E-spouse and I attended the par-tay of the year last night (yes, I know it’s only January), and I talked to a number of folks about Anywhere, USA, including the film’s sound wizard, Bruce Sales, who recently opened a new biz here in Asheville called 2BruceStudio. Bruce told me there were a couple of people who had been at Sundance yesterday morning, then they’d flown in for the Hatch par-tay last night. What jet-set artsy lifestyles some of us are leading, no?
The party was a ticketed introduction to Hatchfest 2009, which will be held in our fair town for the next 10ish years. The festival is a mentoring and arts festival focusing on the disciplines of film, architecture, fashion, music, journalism, photography, design and technology. The festival has the potential, I hope, to bring in some creative, inspiring folks to work with young (and middle-aged) creative professionals. I’ve suggested Frank Deford for journalism. And, of course, Chusy Jardine for film. And he’s already in town. Although today he’s probably on a plane headed this direction. I hope he’s exhausted, hungover, and ectastic.
Again, I digress. I was introduced to Hatchfest about a year ago by the man who’s bringing it to Ashvegas: Sean O’Connell, owner of Music Allies (whose spouse, Amy Jones, is a freelance writer and mega-edgy mama. We somehow ended up in the photo booth together about three minutes after we met, making faces at the camera and giggling. Well, I was making faces. She was just smiling gorgeously).
The party was held at Echo Mountain Recording Studio (another biz I’ve profiled), which was packed to the rafters with beautiful people. Literally, to the rafters, as there were aerialists hanging from ribbons in the ceiling, contorting their bods sexily while wearing minimal clothing and exotic face paint. I did notice that only a few brave (or very dumb) party-goers were bold enough to stand under the aerialists while they flipped and shimmied.
There were 6-foot tall models sashaying around in Brooke Priddy dresses (Brooke, next time, let me model one of your works of art. After all, it’s mostly those of us middle-aged mamas who can afford your stuff).
There were fotogs with fancy cameras. I spent a good bit of time trying not to drool on Galen McGee of Peak definition’s new Nikon D300. I have yet to find shots on-line, but I’m sure they’ll be popping up soon.
There were Hatchinis, composed of pomegranate juice, vodka, and something else. There was beer from the boys at Pisgah brewing: their Pale and Summer Ales. There was food from Ophelia’s. There was a champagne toast. I imagine there’s quite a bit of party flu incapacitating Ashvegas’ beautiful people today. Anyone else feeling a mite headachy after the Hatchinis?
There was speech-making, a video presentation, back-slapping, and somewhere, fire eaters. Rather appropriate, don’t you think?
And here’s where I go off on my scree.
Why, oh why, do we let people denigrate Southerners and the South–to our faces–without even a murmur of “what the hell”? The Hatch organizer from Bozeman, Mont., spoke and the first thing that dropped out of his mouth was something to the effect of: “We thought that Asheville, N.C. might be a little too far south on the East coast for Hatch, but now that I’m here, this seems like a pretty cool town.” What? I looked around. No one blinked. Of course, maybe I was standing in a crowd of non-Southern transplants. Cause you know that people born and raised in the South couldn’t possibly pull off such a creative, alternative, stylish event.
Well, thanks for your condescension, Mr. Montana. I’m sick of people assuming that all of the South is a fricking third-world country. There are, despite popular belief, lots of highly intelligent, proactive, motivated, successful Southerners. And some of us are even blonde.
So back to our regular programming. If you could be mentored by anyone in one of these fields, film, architecture, fashion, music, journalism, photography, design and technology, who would it be?
