Get out of your dreams and into Big Car!

In March of 2005, the Indianapolis arts group Big Car moved into a 1,250-square foot space on the second floor of the Murphy Arts Center in Fountain Square. Big Car moves from being a virtual arts group to one with a physical home and gallery space.

The Big Car Gallery, a member of the Indianapolis Downtown Arts Dealers Association and the Fountain Square Merchants Association presents local artists in new shows each month. The space on the second floor of the Murphy Building -- directly above Decadent by Design restaurant -- opened April 1, 2005. Each week, the gallery is open Fridays 5-8 p.m. and Saturdays 1-4.

Various creative people share the studio making the Big Car space a creative hothouse. "Our goal is to make Suite 215 the ultimate creative space -- a place where dancers and writers and musicians and painters and photographers and film-makers are intermingling and energizing each other," says Jim Walker, Big Car's executive director and founder. "Creativity, to me, comes best through collaboration."

By its nature, Big Car is an organization built around a blending of artistic genres. Its board of directors includes painters John Clark, Jose Di Gregorio and Jennifer Kaye, box-maker Kipp Normand, and writers Anne Laker, Jim Powell and Emily Watson. Big Car's staff -- which includes the people sharing the creative space -- includes talented web designers, musicians, writers, visual artists, designers and event planners.

All are working together to bring highly collaborative multi-genre arts events to Indianapolis. The first was a celebration of Surrealist artist Max Ernst and National Poetry month on April 2 in the space at the Murphy Arts Center. About 80 people attended this spoken-word event. Other music events, like the Birds of America show in May, drew more than 100 people to the gallery. Big Car plans to work with other arts organizations like the Writers Center of Indiana on future shows. It also plans to book even more unusual local and national music acts.

"These are the kinds of events that appeal to the most people," Walker says. "Somebody might come to see dance and with interest in painting but fall in love with some work they see hanging on the wall. Somebody might come to hear poetry and see a new kind of dance they never knew existed. Their expectations are blown away. Walls come down. That's the real benefit of opening a creative space like this -- both for the artists and the audience."

As a group, Big Car functions on a few different fronts. It is a non-profit public relations company serving other non-profits. It is currently working on public relations and web design for Masterpiece in a Day in Fountain Square, the Beckmann Theatre and the Indianapolis Hoosiers vintage Base Ball team.

Big Car has other media goals: To produce video work, to publish local authors, to stage off-site theatrical performances, and more.

"The idea is to do fresh things, innovative things," Walker says. "We want to bring exciting, cutting edge ideas to reality in Indianapolis. We've had enough hum drum here. Big Car is about doing something different and daring under the umbrella of "arts and culture."