The City of Santa Clarita’s Arts and Events office is debuting a new vending machine, “Art2Go”, at the August Art Walk/First Thursday on Aug. 2.

With products a little pricier than a candy bar, but a definite investment in the soul, Art2Go will dispense original works from local artists, including the works of Pablo Cevallos, Laurie Beth Finkelstein (acrylic and mixed media) and Marci Goldstein (photography) among others.

“Art2go is a project we’ve been working on for about two years. The idea is that we have a large vending machine that will be at different events and different locations during the year that sells mini pieces of art,” explained Arts and Events Supervisor Jeff Barber.

“People can start a collection of art very cheaply because the art is $10 per piece,” he said. “They are all original pieces created by mostly local artists and there’s a variety of art. There’s watercolor, there’s oil paint, some mixed media, there’s even some origami pieces in there.”

“We have about 10 artists right now, and about six others have shown interest and are developing pieces, so we’ll have about 16 to 20 artists total once it’s all ready.”

Proceeds from the ongoing program – which Barber admits won’t be a lot, but he’s optimistic – will go toward arts education program that city Arts and Events staff put in for the schools.

The machine being unveiled Thursday will be located at the Canyon Theatre Guild, at the corner of Main and 6th Streets.

Art Walk is a free event from 6 to 10 p.m. the first week of every month designed to expose community members to new forms of art from local and regional artists. The city is dedicated to increasing opportunities for students to participate in high quality arts experiences while increasing awareness of the value that arts add to our community.