Fall is a great time to take a walk and enjoy some natural beauty – and some artistic beauty, as well. It’s a time when theater companies launch their new seasons, and galleries and museums often schedule their big autumn shows.
And it’s still warm enough to enjoy some of this art outdoors. The Emerson-East Eken Park Art Walk returns for its second year later this month, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 28.
Visit Eken Park
Eken Park (pronounced EEH-ken) is a small but fast-growing neighborhood at the northern end of Madison’s near east side. The neighborhood is full of single family homes and small apartment buildings that once housed workers at the nearby Oscar Mayer planet, and even though the plant closed years ago, Eken Park still is called “Weiner-ville” by some locals.
Along with the growth in population has come a bunch of new businesses, including the North Street Cabaret, the Northside Lounge, and the Northstreet collective, which includes Cafe Domestique, Young Blood Beer Co., and Bloom Bake Shop. Are you getting the sense that Eken Park is proud of its northern locale?
Take a Walk
Sort of like the city-wide Gallery Night (which takes place the following weekend on Oct. 4), the Art Walk is a chance for art lovers to wander in and out of artists’ studios and pop-up galleries, seeing the work of local painters, sculptors, photographers and craftspeople.
Emerson Eken Arts, the neighborhood arts association which puts on the festival, has an interactive map on its website that’s a handy guide to all the participating artists. Check out the pots at Dirty Girl Pottery, glass-blown flowers in Girls & A Garage, or collections of work by different artists at Dexter’s Pub and The Bubbling Teapot.
