Last year Kate Kaiser wore a gumdrop dress to the Snow Ball. This year, she and her daughter Rhapsody outdid themselves, fashioning Kate’s dress from pink Hostess Snowballs. In fact, seems like everybody outdid themselves this year, with most participants reporting that it was even better than in years’ past.
This annual Art House Productions bash raises money for the organization and gives Jersey City’s art lovers a chance to wear “black tie creative” while eating, drinking, dancing, and generally whooping it up
Art House Productions Executive Director Christine Goodman admitted that she “went as my own spin on Marie Antoinette. It was the same vein but I reinterpreted the wig.”
“The money was raised for a terrific cause, art in Jersey City.”—Kate Kaiser
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Said Kate Kaiser, “The money was raised for a terrific cause, art in Jersey City.”
The tickets were $60 in advance and $70 at the door.
“We’re continually looking at how to raise vital funds for the organization,” Goodman said, “but keep people involved and make it acceptable.”
Food and drink donations
Local restaurants and wine and beer suppliers helped make it happen. Made with Love Artisan Bakery and Café was the major dessert sponsor. Restaurants that donated food were the Embankment, L.I.T.M., Skinner’s Loft, Madame Claude Café, and Cosi. The beer flowed from the New Jersey Beer Company, and Barefoot Wine supplied the wine and bubbly.
“There was a really great spread of food,” said Jersey City artist Beth Achenbach. Her “black tie creative” was a “fancy red jacket that a friend sent from Virginia.”
Entertainment was provided by the band Manouche Bag, a gypsy jazz quartet founded by Mattias Gustafsson, owner of Madame Claude’s. Late night dancing followed with DJ George “Soul” Fernandez, a Snow Ball regular.
The silent auction this year included a signed print from William Wegman, pioneer video artist, photographer, painter, and writer.
Glamorous gala
“It is like the coming-together energy of a high school prom, but more glamorous and executed by a community of strangers who end up feeling a part of something wonderful,” Kate Kaiser said. Now, about those pink Hostess Snowballs … “Fifty-one hours before the ball nothing was working,” Kaiser related, “but we made the dress happen by taking the pink shell off of the chocolate cupcake (Rhapsody’s idea), straight-pinning the pink shell to a Styrofoam ball cut in half, and gluing the ball to the dress.”
And it all came together for Goodman and the Art House team. “It was wonderful to see such enthusiasm at the Snow Ball,” Goodman said. “The more people who come out to the Snow Ball, the more organizations like Art House will grow up and thrive in the future.”
Kate Rounds can be reached at krounds@hudsonreporter.com.