Raucous Celebration - Not Wake - To Close Rm 608

When an arts center closes up shop, there are usually a few tears shed, sorrows expressed, mistakes bemoaned, bills unpaid.

Not at Rm 608.

On Aug. 27, the tiny but influential Capitol Hill performance and art gallery will cease operation because its next-door landlord - Wood Specialties, a custom woodworking studio - wants to expand.

But Rm 608 is going raucously, not mournfully, into that good night.

The August schedule is crammed with film showings and stage performances. And the final event will be a rave-up masquerade ball, featuring some of the hot young Seattle theater artists who got their first breaks at the frisky venue.

Matthew Richter, the self-billed "arts czar" who founded the place, considers the Aug.27 bash a celebration - not a wake.

"I have no regrets about this ending," declares Richter, an idealistic, pony-tailed cultural mover of 26, who talks at a brisk clip.

"To use a boxing metaphor, we made it to the bell. We succeeded in doing what we wanted to do here, and way beyond."

In the fall of 1992, Richter was living in an apartment above the then-empty 19th Avenue East storefront. Hearing the landlords were looking for a temporary tenant, the former Northwestern University theater student had a brainstorm: Why not turn the place into a 50-seat theater and pocket-sized art gallery?

With a $2,000 seed grant from the Pelican Bay Arts Foundation, and the enthusiastic support of local fringe artists, Richter did just that.

Despite a negligible budget and cramped confines, Rm 608 yielded a startling bounty of exhibits and performances over the next 21 months. Assisted by a 12-member artistic committee, Richter presented more than 200 shows on the shoe box of a stage, harnessing the creative energy of droves of up-and-coming Seattle artists.

Many were iconoclastic writer-actors, would-be Spalding Grays trying out solo works in Rm 608's monthly open-mike forum, Idiot Wind. Or the semi-annual Festival of One. Or a irregular "showcase" series, Go to Your Room.

Kristen Kosmas, a dancer-writer-actor who's gone on to critical success in larger alternative venues, says Rm 608 is more than just a bare stage on the outskirts of a hip neighborhood. "It's my favorite place to perform, and a real spiritual home for some of us, " she explains.

Tanya Steed (who directs and acts in Rm 608's live, late-night soap opera, "Shuddering Pines") concurs. She views Rm 608 as a haven for the riskier, quirkier practitioners in Seattle's youthful fringe drama scene - a place to start out, mingle, and grow your art.

"The main thing," Steed notes, "is the accessibility to artists. Anything you want to try goes, plus you can afford to do it. Rehearsal space costs only $7 an hour."

As the closing date approaches, Rm 608 is, ironically, doing better than ever. The Seattle Arts Commission just gave the space its first grant. And while early shows attracted as few as 4 or 5 patrons, audiences are now much larger and really jazzed.

But Richter has no immediate plans to find another vacant storefront and christen it Rm 608, Jr. He says that after the party, he wants to find a paying job, re-group, stay in touch with the Rm 608 "family," and wait for a new inspiration.

`Maybe it will be a performance space and gallery," Richter muses. `"r it could be a Laundromat/coffee house, or a documentary film. It will click when it clicks. And we'll be ready for it." ----------------------------------------------------------------- Rm 608's last month

The final month's schedule for Rm 608, 608 19th Ave. E., includes: -- "Shuddering Pines" (10 p.m. tomorrow and Saturday, 8 p.m. Sunday);

-- "The Narrow Trail," a silent film with live music by iv bricoleurs (Aug. 11-13);

-- Idiot Wind open mike (Aug. 25), and Masquerade Closing Bash (Aug. 27). For details, call 328-7551.