oakland has fast become a hub for art and culture, along with great food and drinks, and is often a destination for art lovers on the first Friday of each month.

After years of working in the art world, Candace Huey, an independent curator who has worked variously for the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Bonham's auction house, and for several galleries in the Bay Area, decided that it was time to start her own project.

While living in Kenya, Ed Cross discovered a vibrant art scene throughout Africa that was largely unheard of throughout much of the rest of the world.

Visitors to If So, What? will be treated to exhibitions from galleries and artists from around the world. Among the international highlights will be Zielinksy Gallery, a contemporary art gallery specializing in Latin American art, with locations in Barcelona and Brazil.

Kira Wampler is a 20-year product and marketing leader who has successfully led teams at major companies, including Trulia, Lyft, and Intuit.

In advance of If So, What? we had the opportunity to chat with Alyssa Laverda, Associate Director at Seraphin Gallery. The Philadelphia-based contemporary art gallery will be bringing a wide range of artists to If So, What?

G-77 Gallery was founded by Andrei Mikhilov in St. Petersburg Russia. Mikhilov had a longstanding interest in Japanese art – a country that he had lived in for 10 years – and when he opened G-77 it was one of the first galleries in Russia to represent contemporary international artists with a particular focus on Japan.

We sat down with If So, What? media sponsor artnet and brother and sister team Sophie Neuendorf and Jacob Pabst to learn more about their storied, family-run business, the way they see the art world changing, and why they are looking forward to being a part of If So, What? this year.

In 2007 Bennett, a young Bay Area-based artist, was hired by Mark Zuckerberg to paint the walls of Facebook’s Palo Alto offices, a project that took him four months.

In 2009, Roy Seifert saw an opportunity. There were a number of young Israeli artists whose work he was interested in, but there were not enough places for hem to exhibit.

In 2008 Roya Khadjavi found herself setting foot in her native Iran for the first time in over 30 years – something she had once promised herself that she would never do again.

Kevin Abosch is a conceptual artist and photographer who has photographed celebrities around the world, including Johnny Depp, MalalaYosafzai, Yoko Ono, and Aung San Suu Kyi

In 2008, Carrie Scott decided to break the mold. From her perspective as a Director at Nicole Klagsburn Gallery, in the wake of a national financial crisis, continuing to run a gallery with massive overhead costs wasn’t a model that she felt was sustainable.

For some galleries, expanding to multiple locations is the mark of success. For Harry Hutchison, Director of Aicon Gallery, he found that just the opposite was true.

While Philippe Hoerle-Guggenheim has always had a passion for art—he says that he began collecting as a child—it was not until later in life that he realized that art could be not only his passion but also his career.

For the uninitiated, projection mapping is a process that essentially turns anything into a platform for video mapping; a skyscraper becomes a virtual ad, a pool table becomes the platform for a dazzling light show.

It’s no surprise that the Bay Area has become a new destination for the art and design community given With the reopening of the recently expanded SFMOMA and the new Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive in 2016, the creation of FOG Design+Art 5 years ago, Untitled’s move to San Francisco last year, the new, gorgeous campus for the San Francisco Art Institute at Fort Mason and the California College of the Arts planned expansion.

SuperDesign: Italian Radical Design from 1965-1975 is a major retrospective of Italian Radical Design that explores major works by leading figures of the movement, tracing a time of political and social upheaval in Italy through the eyes of the country’s architects and designers.

This week marks the opening of Art Basel Miami Beach, the art fair that has helped turn Miami into a destination for the art and design world. The week is packed with a month’s worth of events, exhibitions, and parties for art lovers.

“I think about audience as much as I think about how to support artists.” Says David Gryn, who is speaking with me in the lead up to the opening of Art Basel Miami Beach (ABMB) about curating film programs, his thoughts on the upcoming fair in Miami, and his new role as Technology and Sound Curator for If So, What?

“I love art that reflects our times, and I am excited to be in the position to work with artists who are shaping contemporary culture and bringing the beauty of under-exposed aspects of modern life to a greater public. It’s important to me to work within contemporary urban history and this means maintaining a critical dialogue with emerging artists, especially those of African descent.