Pasquale Iannetti Art Gallery

Stephen Von Mason was born in South Bend Indiana in 1954. He grew up in a working class family where his father was a postal employee and mother was a domestic. Young Mason loved to draw and showed a strong desire to become an artist. His father however thought being an artist was impractical and gave his son a set of drafting tools so he could become an architect. This was fine for a while but Mason actually loved drawing pictures of rodeo cowboys and football players so becoming an architect was not meant to be.

In 1972 after High School, Mason moved to Indianapolis, Indiana to attend John Herron School of Art – Indiana University where he studied fine art and received a Bachelors of Fine Arts degree in printmaking. Because he liked to draw so much, printmaking was the logical art form to pursue. In his senior year he began using oil paint because of the high density and illuminant color. This was the beginning of a possible career in painting and printmaking. In 1977 Mason moved to San Francisco, California to do his post graduate work at the San Francisco Art Institute where in 1979 he received a Masters of Fine Arts degree in printmaking and minored in painting.

Mason is best known for his abstract figurative paintings with expressive dreamlike environments depicting humans, animals, ancestral spirits and a love for art history that speaks to the predicaments of the human experience such as joy, loss, love, reflection and hope. These elements contribute to the study and exploration of Art, Life and the ongoing search for truth.

Mason’s work has appeared on the cover of a national magazine titled, American Visions out of Washington D. C. and have been written up in renown magazines with some color reproductions such as Art Now – International Gallery Guide, Art News, The Word and I, Art in America and Frisko Magazine. He illustrated children’s books such as Brother Anansi and the Cattle Ranch and collaborated with thirteen artists on titles including, Just Like Me and Honoring our Ancestors. His paintings and drawings are exhibited throughout the world including the Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, Christies Auction House in New York City, Stedelijk Museum of Art in Amsterdam, Holland, Cartwright Hall in Bradford West Yorkshire, England, Crocker Museum of Art in Sacramento, California, Rotterdam Art Center in Rotterdam, Netherlands, Triton Museum of Art in Santa Clara, California, Actor Danny Glover’s Bomani Gallery in San Francisco, Stephen Wirtz Gallery in San Francisco and a host of other galleries across the United States. Mason’s children’s book Brother Anansi and the Cattle Ranch was produced into a children’s animation show titled, Afrika Wunderkind T. V. in the Netherlands Holland. In addition he wrote a story and co-created a screenplay with the assistance of two colleagues, Rick Stone and Steven Firestone titled “Race”, about a jockey named Issac Murphy and the horse racing industry from 1875 to 1923. A pitch trailer was made by Hollywood producer Don Kurt and Universal Pictures, last pending with top Hollywood producer Michael Mann then Dubai Film Works.

Throughout Mason’s career he developed himself as an Artisan with skills such as teaching, museum and gallery preparatory, conservation framing and some painting restoration. He now lives in the Greater Bay Area teaching fine art at a college preparatory public charter middle school while continuing his painting and drawing career.