A Livermore resident, Vena grew up in the tri-valley. She teaches middle school art, facilitating the creativity of others. While her own artwork spans a variety of media and styles, she is interested in layers - of color, texture, media and images combined with text. She is what Barbara Sher describes as a sampler - an explorer not only of ideas, but of media, process and context. Her work is often a celebration of the everyday, the things that may otherwise go unnoticed in the hustle and bustle of our existence.