Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Cool art for a hot Friday

At the intersection of Colorado Avenue and Casino Center Boulevard - a nexus of antique stores and old duplexes-turned-artist-studios - the evening sun is casting long shadows on the asphalt, and the only salvation is the sliver of shade provided by the building's overhang.

Margaritas flow at the taco stand, and funky urban folk art calls from sidewalk stalls as the monthly menagerie emerges. Early arrivals, unfazed by the heat, examine a waterless human car wash - a tactile art exhibit originally designed for the annual Burning Man festival in Northern Nevada by Tony Bondi, who says he wanted to build the "opposite of fire."

But behind the Friends of First Friday information table, volunteer Amy Schmidt is sweating.

"It's too hot," she says from behind her Coach sunglasses. "And I'm going to repeat that 20 times. Guess what? It's too hot."

It's not so much a complaint as it is a description: 95 degrees and muggy. And Schmidt - an evangelist for the downtown arts scene - wouldn't be anywhere else tonight. This is her perch, her "contribution" to downtown and its growing arts movement, the place where she comes every First Friday to pass out maps and newsletters, explain the trolley system and give directions to hot spots at the monthly arts event.

"You see a little bit of everything here," she says from behind the table.

But Schmidt, a witty and stylish thirtysomething in an olive-colored skirt and black top, is as much a part of the show as she is a voyeur.

She taunts hot, sweaty passers-by, waving her hand-held fan. "I bet you wish you had one of these, don't ya?"

When hipsters come for tickets to Get Back, First Friday's "after party," she makes them work: "I don't like to just hand them over. If you can't perform, you don't get free passes."

A half-hearted jig danced by a slender young man, wearing aviator sunglasses and a Disneyland T-shirt, hardly seems worth the three tickets she awards him. But, Schmidt says, "You can only get them to do so much."

The night proves her wrong as a long-haired blonde refuses to do jumping jacks but agrees to sing T-Bone Walker's "Stormy Monday." A twentysomething wearing an ironic unicorn-with-rainbow T-shirt tells a joke. Another girl recites Robert Frost's "Good Hours," smashed by hip-hop from one stage and rock from another.

"One time, a kid - and don't ask me why - had a stuffed monkey that he wore around his neck," Schmidt says. "He let me wear it for a while. For that he got two passes."

Schmidt has been volunteering for Friends of First Friday for a year. She sits on the event's advisory commission, is a member of the Las Vegas Arts District Neighborhood Association and business partner in Vegas Ink, an editing and writing company that prints the 24-page full-color First Friday newsletter.

Volunteering, she says, is her way of participating in the downtown that she loves so much - and there are never enough volunteers for the four-year-old arts festival.

"I grew up in Las Vegas," Schmidt says, fanning herself. "I always loved downtown. My parents brought me downtown. They loved old Las Vegas. I knew when I bought a home I wanted to be down here."

Even her three-bedroom house in the Westleigh neighborhood reflects the growth of a local arts scene. It's filled with work by local artists, including a miniature painting by Christina Natsuko Paulos that Schmidt buys for $35 on Friday and stuffs into her beach bag.

By 9 p.m. at least two dozen first timers come to the information table to find their way around the industrial area marked by auto shops, art galleries, low-end furniture stores and vacant buildings. The rest came for maps, chit-chat and chalk for street art.

Schmidt doesn't ask visitors to perform for the street chalk, but she does playfully harass a young woman named Africa Toledo, who comes by to load up on chalk and asks her friend, "Should I make something good or something crappy?"

"It better be good with all the chalk you just stole," Schmidt retorts.

From a neighboring table, Cindy Funkhouser, owner of the Funk House and founder of First Friday, explains to Holly Woodward, the evening's other volunteer, that "Amy is a little obsessive about the chalk."

Twenty minutes later, Woodward hands out chalk as if she's carrying a tray of appetizers.

"We have our regulars," Schmidt says, looking at her. "Even the teenagers ask for chalk."

Pausing, she adds, still fanning herself as the evening's humidity is broken by a wicked, albeit brief, breeze, "It's hot."

The heat isn't enough to make for a quiet night. Thousands will be by as the evening progresses and the towering Stratosphere and its rides begin to glow.

Two men dressed in nun drag - members of the Las Vegas order of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence - stroll by, as do neo-punks, Goths, Jews for Jesus, girls in skirts on Rollerblades, artists, jugglers, families and a DJ wheeling his neon Burning Man effigy covered in white faux fur.

The tactile human car wash appeals to the guitarist from the Los Angeles band Oh No, Not Stereo, who breaks from the stage, and (still playing) runs through the crowd and onto the stage.

"That's one of the best things about this," Schmidt says. "You see everything from here. And just seeing people downtown is great. It's the one time a month you see people walking downtown. And they're happy."

For the 20th time, she adds, "It's hot."

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