In-Tacoma.net

Today is a big deal, if you are a creative person living in Tacoma, or you like drinking beer and having pizza with creative people. You need to be at this event tonight:

The Hub
203 Tacoma Ave S
Tacoma, WA 98402 US

When: Thursday, June 4, 4:30PM to 6:30PM Add to my Outlook Calendar
Phone: 253.861.1056

We are inviting all of the local artist/designer/marketing community to a first ever happy hour. join us for a low key get together with some of the most influential people in our region. Take time to gripe about the economy, or network with those who might be able to give you a better job, or bask in the glory of your latest success. Whatever your deal, we’ll force you to enjoy our company. Bring your creative self to the Hub for drink and conversation.

Hope to see you there.

Someone sent me some video from the last creative meetup below, (Its going to be like that again for sure):

This weekend local muralists came together on a wall in the Stadium district. This was the result:

About two weeks ago the Tacoma Art Museum was holding an outdoor art show with live painting, chalk artists, full drum band, and break dancers. The break dancers involved were from the Dance Broomz crew. It was fun to see them try something new and perform with the Stadium High school drum band. Take a look at the video below:

If you are interested in having the Dane Broomz perform at one of your events talk to Fab-5.org

Starting *THIS* Saturday, April 4th Fab-5′s rolling out their 10 week urban art program, L.I.F.E.

They’ll be teaching breakdancing, legal graffiti artwork, and DJing and music production/recording.

What’s beautiful about the L.I.F.E. is they provide all the equipment/art supplies and can accommodate those JUST starting out/wanting to learn more, as well as those that want to advance existing skills. All ages/skill levels are welcome, plus, they hook students up with a free lunch after every class session.

To view the front/back of the the digital brochure, click (here) & (here).

L.I.F.E. happens *every* Saturday of April & May from 11am-3pm @ the Brick City Project in downtown Tacoma (754 Pacific Ave, Tacoma WA 98402)

The energy is real nice on these Saturdays. If participating isn’t your thing, feel free to pass this on to a neighbor, son/daughter, niece/nephew or brother/sister that would be interested.

For this program, Fab-5 employs over 15 professional artists from within the Tacoma community as instructors, so please support your community and get a student or two involved.

For more information or to register a student, please visit Fab-5.org or drop an e-mail to info@fab-5.org

Arts Downtown, Puyallup’s Outdoor Art Gallery, is pleased to announce their annual fundraiser in partnership with the Fish Food Bank on April 18, 2009, at Pioneer Pavilion in downtown Puyallup. The evening begins with a no-host social hour and auction preview followed by a dinner of “soul food” provided by Uncle Thurm’s.You will be surrounded by the sounds of jazz and blues performed by the David Keys Trio. A portion of the evening is devoted to our auction event. Donations have been provided by local merchants and businesses throughout Pierce County.

This event allows us to continue our vision of promoting diverse artistic culture and increase visual literacy. It also allows us the opportunity to embrace our community and educate them about Arts Downtown. We are a non-profit, all volunteer organization that curates a rotating and permanent collection of quality outdoor art.

Please bring a donation of canned or non-perishable food for the FISH Food Bank of Puyallup.

Tickets are $20.00 in advance and $25.00 at the door. Space is limited. This is a 21 and over event.
For further information or to purchase tickets online check out our website at www.artsdowntown.org

Not going to lie, the air did start off really fresh then by the end of the night it was a bit musky. All was good though everyone was having a ton of fun, the drinks were pouring and only some of the artwork was stolen. Saw tons of familiar faces many of them the same from 100th monkey except this time there was awesome music so everyone was in a drunken dance trance.

The art was good like usual, many of the power players of the south sound were on showcase. Jeremy, Olson, Alice, Mary-Kate, etc. I hadn’t seen gryms work before thought it was pretty cool, the snacks were good too though I always get a little weirded out about big bowls of chips and such since most people don’t was their hands.

Oh yea, here are a few pics from the night. You might spot yourself.

Tonight if your looking for something to do big poppa Matt is throwing another one of his fun parties up at the Robert Daniel Gallery. The lineup includes about 6 artists and 5 djs. It starts at about 10ish. For more information checkout the flier.

My prediction for the night includes lots of techno, lots of wine and much different crowd then what was up there at the 100th monkey.

If you’ve had a chance to walk by the Tollbooth gallery lately(Worlds smallest gallery) you might have thought it was closed due to vandalism since its wrapped in a black plastic bag. This caught my eye so I walked over for a closer look. Under the bag I found a creepy video which at first looked like a film where someone took a baby bird and wrapped it in a plastic bag, as it struggled to get out. After a few minutes while I stood in disgust I realized it was a battery operated toy that they put in a bag. (Ha!)

A few minutes later it cut to a scene of another toy trapped and moving around in a bag, the voice was very familiar, it was elmo!

Anyways I thought this was definitly one of the most bizarre and interesting videos that has shown at the gallery in awhile. If you have a chance you should definitly check it out, also if anyone knows who that artist is let us know, I’d like to find a copy of the video on the web.

So I guess last night the annual distribution of glassfloats were hidden around Tacoma. For the last 2 years I actively looked for a glass float to call my own, both years I failed. This Monday I was having a fairly crappy monday (A case of the mondays even). I was working hard and didn’t get a chance to take lunch until 3:30pm. While walking to frieghthouse square I glanced down in a bush and thought I saw a beerbottle shoved in it, giving it a closer look it was a float! I was so happy that I found one, especially since I wasn’t even looking! The find completely turned my day around and it was cool to see that there are actually still some floats hiding around. Reading a few of the other blogs, I couldn’t help but laugh at all the cry babies who were complaining about not finding one and calling people that found more then one names. Come on people chillout ~

Anyone else find one? This event is definitly yet another reason why I love Tacoma. I heard that over 600 floats were hidden around. Anyone else find one?

Tonight you get kultured in naked chicks, wine, underground art, and good people. Sneak you way to the alley of the warehouse located a block down from the downtown Tacoma library. Here around 8ish the drunk, the sober, the young and old enjoy art, dance to the dj and drink more wine. Role call who’s going!

KULTURE LAB is the brainchild of Tacoma’s Dead Artists: James Hume, Jim Price, Jeff Olson, Rob Anderson, and James Bender. Kulture Lab is an underground center for the arts, paintings,video,film, performance,sculpture and conceptual art.

Alice in Kulture lab
1114 Court E Tacoma, $5

http://www.myspace.com/culturelabart

Had a chance to swing by 100th monkey at the Robert Daniel Gallery Space was cool, so many people.. anyone else remember the night?

The Karpeles Manuscript Museum, 407 South G Street. Across the street from Wright Park this ominous and often overlooked building stands tall and sports classic architecture. The cannon in the front of the lot guards the door to a free admission and in my opinion a waste of time. History fascinates me especially priceless artifacts from all cycles of cultures and people both important and obscure. I’m not writing a negative piece about this museum, just an honest one.

Upon Entrance I was greeted by a gal freckled from candy abuse and vitamin D. she doesn’t ask for a donation because there is no donation box. She then yammers about the visiting exhibits “hieroglyphics Noah Webster, and more Hieroglyphics.”

The manuscripts, supposed delicate paper are held in frail wooden boxes lined with velvet and guarded by 50 cent locks. A confused curator interested only in the woes of her cell phone chattered away as I saw there were no security measures to protect any of these priceless pressed pieces of pulp. Everything locked in these wooden boxes looked fake, the crinkles and torn edges bare shadows not of the illumination from this musky hall. The bust of good ol’ Honest Abe held my attention longer than the dummies in shining armor. I was troubled by the prints, all but one looked like an original, the handwritten page out of Noah Webster’s first dictionary everything else looked like a laser copy almost pixilated. The laminated descriptions above each box held no information about where the artifact came from; its preservation from the erosion of time, just a translation of the tiny handwriting of history’s greatest.

The Hieroglyphics were encased in ½” Plexiglas locked in by a convenience lock used at stores like k-mart. The descriptions held only the meaning of the symbol and did not describe what tomb or Egyptian monument they were cut from. The sandstone looked manufactured by Quick-Crete and was in perfect condition making yet another artifact here look counterfeit.

All negatives aside, I did enjoy that the walls in one room were covered in what looked like paintings created for 80’s fantasy pulp novels. Two outrageous glass sculptures created by the local Evan Schaus (see Michaels post), and last but not least a limited edition of a limited edition Declaration of independence, the icing on the cake……

My questions and your mystery to solve for a reward of two beers from myself are: How do they pay taxes on this building if no donations are needed nor accepted? How come there seems to be no authenticity to the artifacts? Why were the levels of security so low when some of these priceless pages could be stolen so easily?

Overall, I was stumped by the time I left and felt a strange feeling of being ripped off even though I didn’t pay! What do you think?

photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/maybelline/342866156/

Not sure how many people have been following the progress of local glass artist Evan Schauss. He started learning how to blow glass for Hilltop Artist in residence and has quickly moved up in ranks blowing glass all over the world, Iceland, Hawaii, New Mexico, etc. I’ve been fortunate enough to know him since we starting blowing glass at around the same time. I had a chance to check out his new site which launched a few weeks ago and he has become phenomenal. Check out a few of his latest works from his gallery, pretty crazy!

Also checkout this cool video he worked with Claire on, its a video of his “Walking on glass” series

source: http://evanschauss.com

Who hasn’t seen Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory… Well the guys at Beautiful Angle created a poster that says GOLDEN TICKET across the top of it and have hidden posters all over town for the lucky people of Tacoma to find. Now your probably wondering what do you get if you find of of these well this is what it reads.

Greetings to you the luck finder of this golden ticket from Mr. Billy Baarsma.

I shake you warmly by the hand! Tremendous things are in store for you. I, Billy Baarsma will conduct you around the holy city by myself! I am preparing other surprises that are even more marvelous and more fantastic for you and for all my beloved Golden Ticket holders – mystic and marvelous surprises that will entrance, delight, intrigue, astonish and perplex you beyond measure. Present this ticket at the city gates of eleven oclock in the morning and do not be late. You may bring with you people you love , people you hate, people who have sinned against you and people whom you have sinned against….but no one else. Oompah dee doo

Anyone have any ideas whats going to happen when I meetup with Bill Baarsma tomorrow? I was pretty fortunate to come across one of these since they are hand numbered, I found #109, anyone else going to join me at the gates? Where did you find yours…keep your eyes peeled I’ve still seen a few of them around town.

Today I stopped by Sean Alexanders house where he was giving away free art since he is moving away. It was cool to meet Sean from the Helm hes so down to earth and generous. I walked away with some amazing free art and I was so stoked to get a Sean Alexander original.

I’ll be honest I’ve been eying his work for awhile I just couldn’t afford most of his work. If you didn’t make it out to see Sean today you definitely missed out but don’t worry he’s planning a final show at his apartment, so keep your ears open. His plans sound really cool hes starting a funky respite program where artists will come and live and work in a converted barn out in longbranch.
Checkout what I walked away with!