The House Café hosted a captivating night of visual art Wednesday.

The DeKalb coffee house, notable for its alternative music scene, dabbled in paint and cinema with sophomore Pat Marek’s gallery opening, followed by the first night of the “Reality Bytes” NIU film festival.

At 8 p.m., a small number of student art patrons entered the The House and took note of Marek’s gallery pieces. The paintings could be easily identified as modern, if not completely post-modern, in style. To develop his unique style inspired by Roberto Matta, Marek used a combination of acrylic and oil paints combined with a selection of magazine cutouts.

His method is to work fast, doing several paints at a time and the gallery pieces were created rapidly. It took the artist only two months to complete all the featured pieces.

The paintings attracted much attention as more people moved through the doors, discussing the pieces among themselves. Marek offered no limitations to how people interpreted his art.

“I didn’t have a message,” Marek said. “Everyone should see what they want to.”

Marek thinks that people should get their own feelings and reactions to art.

“I think a creative mind can make art by itself,” he said.

Reality Bytes film festival

After an hour of art appreciation, The House was almost filled to capacity with students and film appreciators anxious to view the first five of the 17 “Reality Bytes” installments. Communications professor Laura Vazquez was on hand to operate an laptop that fed the short documentaries onto The House’s projector screen.

The festival is not limited to solely NIU students. Graduate communications students Kathy Giles and Nancy Orr worked to bring notoriety to the festival. They received attention from filmmakers such as Nate George from Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The graduate from the University of Iowa submitted his senior thesis, a film about drug testing called “The Path.” The film explored the relevance of a sweat patch drug test and the use of possible false-positive drug convictions.

The night also included “Turbo’d,” a film about racing in Virginia, “Eight Wheel Drive,” about a female roller derby league, and “F*ck Art!” from NIU student Sarah Kim.

“My students do really good productions, but I wanted them to see how they would do in the bigger field,” said Vazquez.

The highlight of the evening was the half-hour presentation, “Stars of Ohio,” by Lindsay Byrne from the California Institute of the Arts. Her film explored the effects of the GE corporation leaving her hometown. Aside from the economic factors, the documentary focused on a small-town play performed at the local Ritz Theater.

On the surface the story seemed bleak, but Byrne offered hope through community in her portrayal of the town’s citizens.

“The festival is so diverse,” said Giles. “That’s what I like the most about it.”