Michael Zieve
Exploring the sacred dreamscape of art where creativity meets spirituality
Connect with MeAbout Michael
Michael Zieve is a fine artist and educator living in northern California. He studied painting at Rhode Island School of Design from 1972-74 and earned a BFA Degree from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1977.
He began showing his work through Nancy Lurie Gallery in Chicago in 1980. During the ensuing years in Chicago, he exhibited widely in various venues including the Museum of Contemporary Art/ Chicago, Randolph Street Gallery, Chicago, The Art Institute of Chicago, The Indianapolis Museum of Art, Phyllis Kind Gallery and with three other Chicago artists at the Center d' Art Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland.
After two decades living on Chicago's west side, Michael relocated to a nature preserve in northern Indiana and opened his fine and decorative arts studio nearby in Three Oaks, Michigan. His love for the natural world was rekindled and a dramatic shift in his artwork ensued. In 1998 he executed two large historical murals for the U.S. Post Office in the small town of Rolling Prairie, Indiana.
His commissioned works are featured in many hospitals and healing centers, including Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago, Marionjoy Rehabilitation Hospital, Wheaton, IL. Lutheran General Hospital, Park Ridge, IL. and the Namaste Center for Holistic Health, Laporte, IN.
In 2011 Michael relocated to northern California inspired by it's natural beauty and spiritual offerings. That year he participated in the annual creativity and meditation retreat at Spirit Rock Meditation Center led by Barbara Kaufman and others. He has enjoyed practicing with many expressive arts and spiritual teachers including, Zuza Engler (conscious movement), Ellen Emmet (somatic inquiry), Santikaro and John Prendergast.
In 2017 he exhibited his paintings at the Science and Non-Duality Conference (SAND) in San Jose, Ca. and in 2024 he made his first pilgrimage to India, imbibing its ancient spirituality, visiting ashrams and holy places.
In his teaching he blends his love for spirituality, poetry and art together, inviting students to inquire into the mysteries of the creative process. He taught at the Sebastopol Center for the Arts and the Petaluma Arts Center until the Covid pandemic arrived. Since then he has continued to hold his class 'Mystic Art Circle' online.
He lives in Sebastopol Ca. near the coast of Northern California.
Artist Statement
For me the beauty of painting resides in the meaning intrinsic to every mark, form and color relationship. When formal qualities harmonize and there is feeling (or content) the painting by itself creates an archetypal field beyond space and time.
Filtered through memory, subjects of contemplation, dance with the rhythms of heart and hand, evoking a larger sphere of existence. Wandering, remaining open and finding rather than willing is central to the sense of discovery that informs my work.
As I grow older, I find my capacity to listen to the whispers of the intuitive body/mind deepens. Embodied practices like dance, yoga, and meditation have deeply informed my journey as an artist. I celebrate the long tradition of the artist as mystic whose work expresses essential qualities of being, channeled through soul and imagination.
Professional Resume
Education
Selected Exhibitions
Sebastopol. Ca.
Sebastopol Center for the Arts
The Cutting Edge Salon, Sebastopol, CA.
Sebastopol Center for the Arts
The Cutting Edge Salon, Sebastopol, CA.
San Jose, CA.
Petaluma Art Center, Petaluma, CA.
Kitty Hawk Gallery, Sebastopol, CA.
Life Force Arts Center, Chicago, IL.
Life Force Arts Foundation, Chicago, IL.
Life Force Arts Foundation, Chicago, IL.
Laporte, IN.
Jane Cowley Gallery, St. Joseph, MI.
St. Joseph, MI.
North Shore Art League, Winnetka, IL.
Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN.
Purdue University North West, Westville, IN.
Laporte County Public Library System, Laporte IN.
Purdue University North West, Westville, IN.
The Hot House Gallery, Chicago, IL.
Michigan City, City Hall, Michigan City, IN.
Gaia Gallery, New Buffalo, MI.
Lubeznik Center for the Arts, Michigan City, IN.
The Dorothea Theil Gallery, South Suburban College, South Holland, IL.
John G. Blank Center for the Arts
John G. Blank Center for the Arts, Michigan City IN.
Harbart Gallery, Michigan City, IN.
John G. Blank Center for the Arts, Michigan City, IN
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL.
Evanston Art Center, Evanston IL.
Evanston Art Center, Evanston IL.
Marianne Deson Gallery, Chicago, IL.
Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL.
The Paine Art Center and Arboretum, Oshkosh, WI.
The Museum of Contemporary Art. Chicago, IL.
Phyllis kind Gallery, Chicago, IL.
Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL.
Randolph St.Gallery, Chicago, IL.
Phyllis Kind Gallery, Chicago, IL.
Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN.
Brentwood Gallery, ST. Louis, MO.
Centre D' Art Contemporain, Geneva, Switzerland
Quay Gallery, San Francisco, CA.
Nancy Lurie Gallery, Chicago IL.
Navy Pier, Chicago, IL.
Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago IL.
West Hubbard Gallery, Chicago, IL.
Collections
Koehnline Museum of Art, Oakton Community College, Des Plaines, IL.
Ft. Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN.
Lobby - 225 W. Wacker Building, Chicago, IL.
Braur Museum of Art, Valporaiso University, Valparaiso IN.
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL.
Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago, IL.
Lutheran General Hospital, Park Ridge, IL.
Marionjoy Rehabilitation Hospital, Wheaton, IL.
Riverside Hospital, Kankakee, IL.
U. S. Post Office, Rolling Prairie, IN.
Public/Private Mural And Painting Commissions
Suite of Relief Paintings
Triptych Painting for Lobby
Suite of four paintings
Decorative Painting
Mural
Painting
Paintings
Mural
Paintings
Mural
Mural
Mural
Paintings
Painting
Painting
Wall murals depicting local history
Mural
Mural
Mural
Trompe l'oeil
Murals
Mural
Murals
Mural
Mural
Mural
Mural
Mural
Murals
Trompe l'oeil
Murals
Teaching
Weekly online series, ongoing.
Sebastopol Center for the Arts
Painting from the Inside Out
Intuitive Painting Workshop. Petaluma Arts Center.
Wild Indigenous Watercolors
Weekly classes at Sebastopol Center for the Arts
Annually at Sacred Garden Events. Sebastopol. Ca.
St. John's Lutheran School, Laporte, IN.
- Lubeznik Center for the Arts, Michigan City, IN.
- Purdue University North Central, Westville, IN.
- Zieve Studios, Three Oaks, MI.
- Atelier Mur Quaglia, Chicago, IL. (With Mur Quaglia)
- Tom Robinson Studio, Chicago,IL.
- Silver Creek Farm, Laporte, IN.
- Suburban Fine Arts Center, Highland Park, IL.
- Flatfile Galleries, Chicago, IL. (With Mur Quaglia)
- Liberation Park Dharma Center, Oak Park, IL. (with Mur Quaglia)
Michigan City, IN.
Laporte, IN.
Children's Museum, The Art Institute of Chicago
Reviews And Publications
Marcia Porter "A Miral-culous View of Rolling Prairie" The South Bend Tribune, Nov. 20, 1998 Section D7
Catalogue, "Art In Chicago 1945-1996 Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, 1996
Dan Cameron, "Blunt Subjects: The Paintings of Mike Zieve" Arts Magazine, Sept. 1991
Michael Bonesteel,"Prairie, Lake, City, a wide range of art" Pioneer Press Newspapers, March 15,1990
Michael Bonesteel, "Life in the City is not so Pretty" Pioneer Press Newspapers, March 3, 1988
Catalogue, "Artists go to bat" Chicago Cubs Wives Charities, 1986
L.J. Douglass, "A Message in the Darkness" The New Art Examiner, June 1984 p.12
Catalogue, "The Big Picture:20 years of the abstracted figure in Chicago Art", Hyde park Art Center, Chicago, IL.1983
Mark Michael Leonhart, "It's Root, Root, Root for the Home Team" The New Art Examiner Feb. 1983 p.22
Christopher Lyon, "Hyde Park show fuels interest in Figurative Art" Chicago Sun Times, Jan.1983 p. 22
Ann Morgan "Mike Zieve" Art International May/June 1982 p.96
Christopher Lyon, "The Importance of Being Tasteless" Chicago Reader May 14, 1982 Sec. 1, p. 36
Leon Regan Upshaw, "Painting in Chicago" Portfolio Magazine May/June 1982 p.62
Mark Michael Leonhart, "Mike Zieve" Flash Art, May 1982 p.52
Michael Bonesteel, "Mike Zieve" Art in America, April 1982 p.151
William C. Dawe, "Michael Zieve", The New Art Examiner, Feb. 1982
Alan Artner, "Expressionism rides in on 80's Wave of Interest", Chicago Tribune, Oct. 18 1981, Sec. 6-p.13
Kathi Norklun, "Narrative Naïve Painting from Chicago" Artweek, August 1981,vol. 12 p.25
Harold Hayden, "Non Naïve Show" Chicago Sun Times, Feb. 15 1980 p.70
Mark Michael Leonhart, "Non Naïve Show" The New Art Examiner, Feb.13, 1980 p.16
Grants
New York, New York
Connect with Michael
Join one of Michael's classes or inquire about available works, prints or commissions.