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When Yellow Tail Japanese Bistro moved out of 1315 Park Street, it left behind a potential venue too choice to pass up. Dan Nguyen, co-owner of Dragon Rouge Vietnamese Bistro down the street at 2304 Encinal Ave., thought about using the space as an art gallery.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s so many local artists that I\u2019m friends with and they don\u2019t have a showcase,\u201d Nguyen says. \u201cAnd I think art and food go hand in hand.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nguyen got the go-ahead from Yellow Tail, which still held the lease for the space, to use the location as an art venue, \u201cOrange Park,\u201d during the weekend of the Park Street Art & Wine Faire. He tapped his employee, Vera Tour of Alameda, to curate an art exhibit there.<\/p>\n
On her Facebook page, Tour jokingly lists her job title as \u201cBest Server Ever\u201d at Dragon Rouge. She is also a painter, and the restaurant\u2019s acting art director, hanging fresh work every three months. \u201cShe\u2019s developed relationships with many artists,\u201d Nguyen says. \u201cI give her a lot of credit for putting all the art together.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s pure enthusiasm,\u201d Tour says. \u201cFor me, it\u2019s because art is a passion. It\u2019s a payoff, right away.\u201d<\/p>\n
The collaboration was a success, with Orange Park featuring a DJ and live music entertaining visitors as they perused artwork. Many of the pieces were dark and pleasantly creepy, including werewolf paintings by Ryan La Bonte. They were \u201cmore film and character-oriented from classical literature,\u201d Tour says.<\/p>\n
Building on this success, Dragon Rouge hoped to expand its art offerings. Nguyen began looking for a larger space to grow into, especially after an appearance on the TV show \u201cCheck, Please!\u201d bumped up business. Although they were outbid on the old Yellow Tail space as a permanent home, they had several other prospects \u2014 \u201cbigger and better and able to do more events, crafts and arts\u201d\u2014most of which were in Alameda, Nguyen says. One of them panned out: Aroma Restaurant at 2337 Blanding Avenue.<\/p>\n
With the owner of Aroma retiring, Dragon Rouge celebrated their grand re-opening in the new location on March 9.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt’s a lot bigger space,\u201d Nguyen said. \u201cThere’s a lot of room in here to do a lot of stuff and art is definitely something we’re going to showcase.\u201d<\/p>\n