Our first stop was Artspace 111. Several people I spoke with were seeing the gallery/event space for the first time. A jazz ensemble was performing standards while soon-to-be-opening Cowtown Brewing Company was introducing locals to the brewpub’s well-crafted brews.

Once Upon a Time by Fort Worth artist John Hartley was a visual treat. His photorealistic oil paintings of tin race cars and action figures conjure childhood memories. The macho imagery also suggests that kids are exposed to a subtle form of propaganda from an early age. You can grab copies of our new magazine, Madeworthy, at Artspace 111!

Our next stop, Cydonia Gallery, is a satellite project of Fort Worth Community Art Center. The collaboration allows the community center to use vacant retail shops in Crockett Row as a gallery space. Homecoming featured Michael Dumontier, Micah Lexier, Trish Tillman, and Emi Winter, and included multi-media and mixed-medium artworks. With so many visitors to the West 7th area, a gallery is the perfect way to add culture to an evening of dining and entertainment.

The best fuel for overworked Culture Vultures is, of course, tacos. Our brief respite at Taco Heads on Montgomery Street hit the spot. With our tummies full and with new margarita-induced vigor, we headed southward toward SAM Gallery

Recently founded by local artist Jeremy Joel, SAM Gallery is a private residence in the Fairmount National Historic District. It’s just south of the Near Southside. A live hip-hop artist performed as we, rather tightly, filed into the abode. Walls throughout the house held paintings from local artists. The idea behind the project, Joel told me that night, is to get Fort Worth’s various arts groups/collectives to collaborate, all with the community in mind. From the feedback I heard from pArty bus revelers later that night, this was one of the most popular stops of the night.

The final Gallery Night stop that night was Fort Works Arts. Owned by artist Lauren Childs, the pristine gallery was hosting the final night of Ben Willis’ Candy Man. There was a lot of eye candy. The event was scheduled to end at 9pm, but the crowd numbers peaked well after that time. We were having a good ol’ time when we were summoned to the bus.

FWBLACKHOUSE (pronounced, “Fort Worth Black House”) was our first and last stop. And in that “roundabout” manner, I have to plug the local art scene. No, I don’t mean the museums (Amon Carter, Kimbell, and The Modern), although I love them. I’m talking about the working artists who are making Fort Worth a destination for great modern art.

The truth is, we have a long road ahead of us. Getting national attention might require a more collaborative approach with regards to working with Dallas, rather than the sometimes-combative stance we often take (ahem, the Dallas jokes we may or may not make). But seriously, even with two sold-out party buses, Fort Worth Fall Gallery Night demands much more attention than it currently gets. My hope is that this article and the expanding role Art Tooth (of which I am on the board) is taking can help raise public awareness of this important twice-a-year arts event.

So, should we do four buses next year?

Edward Brown writes about music, arts, and news for a variety of publications. He’s an award-winning writer for the Fort Worth Weekly and volunteers for numerous Fort Worth nonprofits.

The post Gallery Crawl on the pArty Bus: Fall Gallery Night first appeared on Tanglewood Moms.

As the Uber driver dropped me off at my first Spring Gallery Night stop, Fort Worth Black House, I was feeling giddy — like 5^th-grade-field-trip giddy. A large chartered bus parked nearby was being stocked with vino, suds, and Cheetos. The itinerary for the day was enviable: Artspace 111, Gallery 76102, Fort Worth Contemporary Arts, Fort Works Art, Fort Worth Community Arts Center, and The Foundry District.

The joy ride was organized by a new hybrid art collective, Art Tooth, and sponsored by The Foundry District. Our first stop was nearby. Artspace111 combines a rustic, industrial exterior with a minimalist gallery space and a bucolic outdoor patio. The main attraction was the works of Al Souza, an artist internationally known for his painterly creations that are fabricated from thousands of jigsaw puzzle pieces. For the most part, the subject matter (food, nature, knick-knacks) and medium invited lighthearted, playful observation. As my friend Guillermo Tapia pointed out, everyone has tried to build a jigsaw puzzle at some point in their life. Al Souza’s works will be on display through May 6.

One hour and two drinks later, we were in Gallery 76102, a University of Texas at Arlington-managed contemporary artspace. MAKING WAVES/MOVING MINDS features works by Amie Adelman, Taylor Barnes, Morgan Chivers, Gregory Scott Cook, Joshua Goode, and Letitia Huckaby. The show was notable for the unconventional use of sound, electronics, and fabric-based creations.

TCU’s Fort Worth Contemporary Arts has long been on my list of galleries to visit. The large single room space is straightforward. RAWIYA: We Do Not Choose Our Dictators features works by female photographers. From everyday events to depictions of the perilous life of refugees, the show humanizes the lives of men, women, and children living in the Middle East. The subject matter is prescient in a time when forces (political and otherwise) are working to stereotype and stigmatize Muslims. RAWIYA runs through May 13.

Gallery newcomer Fort Works Art has made a big splash in a short time. Its owner Lauren Childs, a fine artist in her own right, has sought innovative artists (mostly local) of all stripes for shows that have engaging themes. #28grams features artists who have cultivated large numbers of Instagram followers, some in the hundreds of thousands. The show also featured pieces by local artists like Riley Holloway and Hillary Dohoney.

Fort Worth’s arts community finds a home at FWCAC. The sprawling former home of the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth is under new gallery and program management. Jonathan Levy recently announced his big plans for the space. One centerpiece of the Gallery Night event was Katherine Toon’s Bloom. The installation had a strong temporal element not usually found in the visual arts. The metaphor of a fading rose reminded me of how many of my artist friends are currently in the full “bloom” of life.

It was obvious why our last official stop was The Foundry District. Large crowds, a DJ, and endless pours of mixed drinks and beers added a not-so-subtle party feel. It was a great way to end the evening. (I recently interviewed one of the Foundry’s directors for a TanglewoodMoms.com blog.) The center attraction was a 180-foot mural that local artists (including Jay Wilkinson, Jeremy Joel, Hillary Dohoney, Jana Renee, and others) were hard at work on, creating as we watched.

The evening didn’t end with our return to FWBlackHouse. In fact, people were just starting to arrive for a party that lasted well past midnight and featured an exhibit by Dallas-based musician/artist Sean Miller and grub from Funky Town Food Truck.

Hopefully, this article whetted your appetite for modern art or at least got you a little curious about it. Don’t forget to follow Art Tooth and FWBlackHouse for the best ways to keep up with the cutting edge of Fort Worth culture.

For a true artist’s perspective of the evening, my good friend Christopher Blay has a lengthy Gallery Night review out this week in the Fort Worth Weekly that I recommend reading.

Edward Brown writes about music, arts and news for a variety of publications. He’s an award-winning writer for the Fort Worth Weekly and blogger for Fort Worth Convention and Visitors Bureau. He has published articles in Musical Opinion (U.K.), Canadian Music Educators Journal, and Clavier Companion,among others. When Brown isn’t writing about music, he’s actively involved in the local music scene as an educator, performer, lecturer, and judge for student music competitions. His professional affiliations include the Chamber Music Society of Fort Worth, where he volunteers as education director, and the Fort Worth Academy of Fine Arts, where he serves on the board and artistic committee. Brown was born in Bowling Green, Ohio in 1982. He is a graduate of the University of North Texas and currently resides in Fort Worth. His favorite leisure time activities include local music concerts and perusing Fort Worth’s growing gastropub scene.

The post Gallery Hopping on the pArty Bus first appeared on Tanglewood Moms.

The three venues Sarah Angle, Lee DuBose, Victoria Wise, and I visited reflect different aspects of our city’s evolving art scene (as you’ll soon read). The artists and gallery owners we met that evening are some of the most passionate and hard working folks you’ll ever meet. Here are their stories told through my recollections that Saturday.

We began our soiree at the newish gallery Fort Works Art, founded by Lauren Childs and J.W. Wilson, and located one block southwest of the Cultural District. When I looked up from signing the guestbook, Lauren greeted me with a warm hello and hug. An established artist in her own right, Lauren has transformed her art space into a launching pad where locally and regionally-known artists can garner national attention while connecting with discerning art collectors. Lauren has told me in previous conversations that her short term goal is to provide local buyers with a viable alternative to that “other” city to our east. Beyond that, Lauren and her staff are working to see that Fort Worth is one day considered a modern art destination on par with, say, New York City and Los Angeles.

In addition to several artists featured that evening was Dan Lam. Before I go further, open Instagram and look her up (@sopopomo). Yes, the 28-year-old has nearly 83,000 followers. The Dallas-based artist’s polyurethane works are inviting and, dare I say, cute. Well, cute in an amorphous drip art kind of way.

Our next stop, after a few “Road Closed” sign setbacks, was Artspace 111. The art venue, located just east of Downtown, blends an austere gallery space with a bucolic outdoor area that rivals what I imagine the Garden of Eden looked like. I’m less familiar with the venerable space’s history, but I know from my artist friends that the gallery’s owners are extremely supportive of emerging artists. Make time to visit this local treasure soon.

Our last stop was Brik Special Events Venue, more commonly known as Brik. On display that night were photos, paintings, and sculptures by 34 local, regional, and national artists. The show, “FOUR,” was a collaboration between the artist collective Art Tooth and the contemporary pop-up art gallery ART ROOM Gallery.

Even with dozens of artworks on display, the sprawling open floor space never felt cluttered. Live music and a full service bar provided libations and entertainment as my friends and I perused the scene. The Art Tooth folks (Shasta Haubrich, Dee Lara, James Talambas, Brandon Pederson, Jay Wilkinson, Aimee Cardoso, and others) are an interesting group, all young and from varied backgrounds that converge around art. For the past two years, I’ve watched them grow new crowds of contemporary art fans while creating a framework to help aspiring painters, photographers, and sculptors rise from obscurity to public recognition. Like with many professional careers, young artists face certain challenges. One of those obstacles is breaking into commercial gallery spaces. The event organizers at Brik weren’t going to wait for the establishment to recognize them. These young artists are creating opportunities where they didn’t exist before, and I think that’s pretty cool.

The title of this article is “Why Gallery Night Matters.” What I’m really getting at is why art matters. I don’t like to preach, so I saved this thought for last. Modern art, while seen by some as less accessible than works by Monet or Van Gogh, speaks to the time we live in. All art was once modern art.

Hamlet said of playwriting: “For anything so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is to hold, as ’twere, the mirror up to nature, to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure.” Modern art shows “the very age and body of the time…” Choosing to visit these galleries, meet the artists, and purchase the works that connect with you shows that you value culture in the deepest sense of the word.

Edward Brown writes about music, arts and news for a variety of publications. He’s an award-winning writer for the Fort Worth Weekly and blogger for the Fort Worth Convention and Visitors Bureau. He has published articles in Musical Opinion (U.K.), Canadian Music Educators Journal, and Clavier Companion, among others. When Brown isn’t writing about music, he’s actively involved in the local music scene as an educator, performer, lecturer, and judge for student music competitions. His professional affiliations include the Chamber Music Society of Fort Worth, where he volunteers as education director, and the Fort Worth Academy of Fine Arts, where he serves on the board and artistic committee. Brown was born in Bowling Green, Ohio in 1982. He is a graduate of the University of North Texas and currently resides in Fort Worth. His favorite leisure time activities include local music concerts and perusing Fort Worth’s growing gastropub scene.

The post Why Gallery Night Matters first appeared on Tanglewood Moms.