Feast Arts Center has quickly become Tacoma's most avant garde gallery featuring the most challenging of contemporary visual arts including painting, sculpture, installations, conceptual and performance art -- respecting history and tradition while pushing the envelope. Plus, Feast has classes ranging from live figure drawing sessions to classes in performance art, including circus art and abstract watercolor classes.
Todd Jannausch and Chandler Woodfin opened Feast three years ago. "We opened Feast because we saw a need for greater access to the arts. We wanted to create a model that allowed artists to feel empowered, to show their work, to teach classes and to interact with the community in new ways. We wanted to split away from historical models that relied on commoditizing artists' work or relied on public donations as a way to create sustainability. It's a huge struggle but we are doing it. In the last 28 months, we have held 25 gallery exhibitions, we've held hundreds of free events for the community, we provide below market rate studio space to working artists, and we have created partnerships with existing organizations within our community to expand art as part of their curriculum. We are incredibly honored to be a part of the Tacoma arts community, and we hope we can continue to find new ways to support artists and our community."
Next up at Feast is an exhibition of terra cotta sculpture with mixed-media decorations by popular Tacoma artist Nicholas Nyland, such as "Charm Burro," a terra cotta sculpture laden with glazed ceramic charms and mini-sculptures attached with hand-fashioned brass and copper loops and pins.
"I'll be showing new works created within the last year or so that play with traditional forms or motifs from craft and decorative traditions," Nyland says. "I'm interested in the early modern desire to merge art and life and surround themselves with a new aesthetic sensibility."
FEAST ARTS CENTER, gallery hours noon-4 p.m., Saturday; 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., Sunday, and by appointment, Nicholas Nyland show July 19-Aug. 12, 1402 S. 11th St., Tacoma, feastarts.com
