Two years ago I made the announcement that after 12 years in our home studio, we were moving to the westside of Santa Cruz. It was a huge change for us and we were really excited for all the possibilities. The past two years at Mission Industrial Art Studios has been even more amazing than we could of expected; the community of artists who work there became friends, a 1400 sq ft warehouse became our basecamp and you- the community of art lovers- joined us at events, for classes and drop-in visits- it’s been pretty incredible and we’re so grateful.
Just a few weeks ago, the powers-that-be at Mission Industrial notified all the tenants that due to issues with ADA compliance, it is too high of a liability for the property to be open to the public any longer. Therefore all of the tenants are no longer allowed to participate in art events like Open Studios, hold classes, or have the public come onto the property. Everyone was stunned by the news and it has taken time to digest what this means and how each of us will move forward. And to be honest, we’re not exactly sure how Earth Art Studio is going to move forward yet but I wanted to keep you in the loop.
What we do know is that we will not be resuming classes at the studio but we may offer some workshops outside of the studio space, those opportunities will be announced in our monthly email blast. And while, I was delighted to officially be accepted into the Open Studios Art Tour for this coming October, I’m still researching my options for a venue, if a suitable one can’t be found, I may not be participating for the first time in over 15 years.
In the short term, we plan to stay put since the idea of moving the studio again in addition to the lack of spaces available for light industrial artists is daunting but we are keeping our eyes open for options – please let me know of any leads if you’ve got them!
In the meantime, since you can’t visit the studio to buy art any longer, the online shop is open 24/7 for all your art buying needs and will be added to and improved on to make an even better art buying experience for you. I’m also working on more venues to show and sell my work from that are outside of my studio space and will announce those as they happen.
Thanks for sticking with us as we go through these ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch changes!
(also sorry if that song is stuck in your head all day after reading this!)