A group of local artists is taking a more comfortable approach to their pop-up art show in Easthampton: it’s designed as a living room.
“The Living Room,” created by artist collective The Art Band, will have its opening reception in Eastworks Suite 145 on Saturday, Oct. 18, at 5 p.m.
The show – billed as an “art show, hang sesh and happy place” – is situated in an L-shaped space surrounded by art on the walls, tables and clothing racks nearby, and couches, rugs and pillows arranged to provide a homelike feel.
“We’re always trying to break the mold a little bit of what a typical art show is,” said Sharona Color (the artist name of Sharon Leshner).
The Art Band is a group of local visual artists (some of whom are also musicians) who typically meet in another Eastworks studio to create art, hold sessions to share skills within the group, lead workshops and “encourage each other as artists to keep going, just by being a community,” Color said.
“What brings us together is that we continue to make work together, to collaborate despite all the things that make it hard to do that,” she added.
Mary Craig, who is new to the group, said The Art Band, and the artist community in Eastworks as a whole, “feels like this old-growth artist community that has been sustaining itself and growing and becoming more diverse and more supportive. The more people who are making, makes it richer. There’s an abundance as a starting point that I feel landing in this building and in this community in particular. There’s a solidarity and a rooting for you. There’s a hype.”
Group member Amelia Moore added that art-making is often very solitary, so having the feedback and the encouragement “is really huge.”
The group’s past annual exhibits have included “In Between,” a show of works in progress, and a show with an experimental theme, encouraging group members to try something new. With this year’s show, the group’s goal was to create a space that, unlike a traditional art gallery, was universal, familiar and comfortable – and, true to their ethos, helped foster a sense of community.
“It is an art show,” Color said, “but we’re trying to bring the living room energy into the space so that everybody feels like it’s a place where you can ask questions, you can meet the artists, as opposed to the white cube of an art space, the typical sort of environment where you walk around and then maybe you leave.”
Some of the works on display include large oil paintings of trees by Mary Craig; embroidered clothing by hani rosenbaum thompson; small, quick drawings created by Amelia Moore in her first year of motherhood; and more. Other participating artists include Color, Maddie McDougall, Marciela Garcia, Mary Noyes Craig, and Ryan Murray. Color will be showing four works depicting a bird in flight, plus a dozen small works with the theme “party” – specifically chosen as a way of promoting joy in the face of political oppression, especially against queer people and people of color.
“You can’t take that away from us,” she said. “We can celebrate together. We can be together. We can be loud, we can be queer and colorful, and we won’t stand back in the face of these challenges to who we are.”
Following the opening reception, the public can view the show during a “Snacks n Draw” event on Friday, Oct. 24, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., for which guests are invited to meet the artists, bring a snack to share and enjoy “low-stakes drawing”; the Eastworks Open Studios, on Saturday, Nov. 1, and Sunday, Nov. 2, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; and the closing celebration on Saturday, Nov. 15, from 6 to 8 p.m.
“You can sit in your living room by yourself, but we’re not really offering that,” Color said. “Come for the social atmosphere … I think it’s going to be really fun.”
Admission to The Living Room is free. Artwork will be available for purchase.
