True Colors continued.
His digitally enhanced photo, "Awakening," was a finalist in a Canadian juried competition, Mythic Quest. His work was also shown at a solo exhibit at Tia ChuCha Café and Gallery in Sylmar and another in Watts. In San Jose, Manzano has shown his work at Café de Matisse and through the Phantom Gallery project.

Along with his art, Hobbs wanted Manzano to have positive and strong role models. She helped Manzano get scholarships to mentorship retreats with authors Michael Meade and Luis Rodriguez.
Suddenly, Manzano went from having nobody to having someone who believed in him.

"She's pretty much like my best friend," Manzano says. "She's been there every day since we connected and started working together. I look to her for answers."

Their relationship has been beneficial for Hobbs as well. It was Manzano who led Hobbs to find her passion working with young people. Hobbs says she knew nothing about young people until she became a teacher in 1997. Prior to that she lived a quiet life in Willow Glen, waking at 5 a.m. and spending her days writing, doing graphic design and tending to her rescued pets--a dog, a few cats, and a chatty cockatiel.

"I didn't know anything about young people, I didn't have children," Hobbs says. "What I discovered was they were so welcoming at sharing their world."

Soon, Hobbs' students were teaching her about popular rappers such as Cash Money Millionaire and 50 Cent, and slang terms. "They were going on about 'bling bling,' " she laughs. The term refers to jewelry and all forms of showy style. Hobbs found she related to young adults. She found them to be "wonderful, creative and hungry for attention." Like Manzano, these young people needed someone to guide them and believe in their talents. She knew that if it worked with Manzano, it could work with others. She also knew that art could help these young people understand themselves and, if necessary, heal themselves by releasing their emotions on canvas.

Not all of her goals could be accomplished in the classroom, so Hobbs created the nonprofit Catalyst for Youth in July 2002. It aims to create emotional stability and social responsibility and caters to youths and young adults between the ages of 13 and 28.

It became the launching point for Youth on Fire, a 50-artist show at the American Indian Educational Resource Center in June 2003. The show was supported in part by a grant from Arts Council Silicon Valley. Hobbs saw this as a way for young artists to express themselves and discover their uniqueness through their art.

"Outside their lives are chaotic, but if you watch for their heart, there's an image of wholeness," says Hobbs, who called the group of artists Heart of Chaos.

Although the show was a success, the art show was pushed aside the following year due to changes in Hobbs' life when she was laid off at Lincoln High School due to budget cuts. Soon after, she was hired at Brooks College in Sunnyvale to teach graphic design and psychology. Manzano, who was looking for other opportunities, joined Americorps doing conservation work in Alaska.

This year, however, the Youth on Fire art show has returned. The second show will feature young artists from the Bay Area who are eligible to win cash prizes for pieces depicting the Heart of Chaos philosophy.

The art show enables Hobbs to reach more emerging artists. Artist Miguel Machuca, who met Hobbs at the first Youth on Fire show, says Hobbs is "an angel."

"Once we ended up talking, I knew I'd end up working with her," Machuca says. "She's our backbone, she's my backbone. Without her, I don't think I could express myself."

Machuca describes Hobbs as a down-to-earth person who guides rather than dictates. Hobbs has also bonded with Machuca. She selected him and two others, Anabella Pinon and Leon Morimoto, to coordinate this year's Youth on Fire show.

The show's participants demonstrate a raw talent, whose art is bold, edgy and urban.

"This is a product of San Jose," Machuca says. "There's a lot of great, talented painters out there. Their artwork is edgy. We're looking for something new."

Machuca likens this era of art to that of Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso, whose work was innovative and sometimes political. Many of the local artists have no formal training and became interested in art through high school photography classes, graffiti and hip-hop, co-director Morimoto says.

Machuca says his art, also on display, mainly consists of character abstracts in oil. He was inspired by L. Frank Baum's The Wizard of Oz, a book he read as a child. It is the inspiration for Machuca's exaggerated characters and forms on paper and canvas.

When Machuca began to teach himself to paint in oils at age 18, he began painting with two colors, red and blue, to signify conflicting emotions--anger and sadness, passion and loneliness. His paintings also demonstrate hints of surrealism and cubism.

Now 28, Machuca says that the opportunity for young people to display their work is rare in the valley. Morimoto, a DJ and musician now working in paint, says art is one of the few avenues where young people can express their originality. Often, Morimoto says, young people feel they need to fit into stereotypes perpetuated by the media.

"You are like a piece of art, you're a work in progress. Each piece you produce is your development as a person," Morimoto says.

Morimoto and Machuca would like to pass on their love of art to children, and become mentors for young artists. Both work with children professionally. Machuca is the teen advisory board coordinator of WORKS, a nonprofit art gallery in San Jose. Morimoto, 25, works at a recreation center with children. Hobbs is the board's youth and community outreach coordinator.

While her work with young people keeps her busy, she is still thinking of ways to grow the fledgling Catalyst for Youth organization. She envisions creating a mentor program that would pair an established artist and a new artist together for six months. The two would develop a gallery show. She also wants to find funding to pay for art supplies for those young artists who cannot afford them.

"I don't want to think too small," Hobbs says.

Today, the once quiet life she led has done a 180. Her Willow Glen home is filled with art--many pieces by Manzano and other young adults she has touched through encouragement and belief.

"I have these wonderful young people as friends and they truly make my heart sing," Hobbs says.

The Youth on Fire art show opens on Nov. 18, with a reception from 5 to 9 p.m. A second reception will take place on Nov. 19 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. The reception will include music, food, slam poetry and live painting. The artwork can be viewed through December. The gallery is located at Brooks College Sunnyvale, 1120 Kifer Rd., Sunnyvale. For more information, call 408.328.5700 or visit www.heartofchaos.net. For more information about Curtis click here.

Willow Glen Resident Cover Story: Nov. 16, 2005 By Alicia Upano

© Copyright 2007 Catalyst for Youth, a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization. All rights reserved.