The Experience, Emeryville: Celebration of the Arts Opening Night @ Public Market

The Experience:

Be Seen at the Art Scene + Meet the Artists!

You are invited to Opening Night of Emeryville’s Annual Art Exhibition Friday, October 6, 6-9pm at the southern part of Public Market Emeryville, 5905 Shellmound St. This juried exhibition produced by Celebration of the Arts, features nearly 200 artworks created by 126 Emeryville artists. On opening night you get to meet the artists and get a first look at their artwork as you listen to music by The doRiaN Mode: Vintage Jazz & Blues. A no-host bar raises funds for the Emeryville Youth Art Program. It’s always an electrifying opening night as the community celebrates the city’s thriving collective creativity..

We had the opportunity to talk with James Stahlman about his piece in his first appearance at the 37th Emeryville Art Exhibition.

Meet James Stahlman and ‘Incantation: House Smells’ It’s a mixed media monotype with lithography elements, refactored to create a single image. 30˝x22˝ According to James, a desire to provide the viewer of his work the ability to create a pleasurable experience inspired ’Incantation: House Smells’

“In this piece, the incantation is to remind the viewer,” says James, “to allow the scent of a room to affect their way of existing in that liminal space between nose blindness and nose bliss. To scent their homes to attract the energy they want to have personally and/or to share with others.”

He says that by reflecting on the work, there is a trigger to seek out something rare, missing or special in your life. It becomes an incantation to find joy.

Scents bring back fond memories of being at the shore or in your mother’s flower garden, easily done with scented candles. “As an interior designer and artist, attention to the details of a space is something I want everyone to have,” continues James. “Remember rooms of the past, and generally feel okay taking little trips to buy great scented candles.”

All in all – ‘Incantation: House Smells’ is a prayer mat, a quiet word with one’s self.

James has lived in Emeryville for seven years and this is his first time in the Emeryville Art Exhibition. When asked what it is about Emeryville, he said that “Emeryville has a shared appreciation, if not love, a synergy for living and working here. Emeryville was a pioneer in the live-work space.”

Celebration of the Arts

The Annual Emeryville Art Exhibition is sponsored by Emeryville Celebration of the Arts, Inc. Their mission is to foster an appreciation of the arts and artists of Emeryville, to promote the city as a culturally vital and progressive center for living and working, and, most recently, to partner with the City of Emeryville in the Rotten City Emeryville Cultural Arts District, a program of the California Arts Council.