Welcome! art251 officially opens for business on Tuesday, August 12. We’re opening the doors at 10am, and will host an artist welcome reception from 4-7pm.

Kim and I are excited, relieved and exhausted to have finally made it — to this point at least! We’d like to thank each of you, the artists, for making this possible, since without you we’d have a great looking space, but nothing with which to fill it. Over the last 3 months or so we’ve met many artists and seen lots of great art. During this process we’ve been struck by two things: first, the extraordinary level and diversity of creative talent; second, the openness and trustfulness with which you have welcomed us. We sincerely hope to make this a fun and rewarding relationship for all.

art251 events — Artist reception

We’ll be hosting a low-key welcome reception for artists on opening day, August 12, from 4-7pm. We hope you can make it, with or without significant other(s). We plan to have our public “grand-opening” events, sans inflatable gorilla, in mid-September when the weather is cooler, and after we’ve ironed out any last remaining operational glitches. I’ll send you further details of the September events in our next newsletter. We’re aiming for September 13, so please keep that evening open on your calendar, if possible.

Broad range of contemporary art

On opening day we will have around 125 works on display. We have a great range of media, genres, sizes, colors and price points, so we’re off to a great start. The works include: painting (abstract, decorative, figurative and photorealistic), photography, fabric, fused glass, found object assemblage, pottery, metal sculpture, wood craft and jewelry. We deliberately chose a very diverse range of work so we could test our customers’ reactions and then fine-tune our mix of art over the coming months.

Welcome art251 artists

We’ve been waiting to announce our list of opening artists until finalizing our agreements. We are very pleased announce that we have 28 artists who have agreed to show with us. Of these, 20 artists have officially signed as of today, August 7. The artists are: Marnie Vollenhals, Melissa Ayr, Dyanne Welch, Trish Biddle, Aditi Samarth, Sean Fitzgerald, Marla Cook, Jean Storm, Connie Jordan, Chad Beene, Brian Davis, Michael Longhofer, Jay Garrison, Bobbie Nix, Faith Jessup, Kelly Berry, Seppo Aarnos, Melinda Brown, Filomena Booth, Kim Norris. Over the next couple of days we’re also hoping to welcome Dana Blanchard, Diana Chase, James Johnson, Drew Liedtke, Lori Love, Sara Moe, Rita Barnard.

I will publish names of new artists in the new251 newsletter as we welcome them to art251. Eventually, we’re hoping to have a core group of around 40 artists. I’ll also be adding all artists to our website very soon.

art251 space update

Our main display areas and cable system are now in place. So, now all we have to do is hang and display the art! I wonder if ascending and descending a 12 foot ladder several hundred times qualifies as an Olympic event? We aiming to have this complete by Sunday, August 10.

Although we’re opening on August 12, we have 3 remaining fixtures to install, but lack of these is no show-stopper. One is a movable wall system that will give us an additional 150-300 sq.ft of display space. The other includes additional shelving and surfaces for smaller 3D works. The third is a low bench that will hide the spaghetti-looking mess of cables and electrical boxes on our rear wall. We also have our counter and desk to re-stain, so the color will match all the other white-toned wood surfaces. We are hoping to have this work completed by August 22.