Selected Exhibition Narratives
I. Big Orbit 1991-1993
There had
been an art gallery at 30 Essex Street since the 1970s. Known as Artists
Gallery, it played a small but significant role in the Buffalo art scenewith
the usual peaks and valleysuntil late 1990, when it simply ran
out of steam.
In stepped artists Katrin Jurati and Alan Van Every, then renting studio
space in the Essex Street Complex. Jurati and Van Every decided to take
over the administration of Artists Gallery, revitalizing a mission and
identity that up until then had been loosely-defined. In effect, they
not only brought the gallery back to life, they gave it a personality.
Jurati and Van Every, soft-spoken in person, had a gift for public relations,
particularly for using both traditional and non-traditional ways of
communicating with their audiences. Colorful, hand-drawn announcements
and newsletters began to flow from the gallery. The pair made strategic
use of their connections with the Buffalo arts establishment and their
teachers and mentors at the University at Buffalo. They called the gallery
Big Orbitactually the suggestion of an Essex Street neighbor,
Big Mikebecause the astrological metaphor suggested the connectivity
of artists and art spaces, big and small, revolving in the same cultural
sky.
Two of the local museum heads were very supportive right off the
bat, Alan Van Every recalls. I just happened to be taking
classes that semester from Anthony Bannon [then director of the Burchfield-Penney
Art Center] and Sandra Olsen [then director of the Castellani Art Museum
of Niagara University]. Taking advice from these and many other area
arts veterans, the pair crafted an ambitious exhibition and event schedule
that included poetry readings, film screenings, rock concerts, figure
modeling sessions, and regular artists meetings as well as visual
art exhibitions. Their enthusiasm and creative savvy was instantly appreciated
by other arts groupsthe David Anderson Gallery, for example, donated
the proceeds of a yearly event to Big Orbit, while the Burchfield-Penney
Art Center collaborated with the gallery on artist projects.
Everything
was achieved through the support of our community here, including artists,
gallery sitters, interns, our advisory board, our mentors, institutions
all around Buffalo, friends, collectors and criticseven a pro bono
lawyer and accountant, says Jurati. In return for that support,
she concludes, We made a space for artists and art supporters to
get together and have a good time.
Although the enthusiasm and the good times may be a vivid on-going legacy
of Big Orbits first three years, there was also memorable programming.
The exhibitions were an intriguing mixture of established local artists,
emerging artists and themed group shows, which often brought emerging
and established artist together. Highlights of their programming include
early exhibitions by sculptors Patrick Robideau and Kurt Von Voetsch,
in group and solo shows, as well as the final exhibition by artist/filmmaker
Paul Sharits, who died in 1993. Most memorably, Jurati and Van Every,
both sculptors as well as painters, did much to bring sculpture back into
the Western New York limelight. Group shows such as Metal and Woodworks
combined formal and conceptual treatments of three-dimensional media,
as well as used the spacious courtyard adjoining the space to feature
larger works.
By the end of their tenure as Big Orbit co-directors, Jurati and Van Every
had completed the process for the gallery to become its own 501(c)(3)
organization. And another pair of young artists was ready to step in.
II. Big Orbit 1993-1996
AnJanette
Brush and Josh Iguchi were completing their degrees at the University
at Buffalo when they became involved in Big Orbit. Both were working in
photography; Brush was also pursuing an academic degree in comparative
literature.
Kat and Allen asked Josh and me if we were interested in taking
over in the summer of 1993, when they were planning a move to New York,
recalls Brush. When we stepped in, a major goal was to get the gallery
on a more solid financial footing. Big Orbit had just received its non-profit
status, so it was an ideal moment for increasing the budget through grants
and other support, such as corporate and individual giving. We wanted
the gallery to operate on a basis other than the purely volunteer.
Thus, the beginning of Big Orbits transformation to an established
arts institution. The gallerys most ambitious programming over the
next three years reflected a new involvement with official funding sources.
Body/Machine, a group show of women digital artists, was funded through
the gallerys first grant from the New York State Council on the
Arts. Another landmark show, Alert Aesthetics, was the result of an exchange
program with the Czech Republic, and was funded by the National Association
of Artists Organizations through a rigorous competitive selection
process.
In addition to these projects, whichfor the first time in Big Orbits
historyinvolved years of planning, Brush cites installations by
architect Mehrdad Hadighi and sculptor/performance artist Kurt Von Voetsch
as among the most important exhibitions during her tenure. In 1995, Sean
Donaher, a printmaker and designer, became co-director of the gallery
so that Iguchi could devote more time to art-making. Donaher had actually
been working at the gallery since 1993. Big Orbit was now receiving funding
from the Arts Council of Buffalo and Erie Countys Cultural Incentive
Program, as well as funding from the City of Buffalo.
This funding helped by the combination of Brushs academic
background and Donahers background in printing and designmake
it possible for Big Orbit to start producing professional-quality publications
as well as pay its staff.
III. Big Orbit 1996
The last
five years have witnessed a burst of ambitious activity at Big Orbit Gallery.
Some typical scenarios from the last few years: In April 1998, a performer
in a gorilla suit swung from the gallerys ceiling beams, throwing
milk and juice all over himself, the gallery, and, sometimes, the audience
(Craig Smith: Omatic Activities). In October, 2000, two architects transformed
4,500 wooden pallets into an oval cave inside the gallery and a corresponding
huge egg outside in the courtyard (Frank Fantauzzi, Mehrdad Hadighi: Big
Orbits). In December, 2000the space having barely recovered from
its pallet experiencetwo sculptors built a house inside the gallery,
which they then covered with black pigment (Patrick Robideau and Kurt
Von Voetsch: A Whole Lot of Chugger behind a Whole Lot of Pat).
When Sean Donaher took over the directorship mid-1996, the transition
was barely perceptiblehe had been working closely with the gallery
since 1993. But after a couple of years, his curatorial aesthetic began
to emerge. It is clearly an aesthetic that encourages artists to push
their work to the next level and also one which offers the gallery as
an opportunity to be explored to its fullest. During this period, Donaher
did not work alone. Martin Kruck signed on as Assistant Director in the
fall of 1997, before leaving in 1999 to pursue teaching opportunities.
Artist Leah Rico joined Donaher in 1999 as Gallery Manager and then as
Associate Directorbefore leaving in 2001.
As Donaher puts it, Ive really emphasized those emerging artists
who show an elevated artistic maturity and would most benefit from the
exposure a Big Orbit exhibition would providesuch as Jackie Felix,
Reed Anderson, Joshua Marks, and Patrick Holderfield. Ive also worked
with established artists who were experimenting with innovative new projects
or bodies of worksuch as Mehrdad Hadighi, Alberto Rey, Leandro Soto,
and Andrew Johnson. Donaher has also added new funders to the roster,
including regular support from the new York State Council on the Arts
and the County of Erie as well as corporate and foundation support.
In conjunction with exhibitions that questioned the gallerys boundaries
and conventions, a new program involving music, performance, and other
media was instituted in 1999, under the leadership of Buffalo writer/publisher
Craig Reynolds, whose zine, Basta, had been an outlet for experimental
writing since 1997. (Seehis essay in this book for a complete history
of this programming) Reynolds, sometimes working in conjunction with other
presenterssuch as the University at Buffalo and Hallwalls Contemporary
Arts Centerhas brought in a veritable explosion of concerts, readings,
screenings, performance, and other events, often presented in series,
often at satellite spaces. Although the tradition of presenting events
such as poetry, films, lectures, and performance in addition to visual
art exhibitions had been steady at Big Orbit throughout the nineties,
it has never been presented with such ambition and with such a strongly
defined programming philosophy.
Ten years after its first exhibition opened on March, 1991, the mission
of Big Orbit Gallery remains strong. There has been change: new directors/curators,
a trend toward ambitioussometimes massiveinstallations, and
the addition of a cutting edge multi-media performance program. But the
simple yet essential focus of the gallery, to provide a free-wheeling
arena for the best and brightest artists working in Western New York,
is as unfaltering as ever.