Rob Lynch's paintings will be in the Buffalo Arts Studio space.

Clockwise from top: Family Funktion and the Sitar Jams, painting by George Hughes, and sculpture by Jeremy Holmes.

Buffalo Arts Studio hosts its triannual fundraising art party this Saturday, March 26

Trimania, the tri-yearly extravaganza fundraiser to benefit Buffalo Arts Studio among other worthy causes, will occupy five floors of the Tri-Main building, Main near Jewett, and include musical groups in a dozen categories, dance and spoken word performances, and numerous art exhibits. The event will take place this Saturday, March 26, 7pm-1am—or, for a few dollars more, 6pm-1am, with open bar and complimentary eats 6-7pm.

Prominent among other beneficiaries is the Himalayan Institute, which will use its Trimania proceeds this time as it did the last Trimania to dig water wells in African villages otherwise without a local source of drinking water.

Displays of the work of three artists will open in the Buffalo Arts Studio space: Craig LaRotonda, who does political/satirical paintings that have been used as illustrations and/or cover art for such magazines as The Progressive and Traffic (the current issue of Traffic has one of his artworks on the cover); Robert Lynch, a painter of surrealist to expressionist to pop propensities (the artist is also a drummer in the Down to the Roots band that will be providing some of the musical entertainment); and George Hughes, presently a UB art teacher, originally from Ghana, whose large-scale mixed-media works often treat large-scale themes like post-colonialization and globalization.

In addition, in another space, Ithaca artist Jeremy Holmes will exhibit his enormous ribbon-like sculptures you can touch, interact with, and rearrange.

Among dance and performance artists, Fleuron Rouge and friends will perform an array of dance types from belly dance to sword dance to what’s billed as a wing dance; dancer/choreographer Gerald Trentham and videographer/performance artist Jamie O’Neil will collaborate on a dance and video project; and Moss of Ancients—the performance alias of multi-instrumentalist K. Cornelius—will present its sui generis musical soundscape. In a special screening room, Knuckle City Films will present a selection of its cinematic productions. And by way of welcoming spectacle at the door—or better, just outside the door—a group called Pyromancy will present its street art fire show. (The front door to the Tri-Main building, in case anyone doesn’t know, is in the back of the building, on Halbert Street.)

Live music categories and groups or individuals in various locales around the huge venue will include: Gypsy jazz, Babik; bossa nova, Christian Campos; reggae, Neville Francis and the Riddim Posse; Indian sitar and tabla, Family Funktion and the Sitar Jams; African drumming, the Slyboots School of Music Ensemble, a new musical venture in town, a project of Griffin Brady, this time out with featured Ghanaian drummers; bluegrass, Down to the Roots; and even opera (but in a range from opera to opry, it is said) by Canadian Idol competition winner Elton Lammie.

Also on hand: several indie rock bands including Dinosaur Bones, and Irving Klaws, and The Tins; tango jazz group Equinox; buskers Reverend Soapbox and the Rabble Rousers; and Universal Mind, a musical group connected with the Aspire help-for-the-handicapped organization, a tenant in the Tri-Main building. Also, DJ dance music and video projection by Keith Harrington (a.k.a. AV DJ Projex).

Tickets are $30 at the door, but $25 in advance, online at www.trimania.com or from Buffalo Arts Studio, Rust Belt Books, Talking Leaves bookstores, the Western New York Book Arts Center, and Record Theater. Or $50 including drinks and hors d’oeuvres through the Premania (6-7pm) hour. Post-Premania, cash bars and food courts (with sit-down dining if you like) will be located on several floors.

Buffalo Arts Studio Director Joanna Angie said bottled water sales monies—the water has been donated, so the sales monies are pure revenue—will go entirely to the Himalayan Institute for its African wells project. But she pointed out that since alcoholic drink will also be consumed, cabs will be available at the door to convey possibly tipsy attendees safe home.

Also, added free parking will be available in the Zoo parking lot, Parkside and Jewett, and in the First Niagara/Canisius College lot, Main and Jewett, with free shuttle buses to and from the event on 15-minute schedules.

This is the fourth Trimania ever. The first, in 2002—when Hallwalls was still in the Tri-Main building—attracted 2,000 attendees. Attendance has gone up each Trimania since. Angie said this year she expects to top 4,000.

—jack foran