Continuation of the new art space–Monroe Street Market, Brookland

This past Saturday the Monroe Street Market hosted the Art in the Mix Arts Festival with 27 pop-up studios, live music, food trucks, and a special Q&A and book signing with Scott Schuman, founder of The Sartorialist. Brookland which is off the Red Line heading towards Silver Springs and hosts iconic “Welcome to Brookland” boldfaced  graffiti is home to the newly gentrified Monroe Street Market, a complex of luxury apartments aiming to attract young couples and families in D.C.

Scott Schuman drew a descent sized crowd and spoke eloquently and enthusiastically about Instagram, his fashion resolve, and various other topics relating to fashion, photography, and street style. Each studio space was compact, narrow, and filled with a variety of art. Some spaces contained striking photography and a studio featuring works of graphic printing over acrylic paintings was a standout. One studio, Arttjamz, transformed their gallery space into an interactive studio, calling on viewers to grab a puzzle piece from wood cutouts of larger-than-life Pablo Picasso, Frieda Kahlo, and Jean Michel Basquiat, and painting their own piece. The famed artists were now colorful, eclectic, and had an odd component of harmony between the very disparate jigsaw schematic. The food vendors, and pop-up beer garden created by Washington City Paper and Meridian Pint rounded out Art in the Mix and made it quite an attractive and successful Saturday afternoon outing.

Hopefully the excitement and good-sized turnout at the  Art in the Mix Arts Festival will provide a basis for future Brookland events, and could be the foundation for a new unconventional art venue in D.C.