Omega Mart, inside off-Strip complex of curiosities AREA15, seems like any other grocery store at first. The shelves are fully stocked with purchasable products, the employees are friendly and helpful, the space is well-lit and clean.
Inside, everything seems a little off. The produce section offers Aspirational Carrots available by 10-year subscription and absurdly priced Infinity Melons. Slimeapples and Happles offer tactile experiences but are likely deficient in contributing to recommended daily allowances of vitamin D and antioxidants.
Packaged products have unusual names such as Plausible Deniability laundry detergent and Symbiotic Shrimp sports beverage. People enter a small camping tent in a “Re-creation” section and don’t seem to come back out. Blink after seeing someone open a door in the refrigerated section and in the next instance are gone. Disappeared.
A stairwell in a corner leads up to an employee “Micro-Breakroom” that feels a little more normal. The employees know what to do, according to the posted Omega Oath. They follow pre-approved service procedures to the point that they work together like the wheels of a shopping cart.
The room is empty though, until an adult-sized human emerges from a locker and steps into the room, followed by another. The locker seems too small to fit one adult-adult-sized human, let alone two.
That’s because it’s not a locker, as a closer inspection reveals. It’s a portal, one of some half-dozen throughout Omega Mart, into an alternate universe where the futuristic visions and surreal dreams of art collective Meow Wolf manifest as an array of sense-stimulating encounters of the Dram kind.
Omega Mart would not be possible without the Dram family of Omega Mart parent company Dramcorp. Founder Walter Dram retired last year and current generation of Drams run the company today, although there appears to be some sort of conspiracy affecting the clan and certain associates. The corporate office in the backroom dimension of Omega Mart is available for inspection, though, and is a good place to begin unraveling the mystery.
As Cecelia Dram instructs via video memo: “Until you’re completed your Omega Mart and Factory training, I have no work for you here, but feel free to look around and be inspired by all that Source has allowed us to build together…” Abandoned desk spaces, computers and landline telephones connected to the corporate directory reveal the true intentions of Dramcorp. Anyone is welcome to sit at the desk of Vice President of Futurability Kazuhiro Matsumara and vicariously experience the power and influence that comes from sitting at a desk.
The complexity of the conspiracy, and what “Source” is exactly, can be more easily comprehended with training-level access that requires the purchase of a Boop Card, available for $3 purchase at the Omega Mart’s customer service desk. Boop stations are distributed throughout Omega Mart and there are more spaces dedicated to the Drams, but Cecelia’s word salad corporate-speak should be experienced before leaving the office.
There are three ways to explore the bi-level labyrinth-like surreality of Meow Wolf’s cavalcade of art installations and interactive consoles: clockwise, counter-clockwise and randomly. Hug the wall in one direction and explore until arriving at the starting place, or just walk directionlessly and be intrepid. There are infinity exhibits created with innovative uses of light technology. Push-button contraptions enable novices to collectively create and mix electronic music together. Hallway doors open to enchanting environments and rooms designed for momentary immersion and escape.
All paths lead to The Projected Desert of Seven Monolith Village, a cavernous space where kinetic images are shown on the walls and can be appreciated as background or absorbed as concept. While it’s easy to forget that concepts presented in tandem on as large a scale as Omega Mart come from the imaginations of human beings, installations by artists such as Claudia Bueno are reminders that collectives are made of individuals. One of her contributions, “Pulse,” breathes and shimmers like the landscapes and indigenous microorganisms of Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks that inspired its 60 panels of three-dimensional, animated silhouettes and patterns.
In a video artist’s statement, Bueno says the creative sparks of “Pulse” eventually “came together as this world that connects everything,” but she may as well be talking about Omega Mart and Meow Wolf: “This world where everything is intertwined. They’re one. There’s a sense of integration. Everything’s linked. One thing needs the other and they’re all pulsating, throbbing and living all together.”
Meow Wolf came together as a nine-member collective of Santa Fe artists in the wake of the Millennium, when creative arts of all kinds were given a blank slate but the industries that controlled them seemed more inaccessible than ever. The Meow Wolves took do-it-yourself aesthetics to new levels with immersive art exhibits, eventually creating a headquarters in an abandoned bowling alley.
Their endeavors caught on, especially The House of Eternal Return. A precursor to Omega Mart, it was an “intergalactic interdimensional travel agency” run by the effervescent, supernatural Selig family. One element was a refrigerator that opened to a hidden world where the artists’ wild imaginations roamed free.
Omega Mart is the next step beyond an avant-garde travel agency, a grocery store where there are multiple hidden portals to a fantastic fantasy world. This world has a speakeasy, Datamosh, where the atmosphere is relaxed and vodka-based Happle Juice is plentiful and delicious. Datamosh is open daily but in November, Omega Mart began hosting monthly “Night Shift” events for adults who like a libation break when shopping for strange and unusual consumer products.
“I drink, therefore I Dram,” is an appropriate toast to cap off a visit to Omega Mart. There is so much to explore it’s impossible to see it all in one adventure. A two-visit plan, one without a Boop Card followed by one with, is the best approach. It’s also prudent to set aside a budget for purchasing items such as Blue Chunks at $12.99 per pound or a Gummy Pickle. Join the Dram family, in a consumer sense.
AREA15, 3215 S. Rancho Drive, meowwolf/visit/las-vegas.com
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