CJ METZGER : ARTIST + DESIGNER
I'm Candace (CJ) Metzger—painter, illustrator, writer, and designer creating from my enchanting Glendale studio. Born into a family of makers, artists, and teachers, I spent my childhood playing with my toys in the dirt, building imaginary worlds in our Eagle Rock hillside garden with my sister Miss Mindy, crafting projects with my artist mother and creative grandmothers, and building contraptions with my engineer/mad scientist father.
My mantra has always been "Don't tell people your Dreams. Show Them," and I strive to make everything I touch visually memorable.
Since the 1990s, I've made art professionally—exhibiting in traditional and non-traditional settings while building a lovely community of patrons and supporters. Over the decades, I've starred in and curated countless art shows, been featured in the LA Times and Pasadena Weekly, published children's books with Baby Tattoo Books, released vinyl toys at Comic-Con, and created numerous commissioned portraits. I also work as a graphic designer, creating branding, patterns, and stationery that adorn products.
I now work from my artist grandparents' studio—a magical space with giant windows, overflowing with artwork, vintage books, and a lifetime of collected artifacts. My current paintings and designs are narrative works that reveal sweet, wondrous, and sometimes somber stories of humans and their relationships with animals and the natural environment. Using acrylics, collage, mixed media, and digital methods, I blend surreal and whimsical imagery in layered, dreamy, and alluring ways.
Thank you for visiting—I hope my work transports you to an imaginative and faraway place, just like it does for me when I make it.
I currently live in Glendale, California with my husband Pete and daughter Sophie.
Past Fine Art Exhibitions
Leanna Lin's Wonderland Gallery Eagle Rock - Secret Lives of Dolls, November 2023, + Various Solo and group shows 2009-2023
Industrious:Folke - Family Group Show at The Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock, 2019 (both featured in, as well as curator)
Pop Gallery - Santa Fe, NM - Wild Rumpus Group Show, 2013
Whole 9 Gallery- various group shows 2008-2011
WWA Gallery, Culver City, CA – “Trappings ” Group show currated by CJ Metzger & Miss Mindy, 2010
Pop Gallery - Santa Fe, NM - Pop Femme Show, 2009-2010
Gallery Revisited 4 year Anniversary Show, Silverlake, CA – Group Show 2008
The Wonderful World Art Gallery, Culver City, CA – “Carnivale of the Strange” Group show with Tim Burton and others
Meltdown Comics, CA - LA Myth Show - group Show 2007
Pop Gallery - Santa Fe, NM - Sugar Coated Strange - Pop Femme Show, 2008
The Hive Gallery - Downtown Los Angeles, CA - Featured Artist
Black Maria Gallery - Atwater, CA - Menace of Childhood Group show
The Wind-up Gallery. Phoenix, AZ - Unfourgettable Show - 2007
The Hive Gallery - Downtown Los Angeles, CA - Group Show 2007
Gallery Revisited - Silverlake, CA – Secret Lives of Dolls - Joint Show 2007
Gallery Nucleus - Alhambra, CA –Power in Numbers Show - Group Show 2007
Gallery Revisited – part of various salon style shows. 2006 - current
Center for the Arts - Eagle Rock, Route 66 Art Auction 2004-2006
Center for the Arts - Eagle Rock Women’s Work II Exhibit - August 2003
Gallery Ophelia - Girlhood Revisited – Show with Miss Mindy 2003
Gallery Figeroa – Plaisirs de l’imagination – show with Miss Mindy & Katrina Alexy 2002
Lankershim Arts Center - Group Show October 2001
Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock - Women’s Work Exhibit August 2001
Affair of Art – Ryman Foundation Auction at Disney Imagineering Campus2001
Art from the Heart -Chase Place Foundation Children's Hospital – 6th Annual Art Auction 2001
Cannibal Flower – Art and Performance Space – ongoing exhibitions
Group Holiday show at Sirens Coffee House – La Canada December 2000 - January 2001
Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock - Futura Carnival - joint-exhibition November 2000
Northeast InvitationalII– Group exhibition, City of Los Angeles Century Gallery 2000
Paintings and Assemblages - Solo show at Sirens Coffee House – La Canada December 1999
No Ho Nights- North Hollywood Night Street Art Show June and August 1999
Collage, Mixed Media and Sculpture Show – Long Beach Arts – Juror Kim Abeles 1998
COMA Gallery- “Daily Exposures”Student Gallery at Cal. State Los Angeles 1998