Grand Arts was a nonprofit contemporary art space in downtown Kansas City, Missouri, whose mission was to help national and international artists realize projects considered too risky, provocative or complex to otherwise attract support.[1] It was co-founded by Margaret Silva and Sean Kelley in 1995 and operated until 2015 with sole funding from the Margaret Hall Silva Foundation.[2]

Facilities included a 4,000-square-foot fabrication studio, exhibition spaces, offices, and an on-site apartment available for visiting artists.[3]

History

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Margaret Silva and Sean Kelley co-founded Grand Arts in 1995 to give artists "a place for radical experimentation, without the constraints of too little time and even less money".[4] Kelley left Grand Arts in 2003.

Stacy Switzer served as artistic director from 2004 until the gallery's close.[5]

In total, Grand Arts produced 90 exhibitions with more than 120 artists. Projects often took years to produce, from concept to realization, and the organization's full-time staff tended to each phase of the process: research, design, fabrication, programming, publicity and beyond. Grand Arts' practice of long-term collaborative project development is in part what distinguished it from other granting organizations, according to Switzer: "That's what was special about the Grand Arts process. It wasn't that an artist would propose something and we would fabricate it according to the artist's specs. Often, there was a long conversation about how to push, pull, and tease the idea, pull out the most provocative threads and find other people in other fields who could help us enhance it in other ways".[6]

Following exhibition, projects produced at Grand Arts belonged solely to the artist.[1] The works were often then exhibited in museums, commercial galleries and/or art fairs. For example:

Upon Grand Arts' closing, Silva donated the building, a former auto shop located at 1819 Grand Boulevard, to the Kansas City Art Institute.[5]

Exhibition timeline

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Artist(s) Exhibition title Year Essayist
Glenn Goldberg (untitled) 1995 Tad Wiley
Hirokazu Fukawa Like and Ethereal Transfer 1995 Barbara Bloemink
Brad Braverman RawShock 1995 Ann Wylie
Alice Aycock New Works 1995 Monroe Denton
Ryuhei Rex Yuasa (untitled) 1995 Kazuhiro Yamamoto
Lester Goldman (untitled) 1996 Roberta Lord
Jane Lackey In Code 1996 Laurie Palmer
Kimberly Austin, Brad Braverman, Rossana Jeran and Jim Pennington, John O’Reilly, and Seth Rubin Body Double 1996 Monroe Denton
Jeff Aeling The Layman’s Guide to the Passage of the Millennium for the Preservation of Hysteria 1996 Peter von Ziegesar
Mel Kendrick (untitled) 1996 Klaus Kertess
China Marks (untitled) 1997 H. L. Hix
Chris Larson (untitled) 1997 Ronald Jones
Nick Cave (untitled) 1997 Karen Searle
Phil Argent, Linda Besemer, Ingrid Calame, Sally Elesby, Sharon Ellis, Jack Hallberg, Michael Pierzynski, Monique Prieto, Adam Ross, Pauline Stella Sanchez, Jennifer Steinkamp, and Yek Spot Making Sense 1997 curator David Pagel
Seton Smith (untitled) 1997 David Pagel
Kimberly Austin (untitled) 1997 Roberta Lord
GALA Committee In the Name of the Place 1998 Joshua Dector
Beth B. Monuments 1998 Roberta Lord
Michael Rees (untitled) 1998 Dominique Nohas
Tim Rollins and K.O.S. in collaboration with Kansas City youth 1998 Michael Toombs
Kirsten Mosher (untitled) 1998 Alexander Gray
Stuart Netsky (untitled) 1999 Bill Arning
James Drake (untitled) 1999 Bruce W. Ferguson
Zesty Meyers, Evan Snyderman, and Jeff Zimmerman B-Team 1999 Stephanie Cash
Ricci Albenda, Polly Apfelbaum, Erica Baum, Lucky DeBellevue, Steven Evans, Tony Feher, Rachel Feinstein, Eric Hanson, Rachel Harrison, Jonathan Horowitz, Chuck Nanney, Rob Pruitt, and Anthony Viti New York: Neither/Nor 1999 curator Bill Arning
Walter Zimmerman (untitled) 1999 Roberta Lord
Jesse Kaminsky, Demetre Keros, Jennie Pakradooni, Kristine Veith, and Michael Yglesias En Masse 1999 Andrew Wells
Jim Leedy War 2000 H. L. Hix
Isaac Julien Long Road to Mazatlan 2000 Okwui Enwezor
Larry Buechel Eye to Eye 2000 Roberta Lord
Kimberly Austin, Alice Aycock, Brad Braverman, GALA Committee, Glenn Goldberg, Lester Goldman, Dennis Oppenheim, Roxy Paine, Tim Rollins and K.O.S., Heather Schatz and Eric Chan Fast: Five Years at Grand Arts 2000 Roberta Lord
Dennis Oppenheim (untitled) 2000 Mary Beth Karoll
Tara Donovan, Jyung Mee Park, and Achim Mohné De Tempore 2000 Angela Anderson Adams
Jesse Rosser (untitled) 2001 Ingrid Schaffner
Troy Richards (untitled) 2001 Roberta Lord
Jamex and Einar de la Torre Anacronistas 2001 Leah Ollman
Roxy Paine (untitled) 2001 Tan Lin
ChanSchatz (untitled) 2001 Bennett Simpson
John Newman (untitled) 2001 Raphael Rubinstein
Marek Cecula The Porcelain Carpet Project 2002 Roberta Lord
Oliver Boberg, James Casebere, Catherine Chalmers, Gregory Crewdson, Anthony Goicolea, Yoshio Itagaki, Craig Kalpakjian, Izima Kaoru, David Levinthal, Florian Maier-Aichen, Didier Massard, Tracey Moffatt, Vik Muniz, Hiroshi Sugimoto, and Edwin Zwakman Constructed Realities 2002 curator Barbara J. Bloemink
John Powers Operations of the Marvelous 2002 Philip Glahn
Patricia Cronin Memorial to a Marriage 2002 David Frankel
Richard Van Buren Spirit Mold 2002 Klaus Kertess
Sam Easterson Animal, Vegetable, Video: Where the Buffalo Roam 2003 Lisa Fischman
Ian Dawson (untitled) 2003 David Humphrey
Teresita Fernández Immersion 2003 Rochelle Steiner
Catherine Chalmers American Cockroach 2003 Tan Lin
Allan McCollum The Kansas and Missouri Topographical Model Project 2003 Rhea Anastas
Mara Adamitz Scrupe Back to Nature: Collecting the Preserved Garden 2004 Mary Jane Jacob
George Woodman Camera Obscura Photographs 2004 Nancy Princenthal
Sanford Biggers, E.C. Brown, Christoph Büchel, C-Level, Critical Art Ensemble, Miranda July, Eddo Stern, Sarah Sze, Paul Vanouse, and Faith Wilding Join Us: Calls to Ecstasy from the Edge of Oblivion 2004 Stacy Switzer
Rosemarie Fiore Good-Time Mix Machine: Scrambler Drawings 2004 David Hunt
Michael Converse, Egawa + Zbryk, Rachel Hayes, Seth Johnson, and Jay Norton Charlotte Street Awards Exhibition 2004 Stacy Switzer
Alexis Rockman Manifest Destiny 2005 Linda Weintraub
Archive (Anne Walsh and Chris Kubick), Bordermates, Brian Conley, Ammar Eloueini, The Evolution Control Committee, Fritz Haeg, Cameron Jamie, Yoshua Okon, Lucky Pierre, François Perrin, thedinnerparty.net, and Kerry Tribe Mash-Up!: Eight Weeks of Mixing It Up and Throwing It Down (event series) 2005 curated by Nato Thompson
Alfredo Jaar Muxìma 2005 Patricia C. Phillips
Aaron Gach/ Center for Tactical Magic Tactical Ice Cream Unit 2005 Stacy Switzer
Nadine Robinson Conclusion of the System of Things 2005 Christine Y. Kim
Aidas Bareikis The Guard of Sorry Spirit 2006 Maria Elena Buszek
Neal Rock Faith Culture Collection 2006 Christopher Miles
Arts Subterranea, Filip Noterdaeme, Bill Shannon, and Margaret Wertheim Urban Test Sites (event series) 2006
Michael Jones McKean Riverboat Lovesongs for the Ghost Whale Regatta 2006 Alison de Lima Greene
CarianaCarianne, Mathilde ter Heijne, Laurel Nakadate, Mariah Robertson, and Siebren Versteeg Haunted States 2006 Stacy Switzer
Sissel Tolaas The FEAR of Smell/The Smell of FEAR 2007 Elizabeth Thomas
Fritz Haeg, Filip Noterdaeme, Micaela O'Herlihy, Chase Pierson, Spurse, Tavares Strachan, Travis Watson, Katherine Wright, Lynus Young, and Adam Zaretsky From the Fat of the Land: Alchemies, Ecologies, Attractions 2007 Linda Weintraub
Sanford Biggers Blossom 2007 Cay Sophie Rabinowitz
Cody Critcheloe, Jessica Kincaid, Emily Sall, and James Trotter Charlotte Street Awards Exhibition 2007 Julie Rodrigues Widholm
Laurel Nakadate Stay The Same Never Change 2008 Neil LaBute
Mary Kay and Rebecca Morales (untitled) 2008 Sue Spaid
Annie Lapin Parallel Deliria 2008 Lane Relyea
William Pope.L Animal Nationalism 2008 Gregory Volk
Spurse Deep Time Rapid Time 2009 Stacy Switzer and Spurse
Jeremy Deller, presented by Creative Time and the New Museum It Is What It Is: Conversations about Iraq Apr. 1, 2009
Pablo Helguera The Juvenal Players 2009 Naief Yehya
Cody Critcheloe/SSION BOY 2009 Stacy Switzer
Yael Bartana, Sharon Hayes, Matthew Lutz-Kinoy, My Barbarian, Jeanine Oleson, Ulrike Ottinger, Adrian Piper, Dean Spade and Craig Willse, A. L. Steiner, and Ian White Ecstatic Resistance 2009 curator Emily Roysdon
Tavares Strachan Orthostatic Tolerance: Launching into an Infinite Distance 2010 Franklin Sirmans
Ryan Mosley Painting Séance 2010 Elizabeth Thomas
Ari Fish, Sonié Ruffin, and Caleb Taylor Charlotte Street Awards Exhibition 2010 Lacey Wozny
Lori Brack, Julia Cole, Sylvie Fortin, May Tveit, Rob Walker, and Lacey Wozny Dialogue by Design: Experimental Platforms for Intimate Conversations (event series) 2010
John Salvest New Cornucopia and The Big IOU 2011 Stacy Switzer
Mariah Robertson Let’s Change 2012 Eva Respini
Sissel Tolaas SmellScape KCK/KCMO (2007-2012) 2012 Annie Fischer
Anthony Baab A Strenuous Nonbeing 2013 Stephen Lichty
Ellie Ga Square, Octagon, Circle 2013 Lauren O’Neill-Butler
Mike Erickson, Erika Lynne Hanson, and Paul Anthony Smith Charlotte Street Awards Exhibition 2013 Danny Orendorff
Stanya Kahn Don’t Go Back to Sleep 2014 Ed Halter
Glenn Kaino Tank 2015 Kate Hackman
The Propeller Group A Universe of Collisions 2015 Rob Walker

Problems and Provocations: Grand Arts 1995-2015

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In 2016, Grand Arts published Problems and Provocations: Grand Arts 1995-2015, co-edited by Stacy Switzer and Annie Fischer, with a foreword by Margaret Silva and an introduction by Switzer.

The book chronicles 30 of Grand Arts' projects — works by figures including Alice Aycock, Alfredo Jaar, Isaac Julien, William Pope.L, Sanford Biggers, Laurel Nakadate, Stanya Kahn, and Tavares Strachan — with archival materials and project documentation presented alongside newly written anecdotes and reflections by artists and other collaborators.

Essays by Pablo Helguera, Iain Kerr, Emily Roysdon, Gean Moreno and Rob Walker consider the models, practices and ethics of art institutions. A critical study conducted by the research studio RHEI identifies and describes Grand Arts’ unorthodox organizational model.

Successor organization

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In 2016, former Grand Arts associates Stacy Switzer, Lacey Wozny, Eric Dobbins and Annie Fischer relocated to Los Angeles to develop a new organization named Fathomers, similar in mission to Grand Arts but with a focus on long-term thinking and transdisciplinary practice.[17] Fathomers' founding board members are Margaret Silva, Andrew Torrance and Glenn Kaino. The organization's first project is a seven-year collaboration with artist Michael Jones McKean.[18]

References

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  1. ^ a b "Hello, Goodbye". GrandArts.com. Retrieved 14 November 2016.
  2. ^ Lloyd, Ann Wilson (17 October 1999). "Time Off to Dive Into Reality Rather Than Retreat From It". The New York Times. Retrieved 14 November 2016.
  3. ^ Herriman, Kat (27 August 2016). "Kansas City's Grand Arts Releases a Book on 20 Years of Art, Science, and Tech". The Creators Project. Retrieved 14 November 2016.
  4. ^ Walz, Cara (6 July 2000). "Five Years and Counting". The Pitch. Retrieved 15 November 2016.
  5. ^ a b Spencer, Laura (2 September 2015). "After A 20-Year Run Of Extraordinary Freedom For Artists, Grand Arts Closes". KCUR. Retrieved 16 November 2016.
  6. ^ Janovy, C.J. (27 December 2016). "In 2016, The Brains Behind Grand Arts Sent Kansas City A Remembrance From Los Angeles". KCUR 89.3. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  7. ^ "Turner Prize 2001 - Exhibition at Tate Britain | Tate". Tate. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  8. ^ "Blossom". Sanford Biggers. 12 February 2007. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  9. ^ "Brooklyn Museum: Sanford Biggers: Sweet Funk—An Introspective". www.brooklynmuseum.org. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  10. ^ "Grand Arts presents a new film by Laurel Nakadate: Stay the Same Never Change" (PDF). Casiotone for the Painfully Alone. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  11. ^ Wojczuk, Montana (2 June 2009). "In Sight: Stay the Same Never Change Mumblecore Cinema and the Essay Film". bombmagazine.org. BOMB Magazine. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  12. ^ Weisblum, Vida (29 June 2015). "William Pope.L Flag Makes an Appearance at Kendrick Lamar's BET Awards Performance [Updated] | ARTnews". www.artnews.com. ArtNews. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  13. ^ Knight, Christopher (24 March 2015). "William Pope.L sets the U.S. flag waving at the MOCA/Geffen". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  14. ^ "Boy Genius: Ssion's Art of the Music Video". Interview Magazine. 7 April 2010. Retrieved 15 January 2017.
  15. ^ "The Propeller Group's 'A Universe of Collisions,' the Final Show at Grand Arts, Opens August 7". Hyperallergic. 27 July 2015.
  16. ^ Rose, Frank (21 April 2016). "The Propeller Group Brings a Phantasmagorical Vietnam to James Cohan". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 November 2016.
  17. ^ Indrisek, Scott (8 November 2016). "Fathomers Reinvigorates the Grand Arts Mission in L.A." Artinfo. Retrieved 14 November 2016.
  18. ^ Cohen, Alina (31 October 2016). "Problems, Provocations, Roller Coasters, and Guns". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved 14 November 2016.

Further reading

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  • Switzer, Stacy and Annie Fischer, ed. "Problems and Provocations: Grand Arts 1995-2015" (Kansas City: Grand Arts, 2016) ISBN 978-0692625538
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