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Galleries are interested in sales and few restaurants will show cows floating in formaldehyde. Resources and support systems are equally hard to access. An alternative is to move to New York where there is interest, support, an audience, and the hope of getting discovered by the arts editor of the New York Times.
When an artist leaves the community, the community looses a part of itself. Several folks, though, are working to make it possible for artists to stay. They are working to educate the community, to provide exhibition spaces, provide resources for the artists, to help them develop their portfolios and to provide a critical forum where artists can discuss their work.
The oldest of these efforts in Albuquerque is the Harwood Art Center. Founded by the Escuela del Sol Montessori the Harwood has provided studio space for 50 artists, access to educational opportunities, and spaces for exhibitions and performances. The Harwood has been at the core of some major arts initiatives such as the “Prints of Albuquerque” and “Vehicle.” The Harwood has also been blessed with strong leadership and a good deal of community support. Some artists, however, are concerned that the Harwood’s tie to Escuela del Sol and status under school’s board of directors means that it cannot exhibit really edgy controversial work.
Site 2121 has been located at 2121 Isleta Blvd. deep in the heart of Albuquerque’s South Valley, and has been a major exhibition site and a support system for contemporary artists. Jon McConville, Da-Ka-Xeen Mehner and Sabra Sowell have for the past four years have dumped their time, energy and money into making Site 2121 a viable proposition. Recently they have rented the second floor of a building in the downtown. They are currently renting out studio spaces. There will be some exhibition space available although the single staircase precludes anything beyond by invitational openings. They are also working with ARC Gallery to form a nonprofit organization to develop a center for the contemporary arts.
ARC Gallery, the work of Michael Certo and Jessie DeLeers, sits on the corner of Mountain Road and Broadway near Downtown Albuquerque. Like 2121, ARC has been an exhibition space for numerous artists. between the two sites, they have shown over 250 individual artists. ARC specializes in providing a space for artists to experiment and explore new directions. Currently about one fourth of the building is being used for gallery space. The rest is living quarters and studio space.
Certo is certain that if he didn’t own the building that they wouldn’t still be there. Like 2121 artists share in the cost of exhibiting, and Certo and DeLeers provide technical support. “It is like working two jobs to make this go,” states Certo.
The hope is to get non-profit status and to work to find funding for a center. Not only will this provide a stable organization, it will pay these folks for their efforts. The center as envisioned will provide increased exhibition space, a resource center and library, a place where artists can photograph their work, a forum to show slides and discuss each others' work, and a way to begin to educate an audience.
There is the hope that some sort of residency program can be developed that will allow for for visiting artist to come and work here. Certo says he has found that San Francisco has over 14 centers for contemporary art.
Despite the differences in size, income, and sophistication, Albuquerque certainly needs at least one. If the energy and dedication that these folks have shown over the past four years holds out, we’ll get it soon.
Santa Fe is not only the “city different”, it is the city of differences. On Pecos Trail in the old Armory Plan B Evolving Arts is the closest thing to a community center for the contemporary arts. Actually, the current program evolved from the Santa Fe Center for Contemporary Art.
Ginger Myhaver, Michael Luhan and Zane Fisher were brought in as Project Managers from OffSite, a small contemporary art gallery and work space in the warehouse district. There is a large exhibit space, a movie theater, a performance space, a small coffee shop, some studio work spaces and other supports available to artists in the community. One of my favorite programs was a kind of junk exchange shop. Artists would bring in their left overs for other artists to purchase. One man’s junk is...
Exhibits at Plan B are about as edgy as you can get. The gallery space in and of itself is pretty daunting and a bit overwhelming--a cross between a castle keep and a blimp hanger. But, where else can you see a Jan Svakmajer retrospective?
On the other extreme is Site Santa Fe. Funded by big bucks, it brings in some of the edgiest artists from the international world of art. It sits in a renovated warehouse on Paseo des Peralta. It was designed around its first exhibit and hosts everything from the quiet contemplations of Agnes Martin to the twittering robotic machines in its current show. It also sponsors numerous lectures, performances and films. Site Santa Fe was founded on the idea that the city needed a not-for-profit space to show art from the edge. It is a startling discovery for a town so driven by the market and one Albuquerque hopefully will catch on to.