A San Jose artist who chose to serve artists

When Erin Salazar walked into a Knight Foundation networking event back in 2012 wearing paint-covered work coveralls, she wasn’t expecting to launch a nonprofit.

At the time, Salazar was a working artist in San Jose with a simple idea: The city had plenty of talented artists and plenty of blank walls. What it lacked were opportunities to connect the two. More than a decade later, the idea has grown into Local Color, a San Jose nonprofit founded in 2015 that has redistributed more than $2.1 million to artists over the last 11 years, helped facilitate hundreds of murals and created affordable studio spaces for creatives across the South Bay.

Salazar, founder and executive director of Local Color, has spent the last decade building pathways for artists in a region where rising costs have pushed out many people whose livelihood comes from art, music, theater and other crafts.

“What inspires me to continue this work is seeing the real world outcome of the work happen kind of in real time,” Salazar told San José Spotlight. “I’m actively seeing how the work the organization does affects and impacts and continues to empower the lives of local creatives.”

Originally from California’s Mojave Desert, Salazar moved to San Jose to attend San Jose State University, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in drawing and painting. She later earned a master’s degree in nonprofit leadership from the University of Pennsylvania.

Before Local Color became one of San Jose’s most visible arts organizations, Salazar was a muralist trying to figure out how to bring more public art to the city. She said the idea crystallized during a conversation with a Knight Foundation program director at a networking event.

“I think we got a lot of artists. I think that we need more murals,” Salazar recalled telling the program director. “We have a lot of blank walls.”

The conversation resulted in a $10,000 grant to create three murals. Salazar had never managed a grant before and turned to the San Jose Downtown Association for help to administer the funding.

Former San Jose Downtown Association CEO Scott Knies said he remembers seeing Salazar’s vision long before Local Color became a fixture in downtown San Jose.

“It was fun to be there at the beginning of our Local Color journey and to be part of the growth and to see it still prospering and still vibrant,” Knies told San José Spotlight.

One of Local Color’s earliest projects transformed a vacant former Ross department store on South First Street into artist studios and community gathering space. What began as a temporary activation eventually helped shape the organization’s identity.

“We get these spaces in partnership with a developer and we’re able to do some work inside of them that makes them adequate for artist studios,” Salazar said. “We’re trying to build a community.”

Brian Kurtz, CEO of the San Jose Downtown Association, said Salazar’s persistence has been key to Local Color’s success.

“Erin herself and the team she has built have a rare quality: gumption, stick-to-it-iveness and a refusal to take ‘no’ for an answer,” Kurtz told San José Spotlight.

For fellow artist and friend Jorge Camacho, one of Local Color’s earliest members, Salazar’s impact is personal.

Camacho met Salazar while helping clean out the former Ross building. What started as volunteer work turned into a studio space, mentorship and eventually a career as a full-time artist.

“She gave me my first mural job,” Camacho told San José Spotlight. “She taught me how to write an invoice. She taught me what an art studio was. She showed me a path that felt more productive and something I could be proud to share with my family. I don’t think I could honestly say I would have been a full-time artist in San Jose for the past almost 10 years if it wasn’t for Local Color.”

Camacho said Salazar made a choice many artists never do.

“I see this split in the road where I can either remain an artist, or I can serve artists,” he said. “I really respect and commend Erin for using the serving artists path.”

As Local Color continues to expand, Salazar is focused on securing long-term creative spaces and building sustainable opportunities for artists in Silicon Valley.

She’ll also represent San Jose later this month at Harvard Business School’s Young American Leadership Program, joining civic leaders from across the country to discuss community challenges and solutions.

Still, Salazar said the organization’s mission remains unchanged.

“We are more than an arts organization,” she said. “We are an artists organization.”

For Salazar, success isn’t measured only by murals or square footage. It’s measured by the artists who are able to stay in San Jose and continue creating.

“Any support of Local Color is the support of artists,” she said.

Contact Maryanne Casas-Perez at [email protected] or @CasasPerezRed on X.