Starting November 1, The Bleeding Heart Art Space will actually be ... a space.
Until now, we've done well incarnating space wherever and whenever we are able. Living rooms. Wood-lined and incense-infused church sanctuaries. Coffee shops. Art galleries. Community halls. We may still visit such spaces from time to time. But we have a home now.
Our new home is a space shared with Elm Catering, right on 118th Avenue, next door to the only place I know to get some of the best authentic Latin ingredients in town. If you drive by you'll see the Elm building getting a facelift as we speak.
This new home will provide us with permanent gallery space, so watch for a schedule of shows coming up. We hope to have our first show this December.
This home will also provide us with a flexible shared creative work space.
We will open that space up to those of you in the neighbourhood who need somewhere to work away from dishes and laundry and kids. We'll be creating the coolest little shared workspace we can dream up, most likely ready for you to rent out at a low rate early 2015. Interested? Fire me an email.
For me, the schedule for the next few months looks like this. Take possession. Move in. Decorate. Make it homey. Invite friends over. Hospitality is central to the Bleeding Heart vision. We're all very excited to share our home with you.
So, when can you visit?
Thursday, November 13, 2014, we host our first Arts Potluck in the new space. I hope you can make it out, whether you have art to bring or not. I can't wait to give you a tour.
How will we pay for all this?
I was hoping you'd ask that.
I'm also hoping you are excited as I am about the prospects of a space dedication to art, faith and community in our city. A place where art, faith, hope and love can flourish. A place for questions and conversations. I'm hoping you are excited enough to support this space financially. I am.
As we are a project of Urban Bridge Church, we are able to issue tax receipts for your giving. We are so grateful to be a small part of a larger family like Urban Bridge, and they have a lot of faith in us. The Urban Bridge community and a few others have already helped us raise enough for our first year in the space. My hope is to spend that year gathering enough monthly supporters to keep us in our new home for the long haul.
I'm looking for two main groups of monthly donors.
The Daring Dozen will be 12 organizations, businesses or individuals willing to give $100 a month to support the space. This is our rent money. This keeps our lights on. We have our first 2 already. Just 10 more to go.
The Hundred Heartbeats will give $20 a month to power our programming. We need 100 of you who are willing to give at this level, so please consider what a project like this is worth to you. I have no doubts there are 100 people in Edmonton who will support a space like this. And because you do, we'll be able to host shows, put on Bridge Songs every year, pay artists appropriate exhibit fees, etc. Th more programming money we raise, the more we can do.
That's all I can say for now. Except for this – thank you.
I am so blessed to make an announcement like this. So blessed to be on the cusp of dreams realized. So blessed to share this with you. Without you, the Bleeding Heart team and I would be just a handful of lonely, crazy people ranting about our dreams. But we're not. We are a community about to set out a welcome mat in Edmonton's most exciting neighbourhood.
Knock knock.
Of course, you knew this already, because you are on our super-special email list, right? Right?