Celebrate Eugene’s vibrant art scene—and our LGBTQ+ communities!—during the June 7th First Friday ArtWalk! Start your self-guided tour at Farmers Market Pavilion (85 E 8th Ave), where you can pick up your ArtWalk Guide and shop the Artist Marketplace before exploring the many galleries and art venues of Downtown Eugene. The monthly First Friday ArtWalk is from 5:30pm-8:00pm and is always free.
View the list of participating venues | Join the Facebook event
Need a ride to the ArtWalk? You can get your free LTD bus pass just before the event on the ArtWalk page!
IN THE PAVILION
Farmers Market Pavilion and Plaza (85 E 8th Ave)
Join us at the Farmers Market Pavilion to pick up your ArtWalk guide, and start your adventure!
- Community Sewing Circle with HIV Alliance and Eugene PRIDE, inviting everyone to participate in helping to create a new community Pride flag. No previous sewing experience necessary.
- Drag Story Time with Fanny’s Magic Queendom from 6:00pm-6:30pm.
- Free photo booth to capture your fresh look or get your photo taken with your favorite Drag Queen! Images will be available to download and share on your social media platforms or devices.
- ArtWalk After Hours will feature two sets of drag performances some of the community’s most sensational performers, including Daphne Bertha Storm, Karress Ann Slaughter, Nicole Serenity Storm, Petra LaFaye, Maliena, Drake Demonwing, and Morena from 7:30pm-9:30pm.
- Viking Brewing and Kento’s serving up food and beverages to fuel your evening of ArtWalk fun.
Image: c/o Daphne Bertha Storm
COSMIC HAUS
347 W 5th Ave
Join Cosmic Haus for this rare, and first public appearance from Thomas McGrath in 7 years. He’s mingled genres from an admiration of American tattoo culture and a fondness of mid-century modern graphic design. No he’s not a tattoo artist, or a actual designer…. He just get a buzz from a really good doodle.
Image: “Cousins” by McGarth
ROOTED REMEDIES APOTHECARY
271 W 8th Ave
Matthew Brookens is a watercolor artist, as well as a therapist at White Bird Clinic – which is important to name because his artwork reflects the internal work that has allowed him to give, support, and compassionately witness every day. Each piece in this body of work is a reflection of his consciousness and journey towards internal peace, healing, existential meaning, and the abundance in existence squirreled away only to be found under our toes by shifting how we perceive life. When Matthew was younger, he experienced a really severe head trauma which put him into a coma for two days. When he awoke, his consciousness had changed. Assumptions about himself, identity, connection, love, all shifted beneath his feet or were completely destroyed. Although he tried to talk about these blossoming thoughts, he didn’t have anyone in his life that he could connect with or understand to the point that he unconsciously learned that it wasn’t ok or safe for him to share his internal world. Art became a language in which Matthew could communicate his internal and truest self through intuition, feeling, expression, and symbolism when words could not yet be found. One symbol that you will find in his work are little homesteads amongst whimsical and colorful landscapes. This symbolism reflects his relationship to the spiritual, psychological, and material contemplation of home. There is the space in which we reside, build, live, and grow roots. And, there is also a contemplation of home which we create within our minds and hearts to help us face, endure, and grow within the grief that life may bring. Matthew leaves it to you to interpret what else you might find in his work, and he sincerely hopes that you enjoy these glimpses into the homes he has created within myself.
Image: “Emerald Light” by Brookens
