Fri Dec 7 and Sat Dec 8 the Newton Nomadic Theater will be presenting a guest production of Bakersfield Mist – a play about art, in the Clark Shoes mill on Oak St in Upper Falls.

Since the beautiful mill building has a huge amount of space inside we’re also going to hang an exhibition of local artist Shogun Curtis’s work as part of the event.  For those not going to see Bakersfield Mist we’ll open the Shogun Curtis exhibition to the public on Sat Dec 8 from 6 – 7 PM.

I first met Shogun last spring walking his dog.  Soon after, I recruited him to help me install trolls under bridges around Newton (the last remaining one is in a pipe outside the the side entrance of the Newton Free Library).

After that he heard about the Feast of the Falls and offered to design a poster (left) for it.  The totally hand drawn poster is absolutely stunning but what makes it even more fun is that there is almost  infinite details hidden within.  People’s names are embedded all over it.  The squirrel at the top has my whole family’s names (Jerry, Jayla, Marie) embedded on the bottom of the squirrel.  His eye is a heart and his eyebrow is “Carol” – i.e. Carol Stapleton from Newton Parks & Rec.

This summer there was an outdoor sculpture exhibition on the Upper Falls Greenway that was months in the planning.  Shogun walked out his door one morning and saw an artist installing her scupture.  He asked her what was going on and when he heard art was being installed he ran out, got a box of spray paint and tools and spent the next 24 hours creating a wild 40 foot long mural of a wildly colored snake on the 

sidewalk beside the Greenway.

Sometime after that I saw his drawings and paintings and was blown away.  No matter what this guy touches he turns it into fabulous art – oil on canvas, pencil on paper, spray paint on sidewalk, strokes on an iPad.  Give him anything to work with and he can dazzle you with the results.  Don’t miss it.