While working toward her bachelor’s degree in art at University of the Pacific in the late 1980s, Amy Seidel Kelly’s professors encouraged her to apply what she was learning in a practical way.

Taking their advice, Kelly explored textiles and painting, and for her senior thesis, she hand-dyed and painted fabrics and designed the installation for her final show. She went on to forge a 30-year career working with textiles in sales, showroom management, and eventually design and project management roles.

“It was really a hands-on education in materials, pattern and how everything comes together,” she said.

Kelly also founded ASK Amy (with ASK referring to her name, Amy Seidel Kelly), a textile and custom linen business.

“It was a creative outlet during a busy time in my life, raising two young children while working in design showrooms,” she said. “It became a way to stay connected to the work I love.”

She created hand-painted linens as functional works of art, selling them at weekend home-tour boutiques, fundraisers and in-home parties.

Kelly began working as a parttime design assistant at EJ Interior Design, Inc. in Tiburon in 2018, and soon decided to also focus more seriously on her own art. She took Patrick Dintino’s classes at California College of the Arts in San Francisco and participated in workshops with artists in Sonoma.

She began creating mixed-media, layered college artwork on paper, canvas and wood panels.

“Each work is unique, combining acrylic, watercolor, Caran d’Ache, graphite, handmade and found papers, woodblock prints and other ephemera,” she said. “The compositions are primarily abstract or abstracted, often incorporating graphic, organic and floral elements.”

Many of her pieces will be on display in her exhibition, In Bloom: Handpicked Compositions, at the Arts Guild of Sonoma from Wednesday, April 1 through Monday, April 27. The guild is featuring Kelly as its guest artist for April and will be offering a public reception for her on Thursday, April 2, from 5 to 7 p.m.

“I am thrilled to be showing at the Arts Guild of Sonoma gallery,” she said. “I am really looking forward to seeing how my work is received, meeting new artists and collectors, and sharing this experience with friends and family. It is an exciting moment for me and a chance to show what has been unfolding in my life and in the studio.”

She described how her work has evolved from the hand-painted linen items to the mixed media collage works she now creates.

“The linens were functional, design-driven pieces influenced by my upbringing and my years in the interior design world,” Kelly said. “They were polished, decorative and marketable. Over time, I shifted toward a more expressive and exploratory approach, allowing for greater freedom in layering materials and developing composition.”

Kelly said her current work reflects that shift while still drawing on a foundation rooted in textiles, pattern and color.

“My eye and work naturally tend to gravitate toward balanced composition, which I credit to my background working with textiles, interior design and spatial arrangement,” she said.

The interiors she has created are multilayered, incorporating textured wood, beautiful marbles, patterned tiles, lacquered surfaces, plush upholstery, find floral or geometric prints, lush trimmings, multicolored contrast piping and custom, hand-woven area rugs.

“All of these items and details that constitute a home and inform the feeling one has in the space are deeply rooted in me and have guided my career and current work,” Kelly said.

Raised by an artistic family in Pasadena, Kelly and her husband, Mark S. Kelly, now split their time between homes in San Francisco and Sonoma, where she maintains an active studio practice that is focused on mixed media and collage.

“It has become a central part of my life,” she said. “I am now able to dedicate more time to refining my work, developing my ideas and growing as an artist. This period has allowed me to move beyond a structured, design-driven approach into a practice that is more intuitive, exploratory and personally driven. It feels like a natural and important next chapter.”

She is currently exploring color and “drawing” with scissors in the spirit of Henri Matisse.

“It’s a direction I’m eager to continue developing through a new body of work tentatively titled, ‘Back to School: Lessons in Color and Composition,’ aimed at expanding the depth and range of my color palette,” Kelley said.

She is also pursuing extended education at California College of the Arts.

Kelly finds that the act of creating is therapeutic for her.

“I lose myself in the process and find a sense of calm there,” she said. “I’ve always been drawn to making — figuring out how to build, repair and bring things together — and that instinct carries through to my work.

By using fragments, layers and materials influenced by textiles, she places things together in a way that feels both intuitive and grounding.

“Art has become a steady source of balance and meaning in my life,” Kelly said.