Deals from the Top of the Deck

Pick a card. Any card. As long as it’s a Tarot card.

That’s what 50 creative types in the local action sports and fashion scenes were told. They were also instructed to use that card, bearing one of the deck’s 22 allegorical figures, to inspire their own art. The result is “Fin de Siecle: Another View of the Next,” an exhibit of three dozen paintings, photographs and sculptures on display at Gallery Paradiso in Costa Mesa through Dec. 3.

On opening night, most of the pieces were auctioned off, with proceeds benefiting Share Our Selves, which serves the county’s homeless, and the Surfrider Foundation, which organizes ocean cleanup efforts.

Dogpile’s Shawn Peterson made an oil painting on a canvas cut like a cross. Holly Sharp, designer of GirlStar, and Joe McElroy, a graphic artist with Billabong--one of the show’s sponsors--contributed collages.

Bryce Cole, a designer for Redsand, provided an acrylic painting. Surf photographer Art Brewer painted a photo, and Yogi Proctor, a graphic artist for Etnies footwear, offered action shots.

Jack Martinez of Black Flys Eyewear didn’t bring any art, but he did come with some cash. He was the fund-raiser’s highest bidder, buying a disco ball/Buddha creation by Quiksilver artists Peter Schroff, Steve Jones and Roger Russell.

Participants said they enjoyed the experience because it allowed them to take a break from their commercial ventures and express themselves in a new, more freewheeling form.

* Gallery Paradiso, 1604 Babcock, Costa Mesa. (714) 650-3690.