This year, I’m participating in the East Austin Studio Tour (aka EAST.) EAST is a behind-the-scenes look at working artists’ studios. Artists come together, clean up their studios spaces, throw big parties, hang lots of work on the walls, and invite everybody from the community to come and have a look. It’s really a great event, it’s free, and it’s well attended each and every year. This year, over 300 artists are participating and there is food and live music events, as well as other happenings. The doors opened this morning at 11 and it’s been an exciting, fun, crazy busy day for everybody.
The website for EAST is eastaustinstudiotour.com.
You can also follow EAST on twitter, Facebook, and all of the usual places online, but, to really get a feel for EAST, it’s best to enjoy it in person. If you happen to be in Austin, or in the Austin area, consider stopping by for a look and to participate in some of the activities.
EAST allows artists to sell work, but it’s also a way for artists to learn more about other artist’s specific tools, techniques, and practices. It’s a knowledge exchange as well as a big show.
From the website:
E.A.S.T. remains focused on the Artists & Studios. Studios, the places where artists create their work, will be open from 11:00 AM – 6:00 PM on the tour weekends: November 13 & 14 and 20 & 21.
Exhibition Spaces are established venues whose main thrust is to exhibit fine art or performances. This includes galleries, theaters and the like. Exhibition Spaces on the tour will also be open on the weekends from 11:00 AM – 6:00 PM, November 13 & 14 and 20 & 21
Happenings are temporary art projects created specifically for the East Austin Studio Tour. Happenings include performance pieces, art openings and celebrations. Happenings take place on the tour weekends after 6:00 PM. Furthermore includes an eclectic mix of out-of-the-box events, projects, artist competitions, celebrations, et cetera, et cetera! Check out each one for their location and schedule.
There’s a lot happening on the East Austin Studio Tour, so they maintain a website, print a detailed catalog, and provide a printed map of all the events, studios, and galleries, to help you find specific locations.
This year, they also have a mobile version of the map, generously provided and created by groupKGR. Visit: 2010east.com on your phone for free access. For more information: EMAIL [email protected] PHONE 512-385-1670
I spent the day today down at the EAST headquarters, which is located at a place called “Big Medium” on Bolm Road in Austin. Big Medium is a non-profit gallery, studio, performance, etc. space located next door to the Bay 6 encaustic studio.
Today was a wonderful day, with busloads of people coming in, touring the studio spaces, viewing the work, asking about encaustics, and just generally hanging out and having fun. It was a beautiful day for art in Austin and I was very happy to be a small part of it.
I’ll be down in the EAST studio spaces again over the course of the tour and I hope to see some of you there. It’s been crazy busy but if you do make it down, please stop in and say hello. I’ll be at the Texas Wax Encaustic Artists studio extension, which is pinpoint 66 on your EAST maps. It’s located right across the street from Big Medium.
I hope to keep blogging, tweeting, Facebooking-etc. from EAST but it’s been hard since it’s so busy and I’m sharing a lot of face time with folks from the Austin art scene.
Until next time…
PS Some logistics. (Sorry for those of you who are blog readers but, with all of the craziness happening today, I have to use my blog as a means of communicating with my fellow EAST-goers.)
The labels are up now, they were not up earlier in the day today, when I took the photos with the camera phone. We do not have a full price list but all pieces have prices.
The movie is running in the kitchen. We had a hard time getting the projector to loop but you can push play to get it to go again and it’s pretty easy. It’s the button with the arrow on top.
We’ve had some inquiries about the work and came close to selling a few pieces but nothing at the cottage has sold yet (will probably change tomorrow.) Some stuff has sold at the Big Medium studios and also at Bay 6. There is brisk traffic, with bus loads of people coming in. It gets crowded at times, be prepared.
For those gallery sitting, please be ready to chat about encaustics and talk about some of the pieces. We’ve had a lot of artists asking about Texas Wax so remember our website is texaswax.com and be sure to tell them we meet on the 3rd Saturday of the month, starting again in January.
