Join us for the opening reception of Cruising Dystopia on Friday, March 8 from 5-9pm.

Curated Storefront will be hosting Jesse Satterfield's MFA show March 8 through April 19. He is currently a second-year graduate student at Kent State University and will earn his MFA in textiles in May 2024.

The exhibition is a "manifestation of gay loneliness" with each fanciful creature personifying an internal struggle between wanting to be noticed and accepted and the fear of rejection. Satterfield states that "each Wallflower yearns for connection, peacocking how they think they should want to be seen and desired."

See Facebook Event for more details.

Round up your ideas and join us for a FREE Creative Campfire brainstorming workshop led by David Flynn, Wednesday, February 21st from 5:30 - 8:00 pm at Curated Storefront’s Avant Garden ART Studios & Gallery.

Flynn, a distinguished graphic designer and arts educator, established a lecture series dedicated to nurturing and unleashing creative and innovative thinking. Through this ongoing initiative, Flynn aims to inspire and guide individuals towards unlocking their creative potential.

This hands-on workshop welcomes creative thinkers, regional artists, and friends of the arts to gather in a group setting to spark ideas with the goal to make Akron, Ohio a more dynamic place to live, work, and play. If you have ideas you’d like to bounce off of a creative group or want to develop new ones, this campfire is for you. After all, it is traditionally the creatives who inspire change and create culture. Let’s spark a year of action together around a Creative Campfire.

Please RSVP with Eventbrite here.

Venture downtown to World of Wonders for an end of the year party with space themed food, drink, and music! Let’s lift off together!

We want to thank all of you for your support of Curated Storefront and our mission to #TransformAkron with beautiful art. Celebrate with us as we highlight our 2023 accomplishments, say farewell to Clayton Bailey’s World of Wonders for the season, and let you in on what’s on the horizon for 2024.

This event is free and open to the public with complimentary food and drink. We will be raffling off prizes throughout the event.

Facebook Event

Clayton Bailey's World of Wonders will be open during Akron Pride Festival on Saturday, August 26!

From 12-8pm, stop by for a fun photo opportunity and check out Bailey's incredible and weird creations.

World of Wonders is located in the Polsky Building at 225 S. Main St.

On Saturday, August 15, Curated Storefront will be featuring live mural artists and, of course, live music during PorchRokr in the parking lot of Willis, Willis, and Rizzi CO., L.P.A., 670 W. Market Street, Akron, OH 44303.

Special limited edition PorchRokr posters created by Diana Paz, Baghead, and Palehorse will be on sale for $40 each. The posters are printed on 16 x 20” fine art paper and will be signed and numbered by the artists. More details on Facebook.

Download the PorchRokr map here.

In the spirit of arts advocacy, community engagement, and regional tourism, Curated Storefront invites you: our community leaders, neighbors, and regional artists to the Highland Square Universal Gathering Place (HÜG), 133 Merriman Road, for a pre-labyrinth ground-breaking and neighborly celebration of the arts. Fresh Digs: Labyrinth will occur on Friday, August 11 at 5:30pm. A reception will follow this performance of surprise and delight. Light refreshments will be served.

For more details, find our press release here.

For this year's pARTy, Curated Storefront is activating the historic Link building for an evening of art and entertainment in support of the organization.

From the canal level of Lock 4 up to Main Street, 172 South Main Street has been home to the building's eponymous dentist C.E. Link, a meat market, a shoe store, and other ventures. Be the first (in a long while) to experience this historic space before the landscape changes again to become the future home of the Akron History Center.

The evening features live music from Ziggy D from C-Level and Jeri Sapronetti from Big Pop, fantastic food from El Patron, sweet treats from Sweet Mary's Bakery, a special appearance by Dr. Lady J, and more!

VIP Tickets: pARTy access, two complimentary drink tickets, meal, your choice of art experiences, live music, live artmaking, and more!

General Admission Tickets: pARTy access, cash bar, meal, paid art experiences, live music, live artmaking, and more!

Leveling Up is sponsored by The J.M. Smucker Company, Huntington National Bank, The Bonnot Company, and many generous individuals.

Join us for the opening reception of this exhibition featuring artwork by the staff and board of Curated Storefront! You can also get a peek at the Avant Garden Art Studio spaces available for rent.

Art/Work will be on view December 9 through February 4 by appointment, Fridays and Saturdays 12-5pm. Please contact Katie Butler via email to schedule a viewing.

Parking: Park in the visitors parking lot at Bounce and come to the side door (closest to Main St).

An art and community celebration with Curated Storefront and North Hill Community Development Corporation

Akron likes to celebrate – its history, its communities, its artists. Let’s recreate the bustling history of Quaker Square and come together to celebrate what Akron has become – a culturally diverse city streaming with arts, music, and an active entrepreneurial culture.

Curated Storefront and North Hill Community Development Corporation (NHCDC) are partnering for a goodbye pARTy to the art of Quaker Galleries! pARTy with us throughout Quaker Square by sipping on crafted cocktails created by one of Akron’s own mixologist legends, Aaron Sparks of Mixology 21 with food pairings from NOHI culinary art entrepreneurs 28 and South. Musical performances will be provided at various times throughout the evening from musicians, including saxophonist Justin Tibbs, and accompanying DJs all while you get exclusive access to new spaces to dance and socialize throughout the former shops and restaurants of Quaker Square.

Stop by after work anytime between 5pm and 9pm with each hour featuring changing vibes with new music and food. No one experience at one time will be the same!"

Proceeds will equally benefit both organizations.

Join us in bidding "adieu" to Clayton Bailey's World of Wonders at the Institute for Human Science and Culture!

About this event

Tell your friends, tell your enemies—time is running out to see Clayton Bailey’s World of Wonders at the Institute for Human Science and Culture! Join us on Wednesday, September 7th from 4:00-8:00pm for Almost Extinct, a World of Wonders farewell event. What wonders await on this unbelievable evening?

• Bid “adieu” to Bigfoot and his Kaolithic companions with a free mockumentary film screening and guided tour.

• Quench your thirst with a tasty snake oil float* and World of Wonders-inspired snacks.

• The first 100 guests will receive a gold star, compliments of the Curated Storefront team.

• Enjoy free admission to the Cummings Center, including the National Museum of Psychology, Oak Native American Gallery, and Cassie Thornton's The Hologram (part of the 2022 FRONT Triennial).

Screenings of the 30-minute mockumentary will begin at 4:00pm, 5:00pm, 6:00pm, and 7:00pm. After each screening, visitors will be invited into the gallery for a 30-minute tour. Refreshments will be offered throughout the evening.

World of Wonders will be on display at the Institute for Human Science and Culture through Saturday, September 10th. Bailey’s Mechanical Molecules at the Polsky Building will remain open with free admission Fridays and Saturdays 4-8pm.

*Root beer float. No snakes were harmed in the making of this event.

Saturday, the 6th of August, is the opening of our new education room, “Curated Creative Lab” open at 11am until supplies last!

After the opening, this art experience will be available to creatives of all ages from 4-8pm each Saturday in August at Clayton Bailey’s World of Wonders (located in the Polsky building, 225 S. Main St). Participants will be guided through an art process which draws from subject matter explored by Clayton Bailey himself such as the “mad scientist” trope. Each week a new set of materials and techniques will be presented providing unique learning opportunities. Please take the time to see this exhibit, be inspired and enjoy a relaxed art project!

For questions and inquiries about the Curated Creative Lab, please reach out to Katie at katiebarber@curatedstorefront.org

Join Curated Storefront and FRONT International as we welcome the public into our newest pop-up galleries in the former shops and restaurants of Quaker Square! Enjoy a cash bar, three rooms filled with art and all the nostalgia you can handle! Oats not included.

Join Curated Storefront for Summit Artspace’s Akron Artwalk on June 10th from 4-8pm at Outside The Box in the Northside District. We will be revealing our newest mural Stardust by international artist El Mac! Those who attend will enjoy in a fun afternoon of music, art viewing, and spray paint play to create your own mini mural in the theme of Stardust celebrating birth and babies! It’s a Curated Storefront baby shower art “crawl”.

Trigger your nostalgic senses for an evening of artistic revelry as you support the vision of Curated Storefront, to transform Akron into a dynamic urban destination through the arts. This May, Curated Storefront welcomes you to explore Akron’s history as we activate the former shops and restaurants at the historic oat factory turned luxury hotel. This one-night fundraising event will kick the dust off of a few fantastic underutilized historic spaces in preparation for a pop-up art gallery experience presented this summer.

With a bit of polishing magic, creative ingenuity, and your support, Quaker Square will be transformed again; and this time into an arts destination, starting with Grits to Glam: A Curated Party. Come pARTy with us!

Curated Storefront is bringing internationally renowned sculptor Chakaia Booker to Akron and the I Promise School as part of their Artist In Residency Program this April and in partnership with the University of Akron, The Myers School of Art will present an “An Evening with Chakaia Booker” at Stage Door at E.J. Thomas Performing Arts Hall at 7pm on Thursday, April 7.

Booker will talk about her art and share stories of her experience with attendees. Doors open at 6p.m. with performances by UA students from the School of Music; the lecture begins at 7pm. The event is free and open to the community. RSVP through EJ Thomas here.

NEWLY RESCHEDULED!

Horn dogs! Jaw harps! Mutant heads! Bigfoot’s skeleton! Join us at the Cummings Center’s Institute for Human Science and Culture for a wild evening in renowned ceramist and prankster Clayton Bailey’s World of Wonders.

This unique reception for the exhibit, brought to Akron by Curated Storefront and featuring Bailey’s one-of-a-kind Kaolithic curiosities, will be held at the Cummings Center on Friday, March 11th from 3:00pm – 8:00pm. Visitors will enjoy a free mockumentary screening followed by a guided tour of the exhibit hosted by research assistants of Bailey’s frequent collaborator/alter-ego Dr. Gladstone. Learn more about these wonderous curiosities from the world’s foremost Kaolithic experts!

Screenings of the 30-minute mockumentary will begin at 3:00pm, 4:00pm, 5:00pm, 6:00pm, and 7:00pm. After each screening, visitors will be invited into the gallery for a 30-minute tour. Light refreshments will be offered throughout the evening.