(Originally published at SLNN.COM)

Cento Italia – RockPianoman Pienaar’s unique blend of tunes from the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s wafted from the piano Saturday as art patrons gathered for the double gallery opening of Sky Hye and GM Nikolaidis.

Sky Hye has been in Second Life since December 2006. Last October, she had a show at Artopolis which led her to establishing her own gallery. In December, on her Rezday, she had s small gallery opening, and Saturday was the big opening of her current show.

Sky is primarily a representational painter who does a lot of work in oils. While she might not consider herself an activist, she writes about how her landscape paintings were displayed at city council meetings and as evidence in court in a battle over land development. She is also an educator providing details of the artistic process including developing a DVD training package for artists.

GM’s gallery is directly across the hall from Sky’s. GM is a photographer, both in real life and in Second Life. He joined Second Life in June 2007. His pictures in Second Life show a vivid use of color.

The reception was well attended with many notable avatars, such as Alexxa Laval, who helped Sky get going and is active with “Twilight’s Peace” a group “focused on bringing people from different religious backgrounds together to celebrate religious diversity”.

Nimbus Rau attended in one of her new creations. Nimbus creates fascinating avatars such as cats, dolphins and beyond. Em Larsson, another successful photoartis from Second Life was in attendance as was Walt Ireton.

Walt Ireton is a photographer both in real life and Second Life. He will be having an opening at his gallery, Saturday at 3 PM SLT. Walt set up his gallery about a week ago and it has both indoor and outdoor areas.

Walt friend and fellow photographer, Timber Watkins is having a gallery opening on Friday at 1 PM SLT at the Not Too Hot Blues Club. Timber has been in Second Life since June 2006. In November 2007, he opened his studio. This opening was arranged by Eliza Flanagan, his partner and manager of his studio.

Bobby Capra, who advises Timber on publicity matters in Second Life observes that the Not Too Hot Blues Club is a great place for the vent “because of the combination of the arts and events she will be sponsoring to bring people together who aren’t usually in the same circles”.

This makes a lot of sense, since Timber Watkin's real strength is in the portraits of avatars in Second Life. At the club there is a viewer that cycles through recent portraits that Timber has done. These are typically taken during individual or group sittings. Timber makes careful use of lighting, angles and other effects but avoids the over editing that can happen too often when people use tools like photoshop.

After the first hour of the opening, starting at 2 PM SLT, KevinBlue Oh will perform live blues followed by dancing later.