Andrew Stronge was born in Sunderland, England, but moved to the states when he was young. He always had an interest in art and illustration, and he had creative parents who allowed him to express himself all over his bedroom walls. At the encouragement of extended family, Andrew went to school for web design and computer programming, but after a few years working in Charlottesville on different UVA department websites, he realized that he was moving too far away from his passion in illustration. He decided to pursue a job at a local screen printing company where he could use his artistic skills. He started off doing grunt work around the shop, but quickly moved up in the industry, eventually becoming lead designer and operations manager at one of the larger local screen printing companies.
While working full time, Andrew continued to pursue his own art, doing the occasional freelance illustration job or small craft fair, and even illustrated a children’s book called Mathematical Mischief. A charity event called Screens ‘n’ Suds in Richmond, VA inspired Andrew to combine his skills in illustration and screen printing to create his own screen-printed posters. His art has always had a strong pop-art inspired style of bright colors and bold lines, and his work in the screen printing industry had perfected his technique. This medium allowed Andrew to create unique hand made prints of his work that were much more affordable than the hand-painted canvases he had been selling, allowing him to reach a larger audience.
In 2016, Andrew decided to make the leap to leave his job to pursue Stronge Designs full time. Andrew now travels all over the east coast to show and sell his work at comic cons, craft shows, and punk rock flea markets. He occasionally sets up live screen printing events where he can educate people on the process of printing t-shirts and his posters. When he’s not traveling to a show, he is a stay-at-home dad to his 1-year-old son, Alister, and has turned a passion for collecting vintage toys into a small business called Time Capsule. Through Time Capsule, Andrew and his wife, Adrienne, sell vintage toys online and in a shop called Oddballs Collectibles in Richmond. Andrew lives at Lake Monticello with Adrienne, Alister, their two old pugs, and a very large robot and vintage space toy collection, a passion of his that you can see reflected in a lot of his sci-fi inspired work.
We are thrilled to jump back into another First Friday celebration this month with artist, Sara Harper. Based in the Shenandoah Valley, Sara Harper explores the depth of nature with line and form in drawings and oil paintings. Her work evokes a deep appreciation for both complexity and simplicity in nature and is characterized by the practice of observation.
Varied lines and brush strokes are used in Sara’s oil painting portraits of animals and people. These pieces are created with the philosophy that there is great intrinsic value in the rich inner life of each subject. Harper’s dynamic use of color breathes life into her work in a way millions of artists have struggled to achieve, her intricate color layering and delicate brush strokes show she has not only mastered realism but is making it her own.
Sara isn’t just highly experienced with color relationships and layering, through her ink pieces she exemplifies a masterful eye of proportion, shape, and balance – especially when it comes to nature. These pieces and many more will be on display at the CW Depot through the month of October. You can also RSVP to the opening night to meet the artist. We are requiring masks be worn inside and encourage you to be vaccinated if you attend this event.
For more artwork, you can check out Sara’s Instagram and Etsy!
Now that life is slowly shifting back to normal we are eager to start up our beloved First Friday gallery nights, featuring Andrea Konstant, and Cara Walton. Please join us on Friday, September 3rd, 2021 from 5:00 pm – 8:00 pm to celebrate our featured artists and enjoy getting back to community engagement, masks required, vaccines encouraged. You can also learn more or RSVP to this event here.
Cara Walton is a self-proclaimed “accidental artist” and Star Wars nerd who uses photography to take a step away from the stress that comes with work, life, and being an educator through the pandemic. Between being a high school World History professor, and teaching photography for educators at James Madison University, Walton makes time to find the beauty in abandonment.
Andrea Konstant rekindled her love of art in the middle of the pandemic and hasn’t looked back, she pulls inspiration from different aspects of nature such as flowers, shells, and rocks. There is no lack of inspiration for Andrea as she is constantly on the move, she has traveled to Nepal, China, Thailand, India, and all through Europe. She plans to eventually visit every single National Park in the United States, which will lead to even more creative pieces.
We are stoked to get back to First Friday celebrations and even more thrilled to host zentangle inspired artist, Andrea Konstant! Andrea grew up in Elkton and studied art at Blue Ridge Community College, she later went on to pursue a degree in organizational leadership at Eastern Mennonite University. When she isn’t creating new colorful works she can be found hiking, camping, or kayaking, or even in a foreign country.
Andrea Konstant rekindled her love of art in the middle of the pandemic and hasn’t looked back, she pulls inspiration from different aspects of nature such as flowers, shells, and rocks. There is no lack of inspiration for Andrea as she is constantly on the move, she has traveled to Nepal, China, Thailand, India, and all through Europe. She plans to eventually visit every single National Park in the United States, which will lead to even more creative pieces.
Andrea found that studying art didn’t provide the same satisfaction as creating art, and jumped into a zentangle class in hopes of getting back into touch with her creative passion. Her love of art took off more than ever before and she rediscovered her excitement for color, shade, and composition. Konstant’s style focuses heavily on color interactions and shades married with natural elements.
Although most of her work hones in on color, she enjoys experimenting with black and white illustration and geometric subject matter. You can check out more of Andrea’s colorful creations through the month of September at theCW Depot! Or check out her Instagram for her newest pieces! You can also learn more or RSVP to this event here.
As everything begins to shift back to normal, we start to get back to what we missed, one of those things being First Friday. We couldn’t imagine a better way to kick off the festivities than with some amazing artists, this month we will be featuring Professor Cara Walton, who was been featured in ArtSpace, The 1650 Gallery, and the Louvre.
Cara Walton is a self-proclaimed “accidental artist” and Star Wars nerd who uses photography to take a step away from the stress that comes with work, life, and being an educator through the pandemic. Between being a high school World History professor, and teaching photography for educators at James Madison University, Walton makes time to find the beauty in abandonment. Her work focuses on the details of decay and utilizes black and white tones to hone in on fine aspects that would otherwise be lost in full-color prints. On the other hand, she expresses her love of color through tie-dye work and exemplifies a selective eye when it comes to when and how to utilize the rainbow.
We could not be more thrilled to host such a talented artist at The CW Depot and begin to shift back to normal, celebrating art and music once again as a community.
Walton’s work will be on display during the month of September 2021 but to check out more of Cara’s art browse: Instagram, Facebook, and Fine Art America. You can also learn more or RSVP to this event here.
I have decided that this coming year I am going to do 365 intentional acts of kindness. Please join me in making our world a little brighter for others. #rocktownresilient #365actsofkindness
This year has been filled with a lot of negativity and challenges. On a personal level, I know I am blessed to have enough, maybe even more than enough. I did not go hungry. I have a home. I have stayed healthy. While work slowed tremendously for a few months our small business is surviving. While 2020 was filled with negative things, there were lots of silver linings and blessings.
The opportunity to work from home, spending more time with my girls this year, is incredible. I am still able to serve my clients and be with my family more than I ever imagined possible. The interactions I have had with friends this year have been special, whether through zoom or distanced in-person. Not having the ability to see anyone anytime makes the few meetings much sweeter. There have been so many positives in this year.
Finding ways to support others this year also has brought me incredible joy. Rotary Club of Rockingham County has not had in-person meetings since March and many of our service projects were cancelled. However, that did not stop our #serviceaboveself. I was fortunate to be able to deliver meals once a week to First Step on behalf of our club for a couple of months. I participated in a food drive for Our Community Place, cleaned up a highway, picked up trash along blacks run near Purcell Park, helped hand out food to Harrisonburg school families, and planted tulips at First Step and NENA Community Center. I supported local business by eating at locally owned area restaurants once a week at least and showing love to the servers and delivery drivers.
I also wrote positive online reviews for local companies, donated to local fundraisers and food pantries, purchased music and swag from local bands, and sent notes of appreciation to essential workers. I have tried to remember every day to wish a Happy Birthday to friends on Facebook and have sent out more thank you notes and gift cards this year than any other year before. I helped install solar panels at Eastern Mennonite School in a solar barn raising project. I found places to help others by creating online resources for home schooling, researched and published tips to make buildings safer, and created stress relief coloring pages. I also created amonthly young professionals networking group and hosted monthly education sessions for other architects. In order to support the local arts community I designed an outdoor stage that was used by both EMS and Harrisonburg High School.
I had not thought about all the good that these actions were doing for me until I watched this Ted talk that Nadia posted to Facebook.
So now after seeing this video, I am going to be intentional this coming year about putting #serviceaboveself. I will pledge to do #365actsofkindness over the coming year. Please join me and help spread kindness through the world and bring yourself happiness through action.
