The first Friday of the month has become a go-to day for events highlighting arts and culture. From Los Altos and Woodside to the San Mateo County History Museum to one of the Bay Area’s first First Fridays, which has taken place for close to two decades at downtown San Jose galleries, Bay Area residents can enjoy free art receptions, music, history talks, crafts and more at these events.
At one time, Palo Alto was among those destinations, with an art walk held on the first Friday of the month. Now, five downtown Palo Alto galleries are looking to revive the event.
“The art walk is something that has happened in Palo Alto in the past, and I had heard about that, in other areas where there’s some density of gallery presence do this sort of thing, and people love it. Years ago, people started asking me about, ‘oh, will they ever bring back an art walk to Palo Alto?’” said Pamela Walsh, owner of the Pamela Walsh Gallery, who’s organizing the event, joined by Bryant Street Gallery, Masterworks Fine Art Gallery, Pacific Art League and Qualia Contemporary Art.
The cusp of summertime with warmer weather and longer days seemed like the right time to restart the event, according to Walsh.
“COVID really set everything back a long way. It’s taken a long time to get back on our feet in a bunch of aspects. And I think that previously, when I had thought about doing it, I just felt like it wasn’t quite the right time yet,” Walsh said.
“Now we have this wonderful little critical mass of galleries downtown Palo Alto. They’re in close enough proximity that it makes sense to do something where we would invite people in, come down to Palo Alto, see the galleries, go out to dinner. So I just felt like the timing was right, and we wanted to just wait until the time of year was right as well. I’ve reached out to all the gallerists who are in our neighborhood and everybody was really enthusiastic.”
Each of the five spaces will extend their hours until 7 p.m. on June 6, with the aim of encouraging downtown Palo Alto visitors to drop by to see their current shows, and to visit each of the participating galleries. The spaces are all within a short walking distance of each other.
With this event being the first, the galleries are focused on getting the word out, Walsh said. But First Fridays often become a time for spaces to hold receptions, talks or other programs that highlight their exhibitions.
“The first art walk is just a bit of an open house: ‘Come in, see our exhibitions, enjoy an evening out in Palo Alto.’ And if you don’t know all the galleries, get to know the galleries and the gallery owners, because we’re all doing really amazing things here. I think that my vision is that it could really grow to be something really fun and sustainable, not just for the galleries, but for other businesses around,” Walsh said, noting the popularity of downtown Los Altos’ first Friday event, which in addition to featuring live music, often sees businesses taking part, with extended hours, discounts or specials.
Visitors can catch these shows at the June 6 event: “It Happened One Night,” a group show at Bryant Street Gallery that draws on the darker colors and imagery of nighttime as a theme; works in a variety of media by renowned artists such as Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso and Andy Warhol at Masterworks Gallery; a group exhibition featuring works by well over 100 member artists at the Pacific Art League; “Concentric Circles: Tracing the Radiance of Bay Area Figuration,” a show of works by many of the well-known proponents of the Bay Area figurative school, such as Richard Diebenkorn, Nathan Oliveira and Joan Brown at Pamela Walsh Gallery; and Qualia Contemporary Art is featuring “Zhang Yu: Ink Reconstructed,” a solo show of conceptual pieces by Chinese artist Zhang Yu, as well as “Reframing the Margins: Contemporary Works from AAPI Artists,” a group show featuring Asian American women and nonbinary artists Ahn Lee, Zhang Chun Hong, Jesse Liu, Namita Paul, and gallery artist Stella Zhang. The art walk is one of the last chances to see “Reframing the Margins,” which closes June 7.
The First Friday Art Walk will take place monthly, but the event’s second edition will be an exception. Due to the Fourth of July holiday falling on the first Friday in July, the art walk will shift to the second Friday, July 11, just for next month.
“We’ll start up again in August on the first Friday, because I think that’s also easy for people to remember,” Walsh said.” I’ve gotten a lot of enthusiasm. People seem to love the idea, and I think it used to be very popular. For a lot of people who I’ve talked to, they remember, I don’t know how long ago it was, but people remember that there was an art walk, and really enjoyed it. And I’ve always felt that the community in Palo Alto was enthusiastic and really supportive of having art galleries in the downtown area, and it’s so organized now, and feel like, ‘okay, we’re all on the same page, and, you know, we’re working together.’”
The Downtown Palo Alto Art Walk takes place June 6 between 5 and 7 p.m. in downtown Palo Alto at Bryant Street Gallery, 532 Bryant St., bryantstreet.com; Masterworks Fine Art Gallery, 220 Hamilton Ave., masterworksfineart.com; Pacific Art League, 668 Ramona St., pacificartleague.org; Pamela Walsh Gallery, 540 Ramona St., pamelawalshgallery.com; and Qualia Contemporary Art, 229 Hamilton Ave., qualiacontemporaryart.com.