Upcoming events at Artisan's Asylum: hacker flea market/auction, and mural painting

[hrafn.livejournal.com]

Artisan's Asylum is having a few fundraising/showing off the space/meeting other people events in the next couple weeks leading up to the grand opening on June 18.

All of these events will be at the big workshop space at 13 Joy St., right outside of Union Square. The Asylum is on the 2nd floor of the building.

This Saturday, June 5, from noon to 3pm, is a hacker flea market and silent auction. Details, swiped from the Facebook page:

We have a giant pile of miscellaneous stuff that was donated to us by Willoughby & Baltic, and it needs a good home as we get our space ready for action. Come check out the pile and pick out parts for all your circuit bending/hobby robotics/electronic music/wall decoration/tool refurbishing needs!

We have a ton of stuff, and it includes but is not limited to...
+ Gigantic battery chargers designed for several hundred pound fork truck batteries
+ Broken MIG welder
+ Overhead projectors
+ Grab bags of integrated circuits, passive components, and mechanical pieces
+ Wood stove
+ Table saw in need of TLC
+ Jointer in need of TLC
+ Scroll saw in need of TLC
+ VCRs
+ CRTs
+ A bunch of older 6MP digital cameras
+ Oddball raw materials
+ Electronic musical instruments in various stages of disrepair

...and much, much, much more.

We'll be putting a lot of the higher-value parts out on the floor with silent auction fliers (where you bid on components by writing in your bids over a fixed time period, with the part going to the highest bidder at the end of the auction), and selling the lower-value parts directly. The auction will run from 12 PM until 1 PM, and the flea market will continue for a few hours after that depending on interest.

The rules are simple:
1. All sales are final
2. Pay with cash or check
3. Take anything you buy away with you that day

All income will go directly towards purchasing equipment for the Asylum! All pieces that are not sold during the auction or at the flea will be available for free the following day.

Sunday, June 6, from noon to 3pm, everything we tried to sell on Saturday that didn't go will be available for the great price of TAKING IT AWAY. Please help us clear the space out! Facebook details, though really it's much the same as the auction/flea market.

Saturday, June 12, from noon to 7:30pm, Help paint a 4,000 square foot mural! Right now, the interior walls are kind of boring. And there is a LOT of space to paint on. Details, swiped from Facebook:

Artisan's Asylum's newest building is a 9,000 square foot monster of a warehouse, and right now it looks pretty industrial. We have around 4,000 square feet of (currently white) wall in our space, and we want it to come alive with murals painted by our community! Our goal is to have someone walk in off the street, come through the door and say "Whoa... this place is awesome!"

We will have some paint/brushes/rollers available, but we ask that you bring the supplies required for your design if you can. You can give us the receipts for your paint, and we can write you a letter of donation that you can use as a tax deduction! If you can't buy paint, show up anyway! We'll need all the help we can get!

We'll be dividing the room up into themes based on the hugely diverse list of crafts we'd like to offer in the space, so start thinking about what kinds of murals you'd paint for each craft. Our currently list of crafts include (but aren't limited to) precision metalwork, welding, electrical fabrication, woodworking, fabricwork and knitting, jewelrymaking, painting, cooking and photography... but really anything that you'd call a craft could fly!

ETA (everything after this ETA): Events also viewable on Google calendar.

Friday, June 18, 7pm-1am is the Grand Opening! Events will include potluck dinner, a presentation about the space and capabilities, an auction of works & services from local artisans, all followed by performances by the Boston Circus Guild and live music. Details from Facebook:

Come one, come all to the grand opening of the newest, largest public craft space in Massachusetts!

We are Artisan's Asylum, a non-profit community workshop dedicated to the teaching, learning, and practicing of craft. We have 10,000 square feet across two campuses devoted to precision metalwork, electrical fabrication, welding, woodwork, fabricwork and clothing manufacture, painting, cooking and jewelrymaking... and that's just the start of it! We're committed to providing open studio time, where members can use any tool they've trained and tested out on, and we will have a roster of monthly classes taught by local artisans who want to teach you how to create everything from an art bike out of spare parts, to your own clothing from patterns and fabric, to a perfect meal for two, to that robot kit you've always wanted to build... you name something to make with your hands, and we'll find someone to teach it!

We're going all out for our grand opening, friends. We're packing the night with a giant potluck dinner, a public gallery of work from our local artisans, a charity auction of select said works (and services and lessons from said artisans), a presentation on our mission, services, and direction, all followed by an afterparty featuring performances by the Boston Circus Guild and live music provided by Dabu (Links, Vermin Street) and ArcRunner (Vermin Street).

Our schedule will be as follows:

7:00 - 8:00 PM: Potluck, mixer and gallery viewing
8:00 - 9:00 PM: Keynote presentation by Gui Cavalcanti, President of Artisan's Asylum, Inc.
9:00 - 9:30 PM: Fundraising Auction
9:30 - 10:00 PM: Performances
10:00 PM - 1:00 AM: Afterparty with live music featuring Dabu (Links, Vermin Street) and ArcRunner (Vermin Street)

This event will be pay-as-you-can at the door, with a recommended $25 payment to cover the standard joining fee of the space. Any payment amount under $25 will cover admission and membership for the night of the event, and anything over $25 will count towards the joining fee and membership plans of the workshop or donations to the non-profit organization, whichever you would prefer.

If you are a local artisan and would like to donate artwork, lessons, or services for the sake of founding the Asylum, please fill out this form: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/QXJ8V6B.

If you would like to be included in the performances or if you would like your work featured in our gallery (whether or not you'd like it auctioned off), please fill out this form: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/CCMYYCF.

If you cannot attend the event but would like to support our cause or join our membership, please visit our membership and donations page: http://artisansasylum.com/?p=179