A Ride on the ‘Arty Bus’ with Oakland Painter Sloane Gross

Art lovers in the Bay Area are often faced with a funny conundrum: art is everywhere, but given traffic and the geographic size of the nine-county region, it’s hard to get to all of it.

That was the intriguing pitch behind Sloane Gross’ Arty Bus, a party bus that took its riders not to the club, but to a circuit of art locations featuring her work on Saturday, March 15.

The day started inside of Oakland’s Queer Arts Center on Lakeshore Avenue. As DJ Black Woman lowered the music, our tour guide cleared her voice before pouring libations.

“May the Arty Bus be a vessel of healing, joy and liberation,” Gross said to an audience of about 15 people gathered in a semi-circle. “May it awaken something powerful in every city we touch.” Her words were met with a collective response of “asé” and applause from the audience. And then we were on our way.

Inside the bus, more libations were poured, a card game was played and music blasted as we made our way up I-80 en route to the Richmond Art Center.

In one room we saw Daniel Attaboy Seifert’s radiant exhibition, Upcycled Garden. With its floral paper creations jutting out from every inch of the gallery, the installation feels like walking into a Dr. Seuss book.

In an adjacent room we saw an explosion of pieces from the Art of the African Diaspora 2025 exhibition, covering the space wall to wall. It’s an artistic look at Black history and the future of the diaspora.

The exhibition features paintings of rapper Meek Mill and writer James Baldwin. There’s a small Buddha, a tiny Egyptian pharaoh and miniature mermaids in a mixed-media collage by a poet and visual artist named Paradise. There’s a deep blue futuristic painting by Oakland-based artist Zoë Boston and an ethereal indigo self-portrait of San Francisco staple Mailk Seneferu. There’s also a stunning emerald-green painting by Zarahana Kargbo, an 18-year-old artist from Oakland.

On the wall across from Kargbo’s work is Gross’ piece, a mixed-media collage. She stood next to it and explained her creative process. “I don’t pay for art supplies,” she said. “I paint on what I can find or what’s donated to me.”

Gross’ series of works depicting lips and faces, the Be Art collection, was born from the COVID-19 pandemic era of nonstop Zoom video calls. She paired her studies of people’s faces with her excess supplies, and added a dash of inspiration from famed artist Romare Bearden. She produced numerous pieces, a few of which are on walls around the Bay Area.

“I made a million faces and lips,” Gross later told me. “I truly feel like I see and hear God through people. … I wanted to capture all of that.”

After the group took a collective photo in the Upcycled Garden, one of the center’s employees told us that The Art of The Diaspora 2025‘s closing ceremony is this coming weekend, from 2–4 p.m. on March 22.

And then we were back on the bus. The third location was just around the corner at Richmond’s NIAD Art Center (Nurturing Independence Through Artistic Development).

An employee explained to the group that the studio is a space that prioritizes adult artists with developmental disabilities, and we perused the gallery and workshop areas, taking in the wide range of art the center offers.

It’s a huge space with clothing and sculptures, paintings, photos and more.

Gross’ sister, Halisi Noel-Johnson, shared her experience working at the center and noted some of the art she’s created. In the back of the center Noel-Johnson has an archive full of visual prints depicting prominent figures like Maya Angelou.

Gross added that her sister’s art has evolved of late, as she’s focused on knitting and quilt-making.

Gross, who also works with cloth and material, had a display in the middle of the center’s workshop area highlighting her fashion design.

A life-long artist, Gross started painting shoes in high school. Her latest work with paint splatter on clothing is all about “giving art a space outside of the house and outside of the museum,” by getting people to wear it.

“I’m putting art on people,” she told me, “to show that people are art.”

Across the room from Gross’ work was another display, this one by Ericka Stitt, a painter from Richmond. Her depictions of bright-eyed children and optimistic messages stood out in the middle of center’s workshop. I complimented her work and then left with the group, headed toward the next stop: Kaleidoscope Coffee.

The Point Richmond cafe’s burgundy brick walls made Gross’ painted pieces pop in contrast. The collective moved past the images, ordered espressos and lattes, and then made their way to the backyard patio where Lissette de la Rosa led the group in a breathing exercise.

The wind blew and the leaves rustled as de la Rosa reminded us that breathing from the diaphragm is more beneficial to your nervous system than shallow breaths. de la Rosa, who on March 23 will lead A Breathwork Ceremony for Women’s Strength & Legacy at Oakland’s Black Panther Party Museum, talked us through a 10-minute exercise in breathing from our guts.

As the mediation session came to a close, before everyone got back on the bus, I poked my head into a barbershop next to the cafe.

The shop was pristine, glossy with framed images, mounted instruments and fine furniture; an art gallery in salon form.

I complimented Park Place Barbers owner Sam Charles on the aesthetics of the establishment and he told me that the shop, which first opened in 1975, also hosts jazz events where gumbo is served.

Again, there’s art at every turn.

The crew got back on the bus and we headed to the final stop, the newly opened Xingones restaurant in Oakland’s Waterfront Warehouse District, not far from Jack London Square.

Gross has multiple pieces mounted in the Mexican restaurant, some on the large far wall and others on a small wall near the restrooms.

Folks jumped off the bus and into the food line, ordering tacos, chicken sandwiches and burritos. As people polished their plates, the tour came to a close. Before leaving I pulled Gross aside, asking about the importance of this tour.

“Black art needs to be seen,” she said, matter of factly. “So I took people on a tour to see Black art.” Beyond her work, Gross understands that it’s a collective effort to highlight and support local creatives, specifically Black folks trying to make it in the Bay.

“It’s about seeing Black art in its entirety,” she reiterated.

Raised in East Oakland, Gross now has artwork in a dozen places around the Bay Area. And while this tour was an experimental move, a proof of concept if you will, she told me that she’s going to do it again in the near future.

But more immediately Gross is going to take people on a trip deeper into her creative process, as she prepares to do a series of live paintings at Xingones on March 22 during a happy hour event as a part of Oakland Restaurant Week.

Fine dining and unique food options, another thing the Bay Area has a lot of, but isn’t always accessible. Maybe Gross’ next trip can be an “Arty Bus” and mobile foodie truck that hits multiple restaurants.