Waterloo Arts

Opening in the Cafe this Friday: Jamie Brinker, Favorite Child: Four Legs and an Attitude

Opening Reception: Friday, August 7, 6-9pm

Jamie Brinker is a printmaker and painter from Cleveland, Ohio, who received their BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art. Her work is a social critique of misogynistic behaviors using humor and anthropomorphism. In her recent body of work, she paints and prints images of dogs getting into mischief with speech icons. Brinker examines how everyday relationships and cultural attitudes shape our understanding of gender, power, and identity, drawing from family experiences and contemporary life.

Opening in one week: Violet Maimbourg, Your Love is My Favorite Carnival

Opening Reception: Friday, August 7, 6-9pm

From Violet Maimbourg’s Artist Statement: “Your Love Is My Favorite Carnival serves as an episodic, illustrative journey, navigating interpersonal relationships with myself and others. These sculptural objects serve as physical embodiments of my emotional experiences – they exist as sculpture and self-portraiture. Using the visual language of carnival games, funhouse attractions, and retro amusement-park theatrics, the work examines how humor, spectacle and fun can mask the nightmare of intense emotional dysregulation that comes with having Borderline Personality Disorder.”

Violet Maimbourg is a multidisciplinary visual artist from Cleveland, Ohio, working primarily in sculpture alongside film and photography. Violet’s work has been shown nationally and internationally. She earned her BFA in Sculpture + Expanded Media from the Cleveland Institute of Art in 2021 and went on to receive her MFA from Kent State University in 2026. She is known for incorporating molded casts of her own body and themes of body horror, with her graduate work evolving into maximalist, carnival-inspired pieces exploring heartbreak, love, and mental health.

Show runs: August 7 - September 19, 2026
Gallery Hours: Thursday-Saturday 12-4pm or by appointment

Thank you to Lincoln Electric Young Professionals and Collinwood Better Streets for volunteering on Saturday morning to create a beautiful new pocket park in the Kaboom Lot at 15805 Waterloo Rd.

What an amazing transformation in two hours! There were over thirty volunteers working together to spread mulch, donated by the City of Cleveland Department of Urban Forestry, plant flowers, hang solar lights and create a lovely place to sit with a friend or hang with little ones.

Thanks also to Lincoln Electric for sponsoring the event which allowed us to purchase supplies and Paddy Greene for surprising us with a delicious lunch. There is still more to do so if you would like to help out during one of the next workdays, let us know.

Until then, enjoy!

Stop by the gallery today (Saturday, July 25) for the last day of Bbob Drake's amazing kinetic sound art workshop / installation! bbob and his collaborators have been building some amazing creations that are not to be missed. Gallery open 12pm-10pm.

TONIGHT! Closing Performance/Activation: Saturday evening 7:30-10pm | bbob has invited several local artist to activate / collaborate with the work including: Todd Masuda, Grace Harper, Torstein Johansen, olula negre, Laura Swedenborg, and Kristen Ban Drake. We'll have the bar open too!

Save the date! Join us on Saturday, August 8th at 4pm for a screening of "Shades of Violet" a short documentary about artist Violet Maimbourg by Sam Lasko.

Guests will have a chance to meet the artist and view her exhibition, Your Love is My Favorite Carnival, before and after the screening.

Shades of Violet
Directed by
Cinematography by Sam Lasko and Dawn Lu
Edited by Grain Wave Post
Starring:
Violet Maimbourg
Rita Maimbourg
Chuck Maimbourg
Babz Glines
Cady Renee
Special Thanks:
The Maimbourg Family
University Hospitals Urgent Care
Kent State University

Summary: “Masters of Fine Arts student Violet Maimbourg struggles to make her most ambitious sculptural project to date.”

Content Advisory: "Please be advised that this film includes themes of su***de and mental illness. If you or someone you know needs support, help is available. Dial 988 for the Su***de and Crisis Lifeline. You are never alone."

Sound Houses / Falling Apart: Sound Art Pop-Up Installation

Conceived and facilitated by Bbob Drake

Tuesday, July 21st – Saturday, July 25th: 12-9PM
Closing Performance: Saturday, July 25: 7:30-10PM

Help explore and build motorized sound-making contraptions to fill the Waterloo Arts Gallery space, and interact with them to create sonic environments and situations. We will value listening, space, slowly evolving sounds, gentleness, collaboration, and the unexpected. Emphasis will be on temporary and contingent objects that allow for failure (whatever failure means). Raw materials and motors will be provided and/or found onsite. No prior skills or experience needed, just curiosity and a willingness to try things out.

Imaginary scheme:
- Tuesday/Wednesday - creating sound objects and constructions
- Thursday/Friday – “controlling” sculptures with microcontrollers, programmed using AI
- Saturday – interactivity... listening, adjusting, composing.
- Saturday evening will conclude with a participatory “performance” including workshop participants and invited musicians/movement artists