Latest / Rick Outzen: (we don’t) color on the dog / First City Art Center Pumpkin Patch
Transcript
- speaker-0: And this is Rick's Blog Live. We have so many events going on in our community and it seems to really take off after Labor Day and all the way up to to the end of the year. There are several events going on all the time. This one has been around for twenty years. It is first city art, first art center, pumpkin patch. and it's twenty years with the the Unfortunately, we've got a storm coming in. We got Bart Hudson, executive director. What are the plans with with the storm out there? Bart Hudson: Rick, privilege always to be with you. But we we've had to postpone for the first time in twenty years. We are going to postpone for two weeks, twenty-third and twenty-fourth, and then we'll do it again on Halloween, the thirty first. cool. Cool. So we're gonna spread it over three days just to to show the public how much we appreciate their patience with it. speaker-0: Well, so and everybody's tickets are still good. Absolutely. So that's that makes it really simple. If anybody's worried about that, that's well y'all are first class. This is this is an event that has started sorta small. and there how many pumpkins do y'all have this year? Bart Hudson: We have about 5,600. god. You know, we started twenty years ago, one block over, right where we're sitting right now, and and we sold a hundred. And we were very proud of that. Right. And twenty years later, we're we're selling between fifty five hundred and six thousand glass and ceramic pumpkins. speaker-0: Yeah, and they become collector's items for people. They they you have a special preview party on the Friday. talk a little bit about that, how that works. Just the preview. Bart Hudson: It it's an opportunity for folks to come in early and and take kind of a pick of of the patch if you will, and and preview the the selection for that particular year. that goes on from five till eight o'clock. It is a ticketed event, supports the this the First City Arts Center, which is a non profit. and then Saturday is free and open to the public. Right. And we typically see about three thousand folks. Saturday. speaker-0: it's it and it's fun to to walk among all the pumpkins and and look at the various sizes. it is it's it's really a gift, I think, that that your center does for the community. for our viewers who may not be familiar with First City Arts, tell them tell a little bit about that. Bart Hudson: Absolutely, and you're very kind with your comments. we've been in Pensacola for twenty-seven years now, and it started as a couple of rrr artists that just felt a a an opportunity to get together, express their artistic abilities and trade stories and just enjoy each other's company, and it's grown exponentially. we spent about seven years here in the Belmont de Villiers neighborhood. and then unfortunately our building kind of crashed in on us. And so we moved to the old waterworks building on on Gulimard, leased from the city, and that provided us a campus. And now we're doing glass blowing, we're do we've got a really robust ceramics department. We're teaching about 300 people a week in the ceramics department. But we've got painting and drawing, all the mediums, all the various mediums in clay. we teach a a sewing class that's become really popular. We've expanded that to two days a week and we're about to start a children's course because we've got the demand, but we have a really tremendous children's program art program that sees about 1,500 children a year. speaker-0: Well and that's the beauty of the new s space that you have. You're right next to open books. Yes. you've got that huge parking lot, the the open area when the weather's good for out there behind it that's that's available. but the it really because I remember when it started, it started right about the same y'all started this about the same time we started the newspaper, July first, nineteen ninety nine. was our first issue. So I w we've kinda grown together. Over that period of time and it's been fun to watch it one year didn't y'all do it in like in Wahoo Stadium, put all your pumpkins out there during Bart Hudson: COVID we had to do it at the stadium and we did that a couple of years. speaker-0: But that had to be a nightmare moving those pumpkins. Bart Hudson: It it it always is a nightmare. We're so conscious of the we have about forty artists that make those five thousand pumpkins and so we're we're very protective of So when we do the the event on Friday night, we set them out, we take in, protect them, and then put out again. And at the stadium that was huge. Right. And then there was just a demand, you know, we we we have an interesting community of artists that just wanted to go home. you know the parking at at the stadium was fantastic. Right. But folks wanted to go home. speaker-0: Well and the other thing I think is is that there's something about having these pieces of art and and that people enjoy each one's unique. Yes. So it is there's a lot of I've seen people walk through and that they're weighing which one they and often they get both. You know, but but it's it's it's a it's it's become a source of pride for the community for what y'all are able to Bart Hudson: I I was trying to do the math and I'm not very good at that, but i if you sold a hundred in you know twenty years ago and you sold fifty five hundred last year, that tens of thousands of pumpkins right are in Greater Pensacola. That that is a a signal that the community loves what we're producing. speaker-0: So so how where does the money go when when Bart Hudson: Seventy percent of it goes to the artists. you know, th they're speaker-0: It's their art. Bart Hudson: and and it's their creativity, their skill that that creates it. So seventy percent goes to the artist, thirty percent goes to the operating costs of the center, that that we're able to provide the opportunity for all of those artists. But we we have last year we counted twenty eight states folks from from all across the country from from Europe that that were part of the patch. speaker-0: Well that's great. Yeah, we we've we've gotta wrap up but but now that it's moved to a little bit later in the month, you have opportunities for people to volunteer. And Bart Hudson: Yes, please. speaker-0: you can go to the your website, which we have on the screen, that people can volunteer for it because those a lot of pumpkins. Watch over. Bart Hudson: We need all the help we can get all the way. speaker-0: Always. Bart, thank you so much for coming up. Rick, thank you. Always, always. We're gonna go ahead and break. We'll be right back. I'm Rick Altson. This is Rick Blarglock.