Painting by David Estes at Williams Fine Art

We should come up with a name for this — the one time a year when Salt Lake Gallery Stroll shifts from the third Friday to the first. It happens every December, a pragmatic realization that by the third Friday in December people have tons of holiday gatherings to attend, and little money to buy art. By the first Friday in December their wallets may still be recovering from  post-Thanksgiving mayhem, but aren’t totally empty. We could call it Gray Friday. But that wouldn’t do much to call to mind the fabulously colorful event that is a December Gallery Stroll.

This December’s Gallery Stroll falls on December 7th, which happens to be Pearl Harbor Day. So, while most of the galleries are hosting group shows (great places to find something affordable for the more cultured people on your list for whom the latest electronic gadget just isn’t the thing – see a full list at gallerystroll.org) Williams Fine Art is turning their attention to vintage airplanes. Their current exhibit features paintings of vintage planes and ships by artists David Meikle, Ken Baxter and Stephanie Deer. In addition, “Cyclone” Davis, one of the Pearl Harbor survivors and one of the few pilots to fly during the attack, will be in attendance at the opening reception tonight.

The gallery will also hold a special LeConte Stewart symposium featuring the newly published book “LeConte Stewart Masterworks.” You can read Ann Poore’s review of the book in the December 2012 edition of 15 Bytes. Both events are 6-9 pm.

By shifting its stroll this month to the first Friday, Salt Lake Gallery Stroll crowds their compadres in Ogden and Provo, both of which hold regular first friday art strolls. In Ogden tonight you can catch the still life exhibit at the Eccles Community Art Center. One of the featured artists, David Estes, was our video profile in this month’s edition of 15 Bytes. Click here for the complete listings of what’s going on in Ogden tonight. Provo’s first Friday stroll isn’t quite what it used to be, but Terra Nova Gallery always has a great show of small paintings, BYU is opening their We Could Be Heroes and the Covey’s exhibit of Visionism: Hagen Haltern and Jared Harlow looks worth a visit.

15 Bytes

UTAH’S ART MAGAZINE SINCE 2001, 15 Bytes is published by Artists of Utah, a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah.