You might have been there to enjoy music or even the food, but did you know the House of Blues is also a place to enjoy some of the country's best folk art?
In fact, the International House of Blues Foundation holds classes at the Dallas House of Blues to teach local students about folk art.
“You know it’s a really comfortable environment and collection for the kids to interact with and with just a little bit of background knowledge and with the guided tour and they really start to recognize artists and styles of artists and really start to engage in the collection itself,” said Nazanin Fatemian with the International House of Blues Foundation.
The House of Blues in Dallas is home to some of the most unique folk art around the country and the Dallas location isn’t the only one that has it. House of Blues locations around the US have folk art. The entire collection has more than 5000 original pieces.
Some of the more famous artists include Jimmy Lee Suddeth also known as the Mississippi mud painter.
“He as a sweet mud mixture where he combines mud and molasses as his primary medium and then he also integrates berries and grass to add color and texture and then also as he got older he started incorporating house paint,” said Fatemian.
The students also get to see a collaborative work called the Music and Imagination Community Art Project.
“It was led by local artist Emmanuel Gillespie who designed the overall look of the piece and then provided just a section in a black and white outline to each group to participate with and they all worked individually contemplating music and imagination and then we came back for a celebration and put all the pieces together that resulted in the really cool installation that we see there,” said Fatemian.
One of the artists that sticks with students is Roland Knox who used beads to meticulously put together his works of art.
“He actually used an inherited collection of costume jewelry for his medium and he uses that. He was actually looking for a way to release a period of personal depression that he was going through so we focus on that with the kids and the tedious process that they’re going through is their way of creating the artwork is distracting them from any problems or issues they might be kind of obsessing on,” said Fatemian.
International House of Blues Foundation-Dallas & Houston
214-978-4880
2200 North Lamar Street
Dallas, TX 75202
www.ihobf.org
www.actionforthearts.org
