Now that life is slowly shifting back to normal we are eager to start up our beloved First Friday gallery nights, featuring Andrea Konstant, and Cara Walton. Please join us on Friday, September 3rd, 2021 from 5:00 pm – 8:00 pm to celebrate our featured artists and enjoy getting back to community engagement, masks required, vaccines encouraged. You can also learn more or RSVP to this event here.
Cara Walton is a self-proclaimed “accidental artist” and Star Wars nerd who uses photography to take a step away from the stress that comes with work, life, and being an educator through the pandemic. Between being a high school World History professor, and teaching photography for educators at James Madison University, Walton makes time to find the beauty in abandonment.
Andrea Konstant rekindled her love of art in the middle of the pandemic and hasn’t looked back, she pulls inspiration from different aspects of nature such as flowers, shells, and rocks. There is no lack of inspiration for Andrea as she is constantly on the move, she has traveled to Nepal, China, Thailand, India, and all through Europe. She plans to eventually visit every single National Park in the United States, which will lead to even more creative pieces.
We are stoked to get back to First Friday celebrations and even more thrilled to host zentangle inspired artist, Andrea Konstant! Andrea grew up in Elkton and studied art at Blue Ridge Community College, she later went on to pursue a degree in organizational leadership at Eastern Mennonite University. When she isn’t creating new colorful works she can be found hiking, camping, or kayaking, or even in a foreign country.
Andrea Konstant rekindled her love of art in the middle of the pandemic and hasn’t looked back, she pulls inspiration from different aspects of nature such as flowers, shells, and rocks. There is no lack of inspiration for Andrea as she is constantly on the move, she has traveled to Nepal, China, Thailand, India, and all through Europe. She plans to eventually visit every single National Park in the United States, which will lead to even more creative pieces.
Andrea found that studying art didn’t provide the same satisfaction as creating art, and jumped into a zentangle class in hopes of getting back into touch with her creative passion. Her love of art took off more than ever before and she rediscovered her excitement for color, shade, and composition. Konstant’s style focuses heavily on color interactions and shades married with natural elements.
Although most of her work hones in on color, she enjoys experimenting with black and white illustration and geometric subject matter. You can check out more of Andrea’s colorful creations through the month of September at theCW Depot! Or check out her Instagram for her newest pieces! You can also learn more or RSVP to this event here.
As everything begins to shift back to normal, we start to get back to what we missed, one of those things being First Friday. We couldn’t imagine a better way to kick off the festivities than with some amazing artists, this month we will be featuring Professor Cara Walton, who was been featured in ArtSpace, The 1650 Gallery, and the Louvre.
Cara Walton is a self-proclaimed “accidental artist” and Star Wars nerd who uses photography to take a step away from the stress that comes with work, life, and being an educator through the pandemic. Between being a high school World History professor, and teaching photography for educators at James Madison University, Walton makes time to find the beauty in abandonment. Her work focuses on the details of decay and utilizes black and white tones to hone in on fine aspects that would otherwise be lost in full-color prints. On the other hand, she expresses her love of color through tie-dye work and exemplifies a selective eye when it comes to when and how to utilize the rainbow.
We could not be more thrilled to host such a talented artist at The CW Depot and begin to shift back to normal, celebrating art and music once again as a community.
Walton’s work will be on display during the month of September 2021 but to check out more of Cara’s art browse: Instagram, Facebook, and Fine Art America. You can also learn more or RSVP to this event here.
I have decided that this coming year I am going to do 365 intentional acts of kindness. Please join me in making our world a little brighter for others. #rocktownresilient #365actsofkindness
This year has been filled with a lot of negativity and challenges. On a personal level, I know I am blessed to have enough, maybe even more than enough. I did not go hungry. I have a home. I have stayed healthy. While work slowed tremendously for a few months our small business is surviving. While 2020 was filled with negative things, there were lots of silver linings and blessings.
The opportunity to work from home, spending more time with my girls this year, is incredible. I am still able to serve my clients and be with my family more than I ever imagined possible. The interactions I have had with friends this year have been special, whether through zoom or distanced in-person. Not having the ability to see anyone anytime makes the few meetings much sweeter. There have been so many positives in this year.
Finding ways to support others this year also has brought me incredible joy. Rotary Club of Rockingham County has not had in-person meetings since March and many of our service projects were cancelled. However, that did not stop our #serviceaboveself. I was fortunate to be able to deliver meals once a week to First Step on behalf of our club for a couple of months. I participated in a food drive for Our Community Place, cleaned up a highway, picked up trash along blacks run near Purcell Park, helped hand out food to Harrisonburg school families, and planted tulips at First Step and NENA Community Center. I supported local business by eating at locally owned area restaurants once a week at least and showing love to the servers and delivery drivers.
I also wrote positive online reviews for local companies, donated to local fundraisers and food pantries, purchased music and swag from local bands, and sent notes of appreciation to essential workers. I have tried to remember every day to wish a Happy Birthday to friends on Facebook and have sent out more thank you notes and gift cards this year than any other year before. I helped install solar panels at Eastern Mennonite School in a solar barn raising project. I found places to help others by creating online resources for home schooling, researched and published tips to make buildings safer, and created stress relief coloring pages. I also created amonthly young professionals networking group and hosted monthly education sessions for other architects. In order to support the local arts community I designed an outdoor stage that was used by both EMS and Harrisonburg High School.
I had not thought about all the good that these actions were doing for me until I watched this Ted talk that Nadia posted to Facebook.
So now after seeing this video, I am going to be intentional this coming year about putting #serviceaboveself. I will pledge to do #365actsofkindness over the coming year. Please join me and help spread kindness through the world and bring yourself happiness through action.
This event is in the Depot’s 2nd floor gallery located at 141 W. Bruce St., Harrisonburg, VA. Artwork will remain on exhibit through the month.
Jordan Mitchell is an artist who works primarily in watercolor, ink & charcoal. She was born and raised in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania and graduated with a B.S. in Communications from Bridgewater College in Bridgewater, Virginia. Her floral, feminine and typographic pieces are inspired by the colorful works of artists such as Georgia O’Keefe and Ed Rusha. She attributes her passion for creating joyful works to (very) patient public school art teachers and the creative genius that is her younger brother, Noah Mitchell of Atom Shine Comics. Jordan currently lives and works in downtown Harrisonburg where she enjoys painting, relaxing with friends, and frequenting the areas great restaurants.
If you missed our First Friday at the Depot this month, you missed an amazing party. Santa and Red Wing Academy were at the Depot and the spirit of Christmas was in the air.
We had lots of young friends stop by to see the guy in Red – no not Charles – the other jolly elf – Santa. He gave out candy canes and listened to the wish lists. Some LONGER than others. Charles is still hoping Santa will bring him a Harley Davidson if he says it enough times.
We welcomed Red Wing Academy back to our space and they blessed us with beautiful music. Meg with Tiller Strings, led the group in three sets up music playing Christmas tunes and even some Steel Wheels classics.
The night was beautiful and hopefully Santa will recover from his injuries suffered from these two sitting on his lap before Christmas day.
If you have not attended our First Friday downtown in the past, we will start up again in March – we hope you can visit. January and February there are still gallery openings downtown, so watch for posts for locations on the Art Council Facebook page.
From all of us at the Depot, we wish you a peace filled holiday season! Happy Holidays!
