At our last local artists' meeting, someone brought up the topic of having an art center in town. The Ithaca, New York regional area is home to many visual artists (as well as musicians and writers), yet there are very few places to exhibit locally. We do have a couple of not-for-profit spaces that show art, but one is tiny and hardly ever open, and the other, which isn't much better, will be lost soon due to the sale of the building it is housed in. We don't have much in the way of for-profit galleries, either.
My response to this issue has always been to ignore Ithaca as a place to sell art. It's lovely living here and making art, but not a good place for marketing. When the tourists come through, they are looking for a photo or painting of a waterfall or gorge, certainly not my non-representational abstracts. The artists who cater to this market have a better chance to sell.
Establishing an art center takes money, and it's unclear where we would get the funding. There is an art center at Corning, New York, which is supported by Corning Glass. Check out 171 Cedar Arts. They offer classes as well as exhibitions.
We have Cornell University in Ithaca, but they have put their money for the arts into the Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art. They occasionally show a few Ithaca artists' work in a summer exhibition.
Taking a look at art centers on the internet, I came across the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, which opened in 1956 as a non-profit visual arts organization in Winston-Salem, NC. When an industrialist willed his 32-acre estate to the gallery, they increased their scope to 11 southeastern states.
Most non-profit organizations function due to the sweat of many volunteers. It takes that plus gifts and grants to make a success. Artists usually do not have the money or the time to fill these slots. What we need is a wealthy art lover to get such a project off the ground.
It's true that artists often start and manage co-op galleries with group funds and energy, but how many actually make a profit for their artists?
For now, I'll pass on putting my time and energy into starting an art center in Ithaca.
