As it is with every first friday of each month, a group of bikers numbering as few as 15, up to a rumored 50 or more, meet at the belltower at 7pm to ride around downtown to check out the new exhibits at the art galleries. The path is never constant, but there are a few galleries that we’ve always hit: FM Goods, DesignBox, Rebusworks, Lump, Artspace, The Fish Market, and the Morning Times. This month, we checked out some of the usual suspects, as well as a newly opened gallery on Capital Boulevard: Adam Peele Studio and Gallery.

The newest gallery to open downtown, and by far one of the coolest, is Adam Peele Gallery and Studio. It’s located on Capital Boulevard, just north of where McDowell Street turns into Capital. It had to be one of the coolest spaces we’ve visited on a First Friday ride. Connected to the gallery space pictured above is Adam’s studio, where he sells merchandise and does his work. Check it out!

After Adam Peele Gallery and Studio we headed down to Design Box, wherein they began their Brand Fandango. This is their holiday marketplace where they have art and crafts from many NC artists, including one of my favorite printing groups, Blue Barnhouse. They have some of the most bizarre (and in turn, hilarious) holiday cards ranging from creepy to cynical, to downright disturbing, as well as some very well done and beautiful cards. More info on the artists and their work can be found at DesignBox’s website. After this we headed to Lump, where there is a terrific show this month. Cannonball Press had a very good and very filled gallery that had some intense and intricate prints, all for sale. This is my favorite kind of Lump show, dense, packed with work and all of it pretty awesome.

Cannonball Press brought some great work varying in smaller prints (18″x24″) to a couple of huge prints, like the one on the left. Prices ranged from $20 for the small ones, to up to $10,000 for one of the giant prints, like this one:

I happened to run into John here and he joined up with the First Friday bikers as we made our way to Fish Market, the Student run gallery of the NC State College of Design. The Fish Market was having a Senior Show for all of the Art and Design Seniors in the college, and had some pretty neat stuff. Unfortunately, they probably won’t be open many more weekends this year, since exams are happening and break is coming up. Here’s a picture, though, of my friend Steven, looking through some student work.

From there we went to the Morning Times, featuring the work of NCSU College of Design Graduate in both Art & Design and Architecture, Jackson Merrill Hodges. He does some really cool stuff. Stop by and see it next time you pick up some coffee from the MT. Here’s to another great, if not freezing cold, First Friday!

Also, there usually aren’t bike rides in January and February, but Victor said he might reconsider this time, because of the good cold weather turn out. If you’re interested, check out the Bike First Friday Blog and get on the email list. If you have biked it before, you know why it’s awesome. If you haven’t biked it before, what are you waiting for?! As always, be sure to have lights, lock, and perhaps some gloves!

Links:

Bike First Friday

Cannonball Press