Tag Archives: galleries

Life in the Capital, Real World DC, Special Events, The District, Thrifty District
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Planning a DC Wedding: Venues

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

While planning your big day can often seem daunting, First Class Functions will provide you with professional advice to help you know what is needed to make your special day everything you imagined.

Photo courtesy of Karon

 

Random Find
courtesy of Karon
The Social Chair returns to tell us all about finding a DC venue for a DC wedding.

After narrowing down the date for our wedding, Fedward and I began the long process of finding the perfect location. Alas, not enough of you voted for us to win a wedding, so our dream venue of the National Building Museum was quickly out of the running. What could be more DC than one of the locations of the Inaugural Balls?

There are a ton of resources for finding a venue in DC. Our best resource? Friends. DC is filled with event venues and wedding ballrooms. Ask around. Many businesses rent their spaces for private events. We joined forces with another recently engaged couple and shared Google docs with places we’d scouted after choosing our ring from the tungsten wedding rings for men collection.
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Foggy Bottom, We Love Arts
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We Love Arts: 30 Americans at Corcoran Gallery of Art

Kehinde Wiley, Sleep, 2008. Oil on canvas, 132 x 300 inches. Courtesy of Rubell Family Collection, Miami.


At Tuesday night’s preview of 30 Americans, a representative of the Corcoran told the story of how, in 1940, a young, female, African-American artist secretly entered a contest held by the gallery, sending a white friend to drop off the painting because she feared she would not be allowed past the building’s grand front stairs because of the color of her skin. Lois Mailou Jones won the contest and had the prize mailed to her so she would never have to show her face.

Seventy-one years later, Ms. Jones’ painting is held in the Corcoran’s permanent collection and the gallery is hosting a powerful exhibit of contemporary African-American artists which has already generated tremendous excitement in advance of the October 1st public opening.

One of the most-anticipated openings hitting the walls of DC galleries (in a season that is proving to be crowded with buzzed-over exhibits), 30 Americans brings together three decades of influential African-American artists, both household name and lesser-known, in a variety of media. The principle by which they are organized is that all seventy-six works on display (by, in fact, thirty-one American artists) grapple with the concept of identity – particularly but not exclusively race – in modern American life.
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Downtown, Interviews, People, Special Events, The Features, We Love Arts
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He Loves DC: Dan Treado

Dan Treado

For the next four weeks, the Addison/Ripley Fine Art gallery is showing the work of local artist Dan Treado. Though Requesting Quiet is his first public showing in a few years, his art retains his signature imagery with layers of color and airy associations on top of a depth that pulls the viewer into the piece. “In some of the paintings, appropriated samples from selected illustrations and texts provide tense contrast. In others, a crazy quilt of disparate organic images is woven together by this talented painter,” states the gallery’s exhibition description.  “At once cryptic and mesmerizing, the paintings demonstrate a rich complexity and accomplished maturity.  They may ‘request quiet’ but they shout and crackle with energy.”

When I got the invitation to Dan’s show, I was intrigued by the description of his work, not to mention the interesting titles on some of his pieces such as “Shoulda Traveled More,” “In the Key of Shut Your Mouth,” and “Ow, My Leg.” I’ve known Dan more for his incredible exhibition work at the Spy Museum; the opportunity to see a different side of his creative mind was too good to pass up. So this past weekend, I attended the show’s opening night and was quietly amazed at the sheer emotional tapestry on display.

Dan was gracious enough to sit down with WeLoveDC for an interview on his work and his love for the city.  Continue reading →