EVENTS CALENDAR

Enter "Post IT: Sticky Art of Note" at The FORD Studios in Downtown Marion, Virginia

MARCH 2024

FIRST FRIDAY & NEW SHOW: Join us on Friday, March 1st from 5 to 8pm for the opening of "POST IT: Sticky Art of Note", featuring 3"×3" sticky note art. All pieces are $10 unframed or $16 in a 4"×4" frame.

POST IT: Sticky Art of Note
The Show Runs
March 1 - 30, 2024

The names of artists will be posted when the show opens, but the identity of which artist created the individual works will concealed until the piece is sold. Work can be taken home at the time of purchase & framed while you wait.

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“One night, you will wake with a start in this person's bed, you will discover yourself in this person's arms, and you will disentangle yourself for the hundredth time ....and try to leave this person's apartment, but when you get to the door there will be a sticky note over the knob that says, 'but what if this time you stayed?”

― Raphael Bob-Waksberg

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APRIL - MAY 2024

FIRST FRIDAY & NEW SHOW: Join us on Friday, April 5th from 5 to 8pm for the opening of "IKIGAI: The Joy of Little Things", a smallworks show. Ikigai (生き甲斐, lit. 'a reason for being') is a Japanese concept referring to something that gives a person a sense of purpose, a reason for living. Whether big or small, your ikigai is the path to success and happiness in your own life.

(Show Runs April 5- May 18, 2024)

In conjunction with this show, The FORD Studios is partnering with Mount Rogers Community Services and (h)Appys (a collaborative project between Mount Rogers Community Services and Mount Rogers Health District) that offers safe and sober places for folks in recovery and those who support them. From April 2023 to April 2024 (h)Appys participants are endeavoring to find joy in little things by folding 1000 origami cranes from hand-illustrated paper for the front window of The FORD Studios. Traditionally, it was believed that if one folded 1,000 origami cranes (in Japanese, called “senbazuru”), one's wish would come true. It has also become a symbol of hope & healing during challenging times.

On May 17th from 6 to 8pm, we will be selling our 1000 cranes for $1 each as a fundraiser for art supplies for the Creating Connection art therapy program.

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JUNE - JULY 2024

FIRST FRIDAY & NEW SHOW: Join us on Friday, June 7th from 5 to 8pm for the opening of "ADMIXTURE: A Sum of the Parts", a show featuring artwork that features layers in a meaningful, necessary way.

While layering often conjures the idea of collage, and while we will definitely include collage, we are presenting work DEPENDENT on layers as a part of concept and content, not just technique.

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“We live beneath many layers. Some are for
our protection, and some are for our control.”
― Russell Eric Dobda

(Show Runs June 7 - July 27, 2024)

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AUGUST 2024

FIRST FRIDAY & NEW SHOW: Join us on Friday, August 2nd for the opening of FANTASTIC: A Surrealist Dream, featuring artwork limited only by the imagination.

Surrealism is a cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I (approx. 1920) in which artists depicted unnerving, illogical scenes and developed techniques to allow the unconscious mind to express itself. (Wikipedia)

Surrealism aims to revolutionize human experience. It balances a rational vision of life with one that asserts the power of the unconscious and dreams. The movement’s artists find magic and strange beauty in the unexpected and the uncanny, the disregarded and the unconventional. At the core of their work is the willingness to challenge imposed values and norms, and a search for freedom. (Tate)

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“As beautiful as the chance encounter of a sewing machine and an umbrella on an operating table.” -- Isidore Lucien Ducasse

(Show Runs Aug 2 - 31, 2024)

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SEPT / OCT 2024

FIRST FRIDAY & NEW SHOW: Join us on Friday, September 6th for the opening of NOT NEARLY NUDE: A Burlesque Pastiche, a nostalgic show of bawdy humor.

(Show Runs Sept 6 – October 26, 2024)

A burlesque is a literary, dramatic, or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects. The word derives from the Italian burlesco, which, in turn, is derived from the Italian burla – a joke, ridicule or mockery. Burlesque overlaps with caricature, parody, and travesty, and, in its theatrical form, with extravaganza, as presented during the Victorian era. A later use of the term, particularly in the United States, refers to performances in a variety show format. These were popular from the 1860s to the 1940s, often in cabarets and clubs, as well as theatres, and featured bawdy comedy and female striptease. (Wikipedia)

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“Me personally, I want to entertain people above all. When you look back at burlesque in history and the real golden age of burlesque, those entertainers were there to entertain, and there wasn't usually some big political message behind what they were doing.”
– Dita Von Teese

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NOV / DEC 2024

Join us for "VILLAGE de NOËL", a Christmas Market at The FORD Studios in Downtown Marion, Virginia

CHRISTMAS MARKET OPENING: Join us on Friday, November 22nd for the opening of VILLAGE de NOËL, a dreamlike reproduction of a European outdoor Christmas market complete with themed market stalls, dozens of snow-flecked trees, overhead string lights and more.

(Market Runs November 19 – December 21, 2024)

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“Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas.”
– Calvin Coolidge