A battle royale is brewing between Keller and Dallas. Oh, and this is much bigger than the collegiate rivalry between Texas and Oklahoma; stronger than the cultural rivalry between Ft.Worth and Dallas; and even more deep-rooted than the historic rivalry between Dallas and Houston.

Make no mistake, the situaton unfolding between Keller and Dallas eclipses the legendary rivalries between Road Runner and Wile E Coyote, Mac versus PC, Federer versus Nadal, Man U versus Chelsea, Boston Red Sox versus New York Yankees. Yes, this battle is on a par with Batman versus The Joker, and Luke Skywalker versus Darth Vader.

I’m talking about the battle of the Art-o-mats.

You see, almost two years ago art251, right here in Keller, installed the very first Art-o-mat in North Texas. Now, the Big D is imitating it smaller, cuter neighbor to the west and playing catch-up by unveiling a rival Art-o-mat in North Dallas. On Saturday, May 15, only the second Art-o-mat machine in North Texas premiers at the new Whole Foods Market on Park Lane.

To honor this event art251 is hosting Mr. Clark Whittington on May 13, 6-9 pm, during our monthly Keller Gallery Walk. Clark is artistic impresario, chief-innovation-officer, head (TPB) supervisor of Artists-in-Cellophane, and the all-round creative spark behind the Art-o-mat. Then on May 15, Clark heads east to officially unveil the “rival” machine in Dallas.

I’ll let you decide which of the 2 Art-o-mat machines is the classiest. By the way, ours has been on the Rachael Ray Show.

Art-o-mat, art251, Keller

Art-o-mat, Whole Foods Market, Dallas

In case you don’t know what an Art-o-mat is read on. Art-o-mat is a machine. It’s actually a retired and lovingly restored cigarette machine that’s been converted to vend art. In 1997, Clark Whittington used a recently-banned cigarette machine to create the first Art-o-mat. He used the machine to showcase his own black & white photographs which he sold for $1 each. The concept proved so popular with the host of the first machine and other artists that the project soon took on a life of its own. Art-o-mat, the organization, has now grown to around 90 Art-o-mat machines featuring over 400 contributing artists from 10 different countries.

Residents of Keller take note. The suburbs awaken from their (winter) slumber! Adventure awaits!

You make your home in the 7th best place to live in the United States, as ranked by CNN Money Magazine. You welcomed your first commercial art gallery – art251 – in September 2008. Now, you are home to a superb new restaurant. City Hall officially opened its doors on March 22, 2010. It’s located in the Arthouse development in Keller Town Center and is only a 2 minute stroll from art251.

So, what’s so special about City Hall?  Two things. First, the restaurant has first class ambiance and service and an original chef-driven menu led by nationally recognized Chef Otto Borsich. Second, the restaurant is adorned with original art from art251. The walls feature abstracts by Dana Blanchard, Fil Booth and Michael Longhofer.

City Hall is an upscale contemporary American fare restaurant. It’s the first restaurant in Arthouse, a mixed-use community that features multifamily apartments and an eclectic mixture of retail tenants, including art251. The restaurant has a sophisticated urban feel complete with an open kitchen, rich woods, leather booths and contemporary lighting. The space also has a friendly bar and a private dining room, and thoroughly attentive service.

And, then there’s the menu. Real food in the ‘burbs: Maple Brined Pork Tenderloin Wild Mushroom Risotto Cake; Cedar Scented Grilled Salmon, Herbal Orzo; Pan Seared Sea Scallops, Leek & Potato Risotto style, Orange Reduction; Lobster Ravioli with a Light Fennel-Vanilla Cream Sauce. Fresh, original, artfully prepared, mouthwatering – just like art251’s art.

Yes, you read all of this correctly, you’re in the suburbs, surrounded by the culinary wastelands of the mega-chain, processed “food” franchises, and now you have access to lobster, scallops, risotto, and art all in the same evening, and all in your neighborhood!

City Hall images courtesy of City Hall Restaurant. Featured paintings: Teratogenesis by Dana Blanchard, Urban Energy, Hunting Art Prize 2009 finalist, Michael Longhofer.

Go Trish! Local artist Trish Biddle was recently commissioned to be the official artist by the Westminster Kennel Club. Inspired by her interests in fashion and Art Deco, Trish created the image for the official 2010 Westminster Kennel Club poster, “Westminster. There’s only one.”  This is now the second year running that Trish has been commissioned to be the official artist.

Her oil painting depicts an evening street scene outside Madison Square Garden in New York and features representative breeds from all seven groups. The Empire State Building, aglow with Westminster’s signature purple and gold colors, sets the stage. Trish Biddle’s penchant for high fashion is evident, as stylish dog lovers stroll past a Westminster-themed Saks Fifth Avenue window, another New York City icon.

Trish Biddle’s impressive resume continues to grow. In 2009 she was named official artist of the Del Mar Thoroughbred Racing Club. In 2008, she was named official artist of the Kentucky Oaks and Kentucky Derby 134th Run for the Roses.

You can see more of Trish Biddle’s “Glamorous Women in Fabulous Places” original works and many of her limited edition, signed prints at art251.

art251 joins the tweetsphere. You can find us right here. We’re certainly not the first art space to arrive on Twitter. In fact, we follow in the heavy twittering footsteps of more notable venues such as Tate Britain, MoMA, The Metropolitan Museum, the Guggenheim, Whitney and the Brooklyn Museum. And, numerous galleries around the world have been tweeting quite happily across the great tubes of the internet for a year or more. So, why did we take the plunge into twitterspace now?

Well, it’s really a technical answer. Even though tweets on twitter are limited to 140 characters, I didn’t want the added burden of having to update the art251 twitter status each time we posted new material on our website and blog. Of course, there a numerous ways to push status updates to twitter from websites, but I couldn’t find an efficient and reliable way until now. Now, that is, following a complete software upgrade of the art251 website. Hopefully you haven’t noticed any difference – we updated all the behind-the-scenes, inner-workings, and not the outer shell. So, if you follow art251 on Twitter, welcome and, stay tuned for more tweets and a little more art!

I know a mere 4-6 inches of snow is trivial compared to the recent record breaking blizzards in the eastern United States or the regular snowfalls in our mountainous regions. However, when it happens in the Dallas Ft.Worth area it’s a Texas-sized event! So, of course the entire area is rapidly coming to a frozen standstill. It’s beautiful out here – I may even have to build a snowman with my kids. However, art, for today at least, has come a standstill as well.

art251 is closed, and unfortunately, we’ve had to cancel our scheduled Gallery Walk in Keller Town Center on February 11. So, many apologies. Normal service will resume very soon – if you know anything about Texas weather. In the meantime, I’ll be making some art in the snow! Now, where are those skis of mine?

Update: After I hit the “publish” button, another 6 inches of snow buried our neighborhood. Not good for business, but great for our children and all kids at heart.

Our very own Sean Fitzgerald, photographer extraordinaire, picked up a handful of awards recently courtesy of the Trinity River Corridor Project. The City of Dallas sponsored a photography contest for images from the Trinity River. His four entries won the Professional division for landscapes (1st), wildlife (1st and second), and architecture (1st).

An exhibit of some of Sean’s stunning images is on display at art251 – Man And Nature runs until the end of November 2009. All the more exciting for us, because the Trinity River Audubon Center – home to many of Sean’s beautiful wildlife pictures – is also home to art251 Trinity River.

The Trinity River Corridor Project is the most complex and the largest urban development effort ever undertaken by the city of Dallas. It aims to transform a flood protection solution into an opportunity for community revitalization, economic development and the creation of a world-class greenway.

The incredible Trinity River Audubon Center celebrates its 1-year anniversary on October 10-11 with our inaugural?Nature Fest and Art Show. We’ll focus on works of art from area artists in our Great Hall, seminars on sustainable living in our classrooms, and nature-related?activities on the trails. Admission is free… see you this weekend! Click here for the complete schedule.

What is there to do at Trinity River Audubon Center (TRAC) besides art? PLENTY! Here’s a taste:

???? Hike four miles of trails through restored prairie, wetland and bottomland forest habitats
???? Take a guided nature walk for visitors of all ages
???? Bird more than 100 resident and migrant species
???? Enjoy nature from scenic overlooks and bird blinds
???? Learn about the area’s habitats and history through hands-on exhibits
???? Attend workshops on conservation practices & outdoor skills
???? Join a cool nature club: Bug Club, Bird Club, Frog Club, or Adventure Club
???? Attend a field trip with field-based education programs for students
???? Complete your Eagle Scout or Gold Award project
???? Stretch and relax in a yoga class
???? Open young eyes to nature in the Children’s Discovery Garden
???? Participate in the Cornell Lab of Ornithology eBird tracking program
???? Relax and enjoy refreshments on the overview deck or picnic area by the Trinity River
???? Attend Free Third Thursday lectures and activities
???? Sign up for Summer Camp
???? Join an educational program: Birds of Play, Discover Together, Birding 101, Living Green
???? Become a TRAC Volunteer Naturalist

Where are we?

TRAC is 8 minutes from Downtown Dallas on South Loop 12

“A week is a long time in politics”. As goes the quote attributed to British Prime Minister, Harold Wilson. So, on the internet, a year must actually seem like several eons (a billion years, give or take). And, that’s about how long the art251 blog has been around. Thus, a face-lift for the blog has been long overdue.

The new look is designed to give you access to more information about art251 and other arts related musing, and to do so more clearly and efficiently. We’ve made the pages wider, so you have more content to read all the while making it more readable, through better use of white space. We’ve added more links to related pages, and made other information more accessible, so you don’t need to scroll as much. We’ve retained our signature art251 colors – turquoise, blue and green – but made them more subtle, and we’ve changed the layout to make it a little sharper. So, I hope you like it.

So, while I wouldn’t say the blog has undergone major surgery, we have, though, performed some delicate skin grafting procedures.

For the sentimental and historically inclined, here’s an image of the art251 blog 1.0, with the 2.0 revision for comparison.

art251 blog 1.0:

art251 blog 2.0:

It’s been a full year since we first opened our doors to art lovers, on August 19, 2008. We really appreciate all the wonderful support from the community. We’ve generated lots of great buzz in the suburbs, met many enthusiastic art lovers, discovered much great art and many exceptional artists.

So, while we wouldn’t (yet) qualify for a comprehensive retrospective on CNN, here’s a visual tour of some of our most memorable milestones over the last 12 months.

We lifted the veil on our cool sign in August 2008.

We installed our cool custom fixtures in August 2008.

We took delivery of our beautiful blue art-o-mat machine in August 2008.

We previewed some of our newly minted gallery walls in August 2008.

We crashed the annual Ft.Worth Gallery night on Saturday September 6, 2008.

We hosted a “Sip and Sew” event with Sara Moe, our local fiber artist, on September 25, 2008.

We had Clark Whittington, National Bureau Chief for Artists in Cellophane, and brains behind the cult Art-o-mat, art vending machine, in the house in September 2008.

We greeted the Fab Four in October 2008.

We took our art buying seminar on the road to local homeowners associations in November 2008.

We opened our first show, Contemporary Elements, featuring the work of James Johnson (forged metal), Scott Young (glass) and Bobbie Nix (couture jewelry) in December 2008.

?We kicked-off our first annual winter sale in January 2009.

We promoted our first show with Keller City Public Arts Board, featuring photography by Mike Gerra (art251) and Matt Tillbury (Young Artists of Texas Gallery) in February 2009.

?We featured Bryan Wetz’s bold original floral paintings in our March 2009 show.

We started measuring the local “art health index” (AHI) in March 2009. The AHI is a quantitative measure of the following: smiles on the faces of our customers; periods of quiet contemplation looking at new art; sighs of satisfaction from the artist whose work we are featuring for the first time; simultaneous conversations about art; art teachers within the space; average time visitors spend looking at artwork; ratio of small shoe size (kids) to large shoe size (adults); and of course, empty wine glasses and Italian soda bottles from our (in)famous opening receptions.

We featured on Home and Lifestyle TV in March 2009.

We opened art251 Trinity River at the Trinity River Audubon Center in Dallas, with our friend and partner T Hanson in April 2009. Need directions? Click here.

We exhibited Faith Scott Jessup’s dramatic original Texas landscapes in May 2009.

?We hosted the official book release party for Allison Bottke’s novel “You Make Me Feel Like Dancing” in June 2009.

We displayed gorgeously stylish art from nationally recognized, local artist Trish Biddle in our July 2009 show, The Art of Style.

We were voted Best Art Gallery in Tarrant County and placed third in the entire Dallas-Ft.Worth area in a poll of over 60,000 WFAA subscribers, in July 2009.

We were featured in D Magazine’s annual Best of Big D 2009 for “Best Cheap Art”, courtesy of our beautiful blue art-o-mat machine, in August 2009.

So begins year two. We’re ready for another full year of creative adventures and more great art, in the suburbs. Phew!

Thanks to you, our art loving customers, supporters and friends we’ve gained another accolade. Recently, art251 was voted best art gallery in Tarrant County, and 3rd overall in the entire Dallas-Ft.Worth area.

Now, we’re featured in D Magazine’s annual Best of Big D 2009 (that’s Dallas for our non-Texas based readers). And, we’re not even based in Dallas!

art251 is sited for it’s “Best Cheap Art”, courtesy of our beautiful blue art-o-mat machine.

Here’s what D Mag had to say:

“The best part about the Art-o-mat, a retrofitted cigarette machine that sells small pieces of art for $4 to $7 a pop, is that the machine itself is a work of art. Not necessarily in the sense you might immediately think of. The vending machine itself is just a vending machine, same as any other, really. The Art-o-mat, located at the art251 gallery in Keller, is more conceptual in nature, speaking to, among other things, the idea of art as a commodity. More than that, though, it?s practical, leveling the playing field and sparking the interest of those who think they can?t collect art because it?s too expensive. And that is much better for you than a pack of cigarettes. 251 Town Center Ln., Ste. 2109, Keller. 817-898-1444. www.art251.com.”

It’s official. We’re the third best art gallery in the Dallas-Ft.Worth area, and Number One in Tarrant County! In fact, art251 was the only gallery in Tarrant County to make the top 5.

? and

We beat out many bigger name, established galleries and art spaces. So, considering we’ve only been around for just under a year, we are ecstatic and humbled.

So, a very BIG thank you, no THANK YOU! to all our loyal customers and friends. Many of you voted for us in the WFAA poll, and we enjoyed reading all the wonderful reviews as well! And thank you WFAAList on WFAA.com for running the 2009 Best of the Best A-List contest, with 60,485 voters from all over North Texas!

Wondering what all the hoopla! is about? Well, we have an exhibit by Trish Biddle, a local and nationally recognized artist. We’re featuring a range of her decadently stylish originals and prints. The show runs until August 8. Also, we’re home to the only art-o-mat in North Texas. And, of course, we’re a beautiful shell housing original works from over 40 talented local artists who work in clay, oil, ceramic, silver, wood, glass, polymer, ink, fabric and more.

We are fortunate enough to live in a democracy. That means, you get to choose when, where and to whom your precious votes go. Except, when it comes to voting for “best art gallery”.

So, it’s time to cajole and coax you into voting for the 2009 best art gallery in the Dallas-Ft.Worth area. The vote is run by local media WFAA and CityVote. It profiles local businesses and allows consumers to vote across a broad range of favorites from art galleries to zoos.

You can vote online here at WFAAList.

The competition in the art gallery space is tough this year, with numerous nominations, none of which I’ll mention here, except for, of course, art251. So, please check out the site, and give your favorite art gallery in Keller (or any other) your considered and important vote.

Voting ends on July 3, so don’t delay.

By the way, the WFAAlist is a great resource for finding lots of other unique and highly recommended businesses in all manner of categories.