Live From Bloomington and Canvas Creative Arts Magazine are hosting a premiere party at 7 p.m. today in the Blockhouse. Live From Bloomington is celebrating the vinyl record release of its 2015 compilation, and Canvas Creative Arts Magazine is celebrating its spring 2015 edition.
The event will feature poetry readings, art installations and live music.
Bands from Live From Bloomington’s compilation are performing, including Sunspots, The Underhills and Fluffer.
Connor Foy, director of Live From Bloomington, said Canvas Creative Arts Magazine and Live From Bloomington collaborate on the event because the Union Board committees that support local arts need to stick together.
“It just makes a lot of sense to do those things together because in the grand context of what Union Board can do, like the Little 500 concert, the rest of us have to kind of band together to make a big splash,” Foy said.
Supporting local arts and the community is something Austin Atkinson, director of the Canvas Creative Arts Committee, said he thinks is important in the ?collaboration.
The two committees strive to represent the arts in different ways, he said, but still meld together in a great way.
“We think it works really well together because both of our causes come together at an event where all these people who have similar interests come together,” Atkinson said.
This year is the first time Live From Bloomington will release its compilation on a vinyl record since 1989. Foy said he thought vinyl would get people more interested in purchasing the compilation.
“CDs are for everybody, so nobody wants them,” he said. “Vinyl is for a particular group of people who are very invested in music and caring about it and owning a ?collection.”
Foy also said the vinyl record is like “pressing a year of your life into wax.” He said he hopes the album will be a piece of memorabilia for people to reminisce about their year at IU.
“It’s a very unique kind of thing,” Foy said. “Every time you look back at it you’re, like, ‘Oh, 2015 Live From Bloomington. Hell yeah, that was my sophomore year at IU. I met my wife, or ?whatever.’”
The proceeds of the compilation go to the Hoosier Hills Food Bank. Foy also said event goers who bring canned food to donate will be entered into a raffle for the last test pressing of the compilation.
Atkinson said he’s excited to share the new edition of the Canvas Creative Arts Magazine. The printed magazines arrived Tuesday, he said.
“I think it came out really great in terms of printing, and we think that the work in this magazine is particularly strong,” Atkinson said.
He also said he thinks one of the magazine’s most important aspects is getting artists, designers and everyone else involved in a top-tier literary magazine.
“It gives designers and artists, as well as students who may be art majors, experience with the printing process and how that typically works,” Atkinson said. “It also gives artists the chance to be featured in an award-winning magazine. That’s a lot different than just being put up on a blog or being reblogged on Tumblr.”
