Gallery Walk merges art, community

A free bi-monthly community event that draws attention to eight local art galleries will start at 5 p.m. Friday.

Every year, Bloomington art galleries plan Gallery Walks, during which students and people of the community can view special exhibits including paintings and photography.

In 2003, a handful of galleries worked together for the first time to put on four Gallery Walks. Since then, the event has grown to include eight galleries, including Pictura Gallery and Gallery North, which participate in a walk on the first Friday of every other month.

Ruth Conway, a member of the By Hand Co-op, said exhibits for each gallery are often chosen a year before the date of the Gallery Walk in order to give artists time to create new works for the show.

The process for choosing artists to display varies with each gallery.

The By Hand Gallery accepts artist applications and invites artists whose work the co-op admires, Conway said.

“It’s a combination of people we want and people who want us,” she said.
Martha Moore, co-owner of Pictura Gallery, said she helps choose artists whose bodies of work look nice hanging together.

This month the gallery is showing work by artists Richard Koenig and Justin Chase Lane entitled “Reality Check.”

The number of artists exhibited at each gallery also differs. Some galleries, such as the By Hand Gallery and The Venue Fine Arts & Gifts, only feature one or two artists’ works, while others, such as the Wandering Turtle Art Gallery and Gallery North, show work from four or more artists.

For this month’s walk, the Wandering Turtle is showing works celebrating the Bloomington Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender community. Four artists from the Bloomington community submitted photographs that express cultural diversity.

“I’ve always wanted to do this kind of exhibit,” said Jaime Sweany, owner of Wandering Turtle.

With the Midwest Bisexual Lesbian Gay Transgender Ally College Conference coming up on Feb. 13 at IU, Sweany said the timing could not have been more perfect for her to show the exhibit.

Gallery North will show the winners of the National Society of Arts and Letters Emerging Artist competition. Anyone living in or attending school in Indiana between the ages of 18 and 24 could enter the competition, said Cathy Korinek, vice president for shows of Gallery North. Twenty-three young artists’ works will be exhibited.

Moore said all of the galleries agreed to stay open later, show new work and provide food for each Gallery Walk. She said this year the galleries have decided on a few additions to the Gallery Walk, such as having buses circle between the galleries continuously and throwing an after-party with live music at Tutto Bene Gallery.

Moore said she feels that it is very important for the survival of any gallery to take part in the community through events like Gallery Walks.

“They’re a community service, really,” Korinek said, “Gallery Walks are a great way of getting people into the galleries. People learn about art that way.”