Hyder Gallery is changing its name to Project Gallery. Helen Hyder mentioned that when the gallery goes to out-of-town art fairs, people assume the gallery is a vanity gallery because of the name. Hence the name change. By the way, Paul Santoleri has a show there this month, plus there’s a group show to celebrate the gallery’s first year. I didn’t get to last month’s show until the very end of the month, and by time I got around to thinking about writing something, it was gone (left, Sanoleri’s “Fire in the Village”). 
The other interesting thing Hyder mentioned to me was that artists in South America generally don’t paint isolated in studios but rather work in groups. This info came up because the show included an exhibit of drawings from Venezuela from a group of artists calling themselves Circulo de Dibujo who get together regularly to paint (right, one of the paintings from the Circulo, Guillermo Ferrer’s “Arboleda I,” a very sexy rainforest tree). Galleries gone
On Friday we stood before the papered over windows at Union 237 talking to a young man guarding the door. He confirmed what the notes on the windows said–that the gallery was closing. I for one am sad about this, because it took street artists seriously and gave them a gorgeous space to show off their wares. Unfortunately, as far as I could tell, the gallery still wasn’t able to give that work the credibility it needed to attract collectors.
We heard several months ago from an artist who exhibited at Pringle that it was going out of business. But then it didn’t. But now it has. I guess I didn’t feel as wedded to this gallery because it trod the tried and true, showing work from commercially successful artists from around the world. Nonetheless, more galleries is better than fewer galleries. I’m sorry to see it is gone.
And now the good news…
And over on Race Street on the western edge of Old City’s galleries, Hurong Lou Gallery opened in May with highly crafted, high-end sculpture. In addition to the InLiquid web page link, I’m also adding this link to their own Web page, which is too cute for its own good–or to put it another way, form defeated function. It’s so small I can’t read it. But it sure is sweet. Check it out.
