Celebrate the Solstice in Oakridge

Oakridge is known for its transition from a logging town to a mountain bike mecca. Now it will be known for its art.

Sunny Zylstra and Michael Garvin are promoting what they are planning to be the first of future iterations of the “Oakridge Winter Solstice Art Walk” on Saturday, Dec. 22.

Garvin, who is also proprietor of Deep Woods Distillery, says in a press release, “I started recruiting artists for our labels when we first opened the distillery. I kept meeting more, and after a while, I just thought we had to do this. Then it turned into an issue of having enough spaces.”

According to the release, Oakridge has “a lot of artists” and its local characters include some people who “worked on Bernie Sanders’ first campaign for Mayor of Burlington,” another who “was part of the occupation of Alcatraz Island by AIM [American Indian Movement] back in the early ’70s,” a logger who played a logger in the movie Sometimes a Great Notion, and a guy who “has played keyboards for the Supremes and the Temptations for the last couple decades, and still does.”

The town also has “an unnaturally large population of ukulele players” and a long-running theater troupe.

The Oakridge Winter Solstice Art Walk is 2 to 6 pm, Saturday, Dec. 22, at six different venues along E. 1st Street in the Uptown District. Guide booklets are available at all six locations: the Oakridge Museum, the Uptown Mall, the Oakridge Library, Brewers Union Local 180 pub, Deep Woods Distillery and The Hall. Zylstra and Garvin say visitors can enter a raffle at the end of their walk if they have stamps from all six venues at the Uptown Mall.

There will be art and gift items are for sale, refreshments, and the artists will be on hand “if someone needs to know what they were trying to say with a given painting.”

To get there, head east on Highway 58 toward Oakridge.

For more information, contact Sunny Zylstra at sunnyzylstra@gmail.com, or Michael Garvin at 1eyedjack@deepwoodsdistillery.com.

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