TEN YEAR TIDBITS: SOME OF PLUS GALLERY'S BEST MOMENTS OF THE LAST TEN YEARS
FAVORITE E-NEWS MOMENT FROM LAST TEN YEARS AT PLUS
Avid readers of the Plus Gallery newsletter usually know that our favorite day of the year is April 1st. Our first major april fools joke had a number of people from the community wondering if Damien Hirst was really going to be at the gallery on a Sunday, though many people just wrote in to correct our spelling of his name. Two years later we pulled off a stunt that had us surprised at the community response, we've always said you need to write something really outlandish to know if anyone is reading:
Plus Gallery receives funding from Guggenheim foundation, NEA and NRA: The critical acclaim that Plus Gallery has received for our new space at 2501 Larimer has also generated significant interest from some of the standard bearers in the art world and beyond. The illustrious Guggenheim Foundation has given Plus a generous grant for the support of the new facility and the long-term development of our local artists program, as it is the only one of its kind in the world to offer exclusive support to the creme-de-la creme of the Colorado contemporary scene. The NEA has also recognized Plus Gallery's contribution to the arts and has dedicated 52.80% of its budget as a way to celebrate both Denver and the growing stature that the city is realizing world-wide, with Plus firmly at the helm of that advancement. Finally, seeing that we are still in what might be considered a "rough and tumble" neighborhood, the NRA has also generously donated ammunition and weapons to keep the gallery and its artwork safe.
FAVORITE ARTIST TALK FROM LAST TEN YEARS
Plus Gallery is one of the few local galleries to consistently host informal gatherings in which our featured artists can discuss their works, over ten years we've built up a very nice and valuable collection of those moments. Whether they might one-day find their way into a major documentary or forever be relegated to our archives (or Youtube) remains to be seen, but we failed to record our favorite artist talk from 2009, Bill Amundson's rapid-fire stand-up-worthy explanation of his "New Tower of Babel" from his introduction to the gallery in the group show "Brave New World." We later asked Bill to abbreviate that talk, sans audience, feeling that his version of the Tower of Babel was easily one of his masterpieces to date. You can check that out on our Youtube page or wait till Bill returns to Plus Gallery later this fall for his first solo exhibition in late October, which could end up as one of the great moments of the next ten years.
MOST FABULOUS DINNER PARTY FROM THE LAST TEN YEARS
Dinner parties at the gallery, while not common, have been more frequent than most might imagine, but they are generally reserved for clients or those with a keen connection to the gallery or our artists. Back in 2004 we hosted one of the most spectacular exhibitions in our history, Susan Meyer's "Malfunction Junction" which consisted of a scaled-down old-school wooden rollercoaster complete with flashing lights and accompanying soundtrack. We saw the opportunity to host what we called the "Roller-coaster dinner extravaganza" with some old and new friends one night, centered within Meyer's installation, creating a most unusual and dazzling effect that is forever singed in our memories. Our recollection was that the evening ended sometime around dawn, and guests included the architect of our future (now current) space as well as his wife, the current development director for the Denver Art Museum, and the person who revamped our website into something functional and lasting.
FAVORITE PRESS QUOTE FROM LAST TEN YEARS
Courtesy of Michael Paglia of the Westword, who used to pay attention to Plus prior to our move in 2009, and when it came to artist Bruce Price he rightly went over the top for his 2005 exhibition "Full." Paglia closed his review "Paint the Town" with "Price has been one of the most talked-about abstract artists active in Colorado during the past ten years. With the magnificent paintings in FULL, he can also be called one of the area's most important artists of any kind." Strong words indeed, and Price continues to amaze us with his daring and original career.
FAVORITE ARTWORK SALE FROM LAST TEN YEARS
There have been many memorable moments relating to the sale of so many of Jenny Morgan's paintings, we could practically write a novel about them all (and maybe someday we will). But the best has to be the pivotal painting "Enid Ellen" which we had available for years at the gallery before a good client finally added it to their collection. Enid was first introduced at our intern-curated exhibition "Vis-a-visage" at Object+Thought, an offsite space we teamed up with for a couple of years that didn't seem to get the same notoriety as our on-site endeavors but certainly carried our strong curatorial stamp, leading directly to the addition of R. Justin Stewart and Douglas Walker to our permanent stable of artists.
"Enid Ellen" was the first painting that Jenny Morgan collaborated on with another young artist David Mramor whom Jenny met during her masters studies in NYC at SVA and continues to work with in renowned artist Marilyn Minter's studio. Morgan claims to this day that it changed the direction of her painting, one that now resonates so much with major art collectors. It was a gutsy and unusual portrait of Mramor in his performance-artist cross-dresser persona and entirely unlike anything Morgan had painted to date, only you could still tell it was distinctly hers. It turns out that it was a quintessential painting in her young career, something that many shied away from because of the visceral intensity and extreme juxtaposition of opposing painting genres. The couple who eventually bought it have three young children and decided to hang it in their dining room in a home that's just a few blocks from Washington Park. I asked what their neighbors might think when they walked in, to which they replied "our neighbors buy their art from the Cherry Creek Arts Festival, but we buy art for ourselves." This was one of many works they had purchased from us over the last ten years and at a time at which Jenny's career was starting to truly show advanced signs.
Jenny Morgan / David Mramor collaboration: Enid Ellen
10 REMARKABLE AND FAVORITE UNSOLD ARTWORKS OF THE LAST TEN YEARS (IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER)
By our count we've managed to sell over 800 original artworks in the last decade, which of course is how we've stayed in business for 10 years. But some of the best works of the last decade remain unsold. Here's a list of ten favorites and/or truly remarkable works that have yet to make their way into a worthy collection:
- Mike Whiting's "Wedge," 2010
- Douglas Walker's "A-601," 2010
- William Betts' "Attack," 2009
- Karen McClanahan's "Wait (Embedded)," 2007
- Devon Moore's "Hoverplate," 2007
- Jean Arnold's "South Broadway: Alameda," 2007
- Gabriel Liston's "This is a far better thing," 2006
- Susan Meyer's "Shaft," 2010
- Wes Magyar's "Lineage I-IV," 2009
- Tseahai Johnson's "Exploding Carpet," 2008
........And just about anything by Colin Livingston, who we personally consider the Denver artist of the Decade.
DO YOU HAVE A FAVORITE PLUS GALLERY MOMENT FROM THE LAST TEN YEARS?
Tell us and we'll post the best ones, if any, in our final newsletter of the summer next week!
