3 festivals in 2 weeks can mean only 1 thing… art lives!

Last week we visited the Ft.Worth Arts Festival (April 17-20), more commonly known as the Main Street arts festival. This grand event is now in its 23rd year, and is drawing bigger crowds and better art than ever. I had to fight my way through the throngs of people to see some really outstanding and innovative works from 200 juried artists from coast-to-coast. Some of the most notable standouts: Lewis Tardy’s biomechanical sculptures, Joseph Becker’s glasswork, surreal photographs from Barbara Kline, photorealistic paintings by Jeannie Maddox.

Then, as I’ve already mentioned, we hosted the first annual Bear Creek Art gala (April 19) in Keller. I fully expect this to become an annual showcase exclusively for local artists over the coming years.

Now, we’re getting ready for Art in the Square (April 25-27) in Southlake. The festival attracts around 130 artists and 80,000 people, and is now ranked in the top 100 art festivals in the U.S.

And, the winners are: me - my family and I get to see lots of great art and meet some very interesting artists; artists - they get lots of great exposure to a receptive audience and make some sales in the process; local community - much of the proceeds from these events goes to our local charities and non-profits, and there’s significant uptick in business for many local stores in the process. And, the losers? Well, I suppose, people who are trying to avoid art and traffic gridlock.

The first annual Bear Creek Art Gala on April 19, 2008 was a great success. By all accounts we had about 250 attendees to the invitation only event. All proceeds from ticket sales and the silent and live auctions went to Young Artists of Texas, a local non-profit. Kudos to all the organizers, sponsors and caterers for donating various mixtures of energy, time, effort and items for the auctions.

We helped sponsor the soiree by donating our, as yet, unfinished space and some art. So, our empty cavern temporarily became host to a great array of art from local artists including Trish Biddle, Kathy Kromer and Melissa Warren; big board auction items, such as flame red motor scooter, black and white photography package, visit to recording of Regis and Kelly in NYC, limo and champagne at the Dolce Room, and full tank of gas (with a Mercedes) for the weekend. Mountains of great food and fine wine came courtesy of Main Street Bakery, Edible Arrangements, Mezza Luna, Mendocino Wine Company, HNB Gourmet, and Tastefully Yours Catering. My apologies if I’ve missed some.

I have to say that our space looked pretty good filled with art, food and people!

art251 is an official Art-o-mat location! In fact, we’ll be the only place in the whole of north Texas where you’ll be able to see, touch, listen to and purchase from an Art-o-mat.

Art-o-mat is brought to you by Artists in Cellophane, founded by father of the Art-o-mat Clark Whittington (a.k.a. National Bureau Chief).

Wondering what an Art-o-mat is?

No, Art-o-mat is not a hideous mechanical monster from a 1980’s Japanese horror flick. Nor is it a new-fangled robot that will clean your house from top to bottom and feed your family. It’s, it’s…

it’s a retired cigarette vending machine that has been lovingly restored and converted to sell art! Clark Whittington started this crazy scheme in 1997 in his home town of Winston-Salem, North Carolina. There are now 82 machines installed around the U.S. in museums, art galleries, cafes and other select locations. Each machine dispenses small packages of art from a selection of over 400 contributing artists from all over the globe. Each work is authentic and unique. Wondering what an Art-o-mat looks like? Wish to see more?

Last week we whet our appetites and wet our feet on our first art251 ad. Today we have moved on to large scale banners. Tomorrow perhaps we’ll shroud our entire suburb in a crimson Cristoesque veil emblazoned with “art251″. In the meantime, back to the banner. We just finished an 8ft by 3 ft banner to help us spread the word about our new art adventure. Our digital printer, Reprographics of Roanoke / Arlington, did an outstanding job at a great price. The full color banner is stunningly true to its original, digital version (courtesy of Illustrator CS3), and comes complete with a retractable roll-up stand.

Now, we’ll be able to take our message to trade shows, art fairs and use it for other promotional events. Our crazy idea of an art space in the suburbs is starting to seem eerily real.

Since Kim and I are now business owners, we have become jack-of-all-trades (and masters of none, hopefully not). So, one of our many trades is that of advertising copywriter. Our first attempt at “writing copy” is for the first annual Bear Creek Art Gala, on April 19, 2008. As a sponsor, we get a quarter page ad in the program. The ad uses our newly designed logo and builds on our theme of (sub)urban sophistication. Is it art? Perhaps, not. We’re anxiously awaiting real world feedback, which will come at the event itself - we don’t have the luxury of pre-launch focus groups, writers committees and the like (except for our kids) upon which to tests our ads first.

We took possession of the space for art251 today (April 11) at around noon, if Kim’s watch was telling the correct time. Our door opening ceremony was unattended, and much less contentious than the other ceremonial event that’s captivating the world at the moment, something involving an Olympic torch I believe.

I realize, now, that I should have worn an appropriate wrist adornment. So, Kim, you win this one.

Apologies to pun watchers for this post’s title - my wife’s corniness is rubbing off on to me.

We now have our very own copy of the “fully executed lease”, complete with actual signatures, as specified in blue ink. The document is 54 pages long, densely packed with convoluted legalese in sub-paragraphs that go four-deep - a grammarian’s worst nightmare. Now I know why a legal sized page has to be larger than U.S. standard 8½ x 11 inches - the law professional has so much more that needs to be said, all of course, in our best interests.

Avid readers may have noticed that we retired our old art251 logo today. In its place we have put our sleek, new professionally designed identity. I can see it now, on tee-shirts, mailers, tattoos, electronic billboards in airports, Times Square, art251 blimp, Ferrari F1 racing team, replacing the Nike swoosh…

We’re still tweaking the official color palette. So please bear with us as we go through a few final iterations to see which colors work best on the web. In the meantime, for the sentimental in our audience, here’s a last look at our 2 month old “retiree”. May you rest in peace. We’ll miss you!

We signed our building lease for art251 last week, and are now on our way to opening our cool art space. So, we decided to upgrade our project management tool, as shown below. Hmm, lots of blank space to fill in.

As you’ll see, it’s much more sophisticated, though less colorful, than our v1.0 system.

We had this romantic idea of signing the lease inside our space, soon to be art251. But, of course, we didn’t have a nice mahogany desk upon which to pen our deal with the future. So, I used Kim’s back instead! Please do not try this at home - especially if you have an antique fountain pen.

After much to and fro, many ups and downs, evaluations, re-evaluations, gut-feels, hard-numbers, surveys, financial models, heart-to-hearts, side-by-side comparisons, negotiations and several months we signed the lease. Official picture of the two business partners, after lease signing, below. By the way, we’re happily married too (or at least were, until we signed the lease), so you can view this as a sign of yet another interesting marital adventure - this time, headlong into the wonderful world of art.

Thanks to Laura Keck from the Arthouse leasing office for being a good sport, and taking the pic of the two co-conspirators.

art251 is a proud sponsor of the first annual Bear Creek Art Gala. It is on April 19, 2008, from 7-10pm, at the Arthouse in Keller town center - 251 Town Center Lane, Keller, Texas.
We’ll be opening our space for the event, which features original art, live music, video art, great food and an auction. All proceeds go to Young Artists Of Texas (YAT), a local non-profit dedicated to promoting young, local artists.

All signs seem to be pointing towards this event being a great success. So, we have high hopes of turning this gala into an annual affair, which grows in size and scope. We’ll be working with the talented group of organizers and sponsors to make this a premier art event that focuses on LOCAL art and artists. Oh, it’s called “Bear Creek Art Gala” because the location overlooks Bear Creek, a picturesque sliver of water surrounded by trails that meanders through our city.