New Spaces, New Faces

Van Go has officially moved into the fresh, newly renovated space on the south side of our building. If you have been familiar with Van Go, we hope you will be just as delighted with the changes as we are. We will give you time to pick your jaw up the floor when you enter and see this before you:


With skylights, lofty ceilings, and walls of glass, we finally have the room to really let our creativity expand!

And of course, with a new school year our Van Go family expands as well. JAMS and Life JAMS are both welcoming new faces.

(Hello, Alex!)

We are jumping right in and doing some fun projects that will be available at our holiday Adornment show. Mark your calendars--the Saturday after Thanksgiving, or November 29, is our Adornment show and gallery opening. Come ready to find lots of beautiful, creative, unique holiday gifts to give away--or something you have to keep all to yourself!

Trash has never been classy until you put it in one of our fabulous, hand-painted galvanized steel trash cans. Look at Tony, Jesse, and Jessica hard at work!








Altogether, they make quite a collection.



And what kid WOULDN'T want to go home and tell Mom they got paid to play with broken glass?



Macio puts his creative juices to work, making a picture frame to be fused in the kiln.

Some items, like picture frames, go through the kiln once and are ready for sale.


Other items, like this bowl-in-progress, will be fused once, then put back in the kiln with a ceramic mold to be "slumped" into their final shape. (Trying to eat cereal out of a flat bowl would be pretty messy!)



Life at Van Go isn't all fun and games. Sometimes we really work up a sweat! A generous volunteer from Be Moved studio visits weekly to lead the Van Go and Life JAMS staff in an hour of yoga.



This is just another example of how Van Go works to improve the lives of its apprentice artists in all areas--by learning job skills, earning wages, and also by learning how to be healthy and to take care of their bodies.

For some of the apprentice artists, the work they do at Van Go isn't enough. They like to get creative outside of work, too! Check out this piece of art by Jordan, one of the new Life JAMS apprentice artists.



You can find Jordan downtown at Fatso's on Wednesday nights, doing his "live art" paintings for all to see.

At the end of the day, working at Van Go is a very rewarding experience, in more ways than one-- each week a JAMS artist is recognized as the "Employee of the Week." Congratulations, Joe!



Keep checking back to see more of what's going on at Van Go!