Last week, Rebekah Frank, who works for Cranbrook Academy of Art, contacted Maxi Container, she found us on the web searching Google for “Containers Detroit.” Well she found the right place! Rebekah was interested in 5-gallon pails to put under the artist’s respective tables to give them a safe place to store their personal belongings. We were happy to help here at Maxi, since we love helping the community and we love art! In previous months, we have covered different ways people have used containers for art, see previous articles about Wine Barrel Art and Haiti Metal Art (made out of used oil drums), but this was a chance for us to get directly involved. We set-up some conditions, basically “renting” (free of charge) 110 of our PAILSNEW700 for the weekend. One of our own employees at Maxi studied at Cranbrook for a little while and I (creative director) just finished up art school in Chicago. This was an event that I did not want to miss.

Ready for a good evening, my wife Jessie and I went downtown, when we arrived at the Dagleish Cadillac, there was valet parking outside. It was preview night (Friday night) and it had already sold out at $50 a ticket. Luckily, we were on the list (thanks Rebekah)! They had us pick fake name-tag patches like the ones on work shirts, just for fun. With my Kent name-tag attached to my shirt, we started making the rounds and meeting artists. It was great to actually get one-on-one time with the artists. You can learn so much about an artists work when they are actually there, unlike the usual little card next to the painting with some vague artists statement about the meaning of the piece and the material used to construct it. This time it was one on one, unique and engaging!

The Dagleish Cadillac was a great venue choice because with this many artists and interested buyers, the tables where setup in a grid but with enough space to jump between rows easily. They had a coat check and a credit card station to make the experience comfortable and easy. There was live music, some type of string and horn quartet playing swing style. Overall, One X One was set up very nicely and provided a sophisticated and enjoyable experience.

The collection of artists at One X One was diverse and talented. All of the art was of a high caliber. It was a very professional show with an array of beautiful works for sale. On a side note, a lot of the artists had some creative business cards and almost every artist had a website (below there is a list of some of the artist’s websites from the business cards which I received). We thoroughly enjoyed the evening and would like to formally say thank you to Rebekah and Cranbrook Academy for contacting us and hope we can work together again some time in the future. Here is a gallery of some photos from the event including our pails in use! Enjoy!

Here at Maxi we would like to take this moment to tell everyone just how important we think art is. Please support local artists in your community. Get involved and help keep the arts alive!

Related Links:

Cranbrook Academy of Art

Here are a few of the Artist’s websites for you to check out (my favorite is starred) :

Maria Simon – www.nipcrete.com (concrete chair)
Chitra Gopauakrishnan – www.chitraaa.com
Nick Olson – www.nickolsonphotography.com
Edgar Mosa – www.cargocollective.com/edgarmosa
Rebekah Frank – www.rebekahfrank.com
*David Rollins – david.p.rollins@gmail.com (metal_off_the_grid, view below)

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