Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Meet the Momentary
Art, performance venue to host first community event Oct. 5.
BENTONVILLE — The Momentary announced Friday it’ll have its first community event to introduce what the art and performance venue will offer.
Meet the Momentary is set for 3-7 p.m. Oct. 5 on the green space east of the main building, said Emily Neuman, public relations manager of the facility. The free, family friendly event will be open to all ages, she said.
The Momentary, which is owned by Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, is set to open Feb. 22. It’s near the 8th Street Market.
“The overall vision is really designed to give people a sense of what the Momentary will be once it opens,” said Beth Bobbit with Crystal Bridges media relations. “A little bit of performance, a little bit of access to artists, which is going to be really important.”
Among the featured activities is a talk with artist Nick Cave, whose exhibit “Nick Cave: Until” will be featured at the Momentary beginning July 18.
It’ll be the venue’s second exhibition and was in the works with Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art and CarriageWorks of Sydney, Australia, long before it makes its way to Bentonville. Visitors may be familiar with Cave’s “Soundsuits” in the permanent collection of Crystal Bridges or when the artist was included in the 2016 Distinguished Speaker Series lineup.
In “Nick Cave: Until,” the artist will take the viewer in one of his Soundsuits for an immersive and engaging experience.
Barter Boat will also be featured at the event, which will offer a pop-up trading
post, Neuman said.
“It’s a really cool concept,” she said, explaining participants can exchange items with the trading post for other items collected from throughout the country. No money changes hands, she said.
“It’s true to the name with the concept of that engagement with them,” Neuman said of the trading post’s format.
Barter Boat’s website describes the trading post as a carnival stand looking like a boat. The trading post has traveled to Minneapolis, Indianapolis, Baltimore and Atlanta.
Individuals who trade with the post are given an eco-friendly bag carefully curated with the small possessions of participants from another
city, the website states. In turn, items collected in Bentonville will become art as well and traded at the post’s next stop.
Meet the Momentary will also feature food trucks and live music by Hot 8 Brass Band, Neuman said.
“You can come, enjoy yourself and kind of see the type of experience you can get from live music, to art, to performances, engagement in a relaxed environment,” she said.
The Momentary’s green space will be fenced off from the museum, which will still be under construction.
Participants won’t be able to see the in the building at the time of the event, but they will be able to see the free-standing canopy on the green.
Installation of the canopy began Friday and is anticipated to take one to two weeks to complete, Neuman said.
“It’s from Sydney, Australia, and was transported to Northwest Arkansas by boat and train,” she said.
Neuman compared the canopy with the white canopy at the Walmart Arkansas Music Pavilion in Rogers.
“It goes over our stage that will be there, so that will be kind of nice to have that up for the experience,” she said.
Limits haven’t been placed on the number of participants who can attend the event, but Neuman said she encourages people to register for the event on the Momentary’s website to streamline access to the venue.
“If you preregister, they just scan in your bar code, and then you’ll get your wristband to enter,” she said. “I think it just makes it a little quicker to enter.”