I’ve been hoping for it for a couple of months now, but I think finally we’re going to get some nice warm weather for 1st Thursday this week. We’re going to mix it up a bit this month by stopping at a few places that will be totally new to the Santa Barbara Arts Collaborative‘s Art Crawl. I hope you can join me for the night. It should be a blast. All you have to do to join the Art Crawl is show up at 900 State Street in the Walkabout Woods Installation at 5:30 this Thursday. Look for the Art Crawl sign.

Click on the image below to see a larger version of this month’s map.

A Rough Itinerary for the Evening

Here are a few of the things I’m most excited about.

WALKABOUT WOODS
900 State Street
Walkabout Woods is a highly collaborative, interactive art installation made by Fishbon, a local arts collaborative. The project, in its entirety, will resemble a vast abstract enchanted forest and is destined for Burning Man 2011. Come enjoy a small portion of the forest on the patio.

SOJOURNER CAFE
134 East Canon Perdido Street
(805) 965-7922
Kat Devlin won’t be the only draw for this event, the ever popular painter, Chris Potter is teaming up with our long time favorite Kevin Gleason (ask Kevin about our mural), along with a special wine tasting with David from Southern Wine & Spirits. The best place to close out your 1st Thursday evening, open until 11pm.

THE GRANADA THEATRE
1214 State Street
(805) 899-3000
Zombies and Buddhas art exhibition by Jill Littlewood in the McCune Founders Room. “My sons, and their friends, often talk about zombies and surviving zombie attacks. I’ve never heard girls bring this subject up. I began wondering what zombies mean to young men, so I played with the imagery. As I was painting – using colored paper pulp – every once in a while a buddha would appear and give me some relief from the anger and turmoil of zombie faces.” Enjoy Modern Jazz, Latin and Pop from Cut Time, presented by theSanta Barbara Youth Music Academy.

FUZION
1115 State St.
(805) 687-6401
Downstairs at Fuzion Gallery we are hosting Jamie Dufek’s art reception from 7PM-10PM with the show hanging through the month of May, Free drinks for 21+and Guest DJ Chadillac will be playing all night too!

Friday night at 6 pm a 24 hour creative art rally will begin at the Contemporary Arts Forum. I have it from good sources that over 100 artists have signed up for the event. Not all of them will be doing the entire 24 hours, but many will and the results are sure to be interesting. There is also a closing reception on Sunday, but I REALLY recommend going to the event to see the creative marathon in action. I hope to see tons of people there.

If you take pictures, send them my way and I’ll post them on the blog.

COLLECT DRAWINGS CREATED BY LOCAL ARTISTS!

Friday, July 23, 6 pm
through
Saturday, July 24, 6 pm
Closing Reception:
Sunday, July 25, 4-6 pm

Come to see local artists draw and to purchase artwork hot off the presses at the rally and at the celebratory closing reception. All of the proceeds will be divided between the drawers and CAF. $5 to attend the rally and get first pick of available artworks.  FREE to attend the closing reception at which any remaining artworks will be for sale. For more information visit sbcaf.org or call (805) 966-5373

Support for From Dusk ’til Drawn provided by: Bella Dolce Bakery, CASA Magazine, City 2.0, Craft Essentials, DJ Colin Marshall, DJ Magneto, The Graphic Vendor, RND Vodka, Santa Barbara Premiere Catering, The Santa Barbara Independent, The Santa Barbara News-Press, and Via Maestra.

Happy New Year to one and all! It’s time for our first First Thursday of the new decade, and I’ve got a list of highlights to add to your tour tonight.

Artamo Gallery

Artamo is small and easy to miss, but it is Santa Barbara’s leading gallery for international abstract art. Unlike much of Santa Barbara, I am a huge fan of abstract art. Tonight Artamo has put together a group of small works specifically for those of us that do not have large pocketbooks. This might be a great opportunity for fans of abstract art to pick something up for yourself or a loved one, without having to mortgage  away your unborn children–always a plus!

SBMA

The Santa Barbara Museum of Art has extended one of the best shows that they have had there in a long time. If you haven’t seen it yet, make sure to check out “California Calling”, an exhibit that highlights the innovative, and  in-your-face art that has come out of California over the last sixty years, including iconic works by David Park, Sam Francis, and long-time UCSB professor Howard Warshaw.

Santa Barbara Arts Collaborative

The fledgling Santa Barbara Arts Collaborative will be having its second showing of 2-D and 3-D art at Casa de la Guerra. There will be live art making  and music to accompany the exhibit. Make sure and stop by and learn about the big plans that this collaborative has for the new year.

Casa Magazine

Casa Magazine‘s home base on Canon Perdido Street will host an exhibit by Beth Amine entitled Inner Worlds of Possibility: Alive and Visible. Amine will be exhibiting her handmade shrines and leading shrine-making activities. Casa will also have refreshments and tasty provisions for those of you who forgot to eat before hitting the street.

Contemporary Arts Forum

Finally, as mentioned in my last post, Ted Mills will be performing his second installment of The Amazing Animated Jukebox. The Amazing Animated Jukebox Vol. 2 screens videos from Coldplay, Beck, Radiohead, Menomena, N.A.S.A. featuring Kool Keith and Tom Waits, Death Cab for Cutie, Birdy Nam Nam, Lemon Jelly, Royksopp, Azeem, The New Pornographers, and many more. Don’t miss your fix of the latest wave in animated eye candy ranging from old-school 2-D line drawing to computer graphics and those that negotiate the subtle levels in between.

See you on the street!

It has been a crazy week so my usual monthly First Thursday preview is a bit behind this month. However, there is a ton of great shows to see tonight and I want to make sure to highlight some of them so you can make sure to add them to your itinerary. First of all, the Artamo Gallery, CASA Magazine, The Health Gallery and Sullivan Goss – An American Gallery are accepting food donations for Art Helps, a benefit for the Unity Shoppe. This month’s request is for jars of peanut butter. If you bring in a jar of peanut butter you will get a sweet Art Helps button and will receive 10% off a purchase from that gallery. Make sure to pack a jar of peanut butter with you when you head out tonight. Even if you don’t purchase anything, it will help support less fortunate Santa Barbara families.

Click on the image above to see the full-size flyer

The two art shows that I want to highlight start with tonight both begin at 7pm so they would be great places to check out after you’ve made your regular rounds. First off, blog regular Jimmy Bell has a show opening up at Cali Green on West Ortega, just off of State Street. Bell uses a variety of techniques like splatter, scribble and folds to incorporate randomness and chance into his creative process, letting each piece unfold from the outcome of the initial result. Just within the last year you may have seen some of his work  at Red’s, Elsie’s, Blackbird, Fishnet or the Street Murals projec on Mason and Helena Streets. He must be one of the hardest working young artists in town, so make sure to show him your support by stopping by.

The second “Must See” of the night will happen at the Contemporary Arts Forum, also at 7 o’clock. As part of their Forum Lounge series Daniel Barrow will present “Every Time I See Your Picture I Cry”. Barrow comes to us from Winnipeg and was featured in the 2009 Time Based Art Festival in Portland, OR.  He uses obsolete technology like old-school overhead projectors to weave a tale through “manual” animation. It is sure to be an interesting lo-fi event.

Regardless of where you end up tonight, if you see anything that you absolutely loved, make sure to come back to the blog and post your comment to tell us all about it.

For good or for bad, it is Fiesta in Santa Barbara. I usually celebrate the occasion by locking myself inside for the duration and try to avoid State Street at all costs. However, tonight there are very good reasons to make an exception tonight to head out for First Thursday. One of the things I’m most excited about tonight is the opportunity to go behind the scenes at the Granada. The venue will open up the lower sections and allow visitors to see the dressing rooms, rehearsal rooms, etc. I’ve always enjoyed checking out the inner workings of places like this, though  I can’t say exactly why.

It is also Art Helps at  Artamo Gallery, CASA Magazine, The Health Gallery and Sullivan Goss – An American Gallery. These galleries will be accepting donations of cereal for The Unity Shoppe to help needy local families. With your donation you will receive a 10% discount on a future purchase and 10% of the proceeds of that purchase will also be donated to the Unity Shoppe.

If you haven’t seen the wonderful “California Calling” exhibit at the museum this would be a great time to stop in. The exhibit only consists of two small rooms, so you can see the exhibit with plenty of time left over for other places.

At the Contemporary Arts Forum there is “Echo of the Whole: Call For Entries ’08-’09: Adrienne Allebe, Stephanie Dotson, Tera Galanti, Servando Garcia”. I love call for entries shows and was unable to attend the opening for this show last week, so I’m excited to see the work of these four artists tonight. At 7 CAF will have “Selected Short Films by Aïda Ruilova, a video artist who draws inspiration from B-movie horror and vampire flicks of the ’70s. Ruilova’s videos combine classical cinematic devices with distinctively low-tech sensibilities, quick-cuts, and jarring soundtracks to create works that exist in the space between sound and image.”

There are two photography shows to get excited about as well. At the Brooks Institue’s Gallery 27 there is a exhibit of photos of famous photographers by Tim Mantoani. And at Samy’s Camera there is a show by Charlie Mitchell who has recreated famous old master paintings with a camera and clever Photoshop work. I haven’t been able to confirm that Samy’s will be staying open late for First Thursday, so this might make a good first stop on your itinerary.

Wherever you go tonight, make the Fishnet Gallery and Retail Theatre your last stop once all the State Street galleries have closed. Fishnet will be hosting the first monthly First Thursday after-hours event from 8 to Midnight. If you haven’t been to the Fishnet Gallery yet, it is located at 46 Helena St. just a block  from State Street and half a block from the beach. Tonight’s event will feature the work of amazing concept artists Mark Goerner, who will be demonstrating his process live.  I have seen Mark give a presentation on his work before, and it was, without exaggeration, one of the coolest things I have seen in a very long time. So I can’t recommend this highly enough. In typical Fishnet fashion the evening will also include DJs,  fire performers, hoop dancers and the wonderful mayhem usually associated with this crowd. I’ve also heard a rumor that there is some amazing street art murals across the street from Fishnet. I don’t think these are permanent, so make sure to check it out while you can.

I’ve attached all the info on the Fishnet event below. While you’re out and about tonight if you see anything that you think I should mention on the blog, please contact me to tell me all about it.

DON’T FORGET FISHNET ARTIST PROCESS SHOW Tomorrow Night after First Thursday Art Walk

MARK GOERNER at FISHNET

with projections by Republic of Tri, music by
DJ Mouse, Kit on Hoops, a special showing of the new Pyrospin film, and cuisine by the Hot Dog Man

Thursday, AUGUST 6th 8pm-Midnight
46 Helena Avenue, Santa Barbara

Mark Goerner's "Moon Crash 5"

Veteran of countless high profile projects in various industries, including work for such films as Minority Report, X-Men2, Superman, Battle Angel Alita, and Iron Man 2. Mark will demonstrate his process live at FISHNET. This will be a killer night. FISHNET is all about process, how artists conceive, prototype and produce their finished work. Thursday night FISHNET artist MARK GOERNER will be on hand to talk about his process, techniques and the philosophy he uses  to develop is professional and gallery work.

We’ll have a large selection of Mark’s work for sale at the event and he’ll be happy to sign prints following the demo.