 Tom O'Brien welcome back folks and when you know we talk public markets folks bottom line we talk about a lot of entrepreneurs well I'll tell you man we got ourselves an entrepreneur here you know if you happen to ever visit St. Pete or in St. Pete there's a project that's going on right now folks okay that is absolutely incredible it goes for blocks and blocks and it's called the fairgrounds and they're basically a monitor is art for all play for all joy for all we have the man Mr. McCall Mikhail sorry about that mansion he is the founder and the CTO Mikhail welcome to TFNN hey thanks Tom thanks for having me on absolutely you know I'll tell you man it's a may well first off tell us exactly what the fairgrounds are all about and how you got this idea yeah thanks so much so fairgrounds St. Pete is a choose your own adventure style immersive art experience created by over 60 different artists in our inaugural exhibition you know so it's an explorable art space a location based experience where the public's invited to come play and explore and discover it's gonna be full of incredible artwork that is ranging from you know traditional crafts paint sculpture to new media art that involves a projection mapping electronics and other types of interactive technologies now now where did you get this idea you know folks okay first off we all love art okay when you see it this is so unique though it's pretty amazing so where did you get the idea man well I have to be honest this is not my idea I am a co-founder with Liz Dimit yes who originated the idea and I've you know supplemented as we kind of joined together joined forces and became co-founders nice you know I brought the technology focus and the experiential storytelling which is primarily my background into the picture but she had a long running vision for for fairgrounds existing for probably since she was a child in fact okay and you know and we're just executing on it we're part of a larger campus called the factory in the warehouse arts district yes fairgrounds is a tenant of the factory so we're a business that's separate from the factory but we're the anchor tenant and we're gonna be a big draw in the area and you know and we're creating jobs and it's really exciting time we're just about to open our doors in a several weeks here we're getting real close you know construction has been challenging and we've been learning a lot but we're we've got our heads down and we're just so focused and our artists are just so wonderful and you know it really represents what this area is capable of doing creatively now you know when we talk about the amount of jobs it's pretty amazing what you've done we know that artists in general what my best friend is an artist okay and I'll take a wild story the only thing I know how to draw I know I draw to draw a Hoss's head we've been together since the third grade and need my grand kid I show him how to draw a Hoss's head art is an amazing deal art trying to make money is a whole different deal talk to me about because I know that you have hired a lot of artists you've done a huge amount of work you got a huge amount of people that that basically are making money so tell me that aspect of it sure well you know people familiar with st. Pete certainly know that we have a rich creative community it's a big draw to this area yes people who are maybe unfamiliar are not from around here you know come visit because it's it's a vibrant community of creators it existed you know before fairgrounds and and we're just capitalizing on this sort of wonderful creative community that the city is really invested in st. Petersburg being a leader in the arts and you can see it from the plethora of different innovative museums that we have different media from you know famous glass art to the dolly there's much kind of at our doorstep this is kind of a natural extension of that I think what we're doing that's innovative is we're combining it with art and technology and also entrepreneurship and education so we are hiring a lot of people and it's felt great quite honest because you know in the during the pandemic a lot of folks were displaced from different creative industries and especially the entertainment industries where yes live shows and events that were canceled right around the time we were getting invested so we were able to not only hire a lot of these folks who were were displaced unfortunately by by those circumstances it really gave us some firepower and ammunition because suddenly it freed up talent that we were looking for so timing is everything they say and so talk to me a bit about the and folks you know this is going to be up on YouTube we have we have a welcome video from Liz Demet also that's going to be up there talk to me about the you have the artist and now the technology how these go together what has changed or maybe not changed and going forward yeah sure well we had to pivot you know the world really I think it surprised everyone no one really knew what to expect as the pandemic kind of set on and we were building a lot of very touchable haptic things that you could I say we were thinking this was going to be a playground of sorts and in some sense and we really moved away from some of those ideas just to keep the public safe so it caused us to put on our thinking caps and really apply our skills and we invented a number of ways to interact with the artwork with these stories that we were developing but through touchless means so you know using sensors and electronics sometimes foot pedals we found alternative ways to tell a rich and compelling story without you know the sort of same types of conventions that we were planning on doing and and so it's nice to be kind of with a creative group of people that is willing to be flexible and is just so inventive so that that's been part of that story you had a true baptism by fire man yeah now that's what an entrepreneur is all about so hey let me ask you you went you grew up in St. Pete but you went to the real it we are island school design right you made it up to Providence Rhode Island right yeah that's right such a cool city up there we love Providence we lived there for a number of years almost ten years up north so you had some of that good Italian food man I know Providence well I've been not at 25 years but I'm from Boston so I used to get on they just eat yeah totally federal Hill yes exactly exactly so so you learned quite a bit at that school I'm sure right yeah indeed and I worked for a very innovative company that was based in Providence who was affiliated with with RISD Rhode Island School of Design and was able to you know build immersive art experiences for big brands and corporations all around the world so it's what I've been doing most of my career now so so this is kind of a natural extension to that the only difference is is you know this is a brand new company in a startup so and so when we can open the gates we're getting around yeah you know we're looking at we'd like to do it in another month here okay yeah you know on that path to getting our certificate of occupancy and and checking off all those boxes and just trying to get our ducks in a row but we're getting real close and you know please our fairgrounds art is where you can find out more we have an insiders club where you'll you know people who join that the first people to find out about really anything we're doing so well listen man we appreciate you being with us it's fairgrounds dot art folks okay we'll get it out in YouTube for you congratulations that's real bottom line you're giving a lot of jobs a lot of hope and you're gonna do it man have a great one have a safe one