November
2005
Jim Smith
and Rob Clifford, of Clifford • Smith Gallery, have announced
that at the end of this month they will close the South End
exhibition space they have operated since 1998.
Citing the struggles of operating a commercial gallery dealing
in art which is conceptually off the beaten path in Boston,
the pair have indicated that they are developing a new model
with which they hope to combine their skills for curating thought-provoking
solo and group shows, with a lower price-point retail component.
In the meantime they plan to remain active in the vibrant regional
art community they have come to know.
Clifford • Smith Gallery opened its doors in May of 1998
on Harrison Avenue, joining pioneer galleries like Genovese/Sullivan,
and Kingston Gallery, both of which had recently moved to the
South End. They quickly built a reputation as a place to see
finely executed, conceptually strong contemporary art, and over
the years helped to establish the South End as a destination
for any art enthusiast who hoped to find cutting-edge visual
art in Boston. Clifford and Smith specialized in exhibiting
work that explores experimental media or non-traditional uses
of familiar materials. The debut exhibition in the space featured
Los Angeles-based installation artist Karen Kimmel’s slickly-produced,
acrylic sculptural pieces hanging in one room, and New York
artist Larry Krone’s achy-breaky melancholy multimedia
installation in the other; one noteworthy piece consisting of
the entire lyric to Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville spelled
out in the artist’s own hair. The small group gathered
at that first opening reception – mostly the families
and friends of the new gallerists – was treated to Krone’s
rendition of Dolly Parton’s Coat Of Many Colors, the artist
sitting atop a bale of hay and accompanying himself on the ukulele.
This pairing of divergent but complimentary artists’ bodies
of work became the first in a program of strong work by talented
artists that Clifford•Smith Gallery would come to be known
for.
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Rob
Clifford, Jim Smith & Lucy Clifford-Smith
Photographed during an exhibition of Chris Teasley's paintings,
March 2003
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In
the late 90’s, other than neighbors such as the Pine Street
Inn, the gallery building populated by artists and owned by
GTI Properties was surrounded by empty lots and abandoned buildings.
GTI supported the young galleries’ efforts to promote
the neighborhood and to attract other galleries. Over the years,
Clifford•Smith Gallery gladly acted as poster-child and
eventually were joined by, and inspired by galleries that opened
such as O•H+T, Allston Skirt, Bernard Toale, Gallery Katz,
Open Studios Press and Samson Projects.
Clifford•Smith Gallery’s curatorial aesthetic continued
to define itself, and the exhibition program gained a large
audience thanks in no small way to the press which was devoted
to covering the range of exhibitions that were popping up in
the South End. Mainstream media and art world publications wrote
regularly about the artists who showed at Clifford•Smith,
from the local and supportive papers like South End News, to
cultural weeklies such as The Weekly Dig and The Boston Phoenix,
to regional favorites like the Boston Globe and Art New England,
and international publications such as Art Forum, Art In America,
Tema Celeste and Art on Paper. In recent years thoughtful and
insightful reviews have also appeared in online sites like bigredandshiny.com
and someothermagazine.com. The culmination of this sort of endorsement
came in the form of two awards for gallery shows in 2004, including
one for Best Solo Exhibition and another for Best Group Exhibition
at a Commercial Gallery, awarded by the Boston chapter of the
International Association of Art Critics (Association Internationale
des Critiques d’Art).
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Smith
and Clifford never restricted themselves by limiting their roster
to only local artists, or only artists hailing from outside of
the area. Rather, they enjoyed the process of juxtaposing locally-based
artists’ work with that of their peers from around the country,
and in bringing work that fit the gallery’s aesthetic to
Boston from other regions. The dialogue between these artists
and their work, sometimes influenced by the artist’s surroundings,
interested the duo far more than focusing where the work was produced.
Over the years the gallerists did work with––and become
friends with––emerging and mid-career artists from
around the country. Many of these artists were former students
or faculty from the great academic programs around New England
like the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Massachusetts College
of Art, Montserrat, Yale, and Bard, to name a few. The curators,
staff and administrators at those institutions also became friends
of the gallery, as did their peers from the Institute of Contemporary
Art, MIT’s List Visual Arts Center, the Worcester Art Museum,
the DeCordova Museum, the Fogg Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts,
and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, all of whom frequented
the space to stay abreast of what was happening in the contemporary
art scene in Boston and beyond.
One
of the few frustrations for Clifford and Smith was the inability
to take the gallery to a more self-sustaining place, expanding
beyond Boston’s small contemporary art maket by tapping
into the national market and scene, a leap which often requires
an investment of personal financial resources they simply did
not have. National reviews of exhibitions and trips to art fairs
around the country (including participating in 2001’s FastForwardMiami,
a fair that gave birth to today’s Scope, NADA and other
interesting smaller fairs) were a start, but further resources
were required and for the moment establishing themselves on a
more national level has remained elusive to them. The door remains
open though, and as they bid adieu to their friends and colleagues,
Jim Smith and Rob Clifford also say “We look forward to
seeing our friends and fellow art lovers around the usual places,
and hope you’ll all check out our next ventures, whatever
they may be.” |
For
more information please
e-mail the gallery |
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