Free henna and Great Lakes ‘ghost ships’ at ART@106 for First Thursday

Jodie Fleming, owner of Big Smile Caricatures & Entertainment, was set to give free henna designs from 5 to 7 p.m. at the ART@106 Artist’s Guild during October’s First Thursday in downtown Bellevue.

Fleming has done mehndi, or henna, for about 15 years. She took it up after clients kept asking whether she did tattoos, which she does not. She mixes the paste fresh for each event and said the crop, the oils and even the humidity change how it behaves. “It’s an art in itself just making the mud!” she said. She can do up to 30 designs an hour, mostly for company events, parties and colleges, and she gives “henna crowns” to cancer patients who have lost their hair.

The gallery also showed local artist Jim Andrews’ “Great Lakes Ghost Ships.” He started the series after friends in the Bay Area Divers asked him to show paintings at a shipwreck banquet. His research took him to the maritime museum in Vermilion, to Toledo, to several libraries and to the Hayes Presidential Library. He made 14 prints, including wrecks near Kelleys Island, Vermilion and Port Clinton, along with some oil paintings.

Other stores stayed open late with specials, and the Green Emerald hosted the Anson Hupp spaghetti dinner and silent auction from 5 to 8 p.m.

Shipwreck research: National Museum of the Great Lakes and Hayes Presidential Library. More on ART@106: downtown groups. More in Community.