A Place to Visit: An Interview with Olympia and Jip Gallery

Aside from Covid-19, the exhausted proliferation of virtual viewing rooms, AR tours, and 3-D gallery walk-throughs housed by in-browser replicas all seem to share one commonality: the art market’s hope for a return to brick and mortar, a back to business as usual. A project entitled A Place to Visit (APTV), launched during the early-stage pandemic by New York-based curatorial collective Jip Gallery and Olympia, seeks to challenge the systems through which artists are often bound to monetize their work, by utilizing the internet. With artists being amongst the hardest impacted in the past year, APTV addresses the fact that a return to normal is not an option, or more largely, what has become normalized is failing. What started as a conversation between two curatorial collectives at the beginning of the pandemic evolved into another model: an online platform and long-term solution that both serves artist communities and raises funds for various mutual aid causes determined by the participating artists.

Amanda Madrigal, Ripe, 2020, Gardening gloves, donated quilters fabric, poly-fill, toy parts, canvas, polymer clay, acrylic paint, 3’ x 2’ x 0.5’.

At this moment, A Place to Visit might be best described as a collective platform, virtual exhibition series, and fundraiser compilation. The concept is straightforward, just as its structure: each iteration invites artists to submit their work, sans submission fee, to exhibit, sell, and determine a cause of choice to which a percentage of proceeds are donated upon purchase of the work. The rest the artist keeps. Artists are not bound to a consignment contract during the eight weeks. With a flexible online model, its founders can afford to take no profits. As artists continue to figure out new spaces to exist, A Place to Visit, now in its third volume on view through April 9th, 2021, provides an overarching theme of deconstruction and reconstruction in times of societal upheaval. Artists and collectives from around the globe were selected from an open call, including: Izabela Adamczyk, Ginssiyo Apara, Amelia Briggs, Nathan Hewitt, Lauren Howie, Phaan Howng, Jennifer Lai, Craig Jun Li, Citron Lunardi, and Eva Stamatiou & Artemis Patsalia-Kostiri. The conversation below further discusses the ideas behind the project model with Olympia founder Ali Rossi, and Jip founders Sophia Park and Michelle Faviola.

Danni Shen: Tell me more about the title A Place to Visit. What collectively inspired you to start this project virtually? 

Ali Rossi: Blue chip online viewing rooms have existed for a few years now and it's become more of a focus for gallery entities during Covid. Almost every mainstream gallery made a pivot to the online sphere in March, and there became this over-saturation of that stand-in for IRL structure. We came together basically saying: “This isn’t doing anything for anyone.”

If anything, this type of monotonous structure is becoming even more monolithic, and so we counter it. We are not the first to utilize the internet for community-focused programs. Legacy Russell’s Glitch Feminism has become a go-to resource for A Place to Visit’s curatorial methodologies. In her manifesto, she explores the ways in which the internet has been utilized as a space for finding community, building identity, and deploying new tactics away from keyboard (AFK) environments.

In APTV, we are very focused on creating something expansive enough to help our existing communities, and develop bridges to new ones, on a global scale. Rhizome has also been extremely helpful in reminding us that online exhibitions can and should be experimental, and that the exhibition is an ephemeral constellation, changing depending on the viewers conditions.

Sophia Park: We weren’t the only ones who thought the logical step was to try to help our communities with the skill and networks we have. Other initiatives popped up such as Hannah Beerman’s Artists for Humans, which was an Instagram-based fundraiser with artists donating their sales, and the Artist Support Pledge started by Matthew Burrows where emerging artists pledge to support other artists by buying their work. This culture of generosity has always existed in the art world. We just became another way people could support artists and the larger community.

And behind the name, we’ve all been stuck at home, so our lives became really intertwined with digital space and people visiting other places online. A Place to Visit in part pokes fun at being able to “visit” places during the pandemic and not being able to. Also not being able to go to people’s homes, since the structure is a house.

Lauren Howie, Valley, Digital Print, 11x14”.

AR: All of our programs previously were hosted in homes and apartments, so it’s also about recreating what that experience could be like, virtually. We also throw shade at minimalist tendencies of blue-chip galleries. We don’t want to try to be a white cube, as it is truly ignorant to the nuances of the individual experience. In a way, the repetition of white cubes, is a perpetuation, or rather, regurition of capitalism playing out architecturally.

DS: As a continuous project, A Place to Visit strategizes ways to bring the founding principles of house galleries to the online sphere. How does this structure translate and further serve as a social tool to dismantle blue-chip methodologies? Can you elaborate on this mission: what do you see as its potentials and limits?

AR: This project was born in April of 2020. We’ve positioned ourselves against the things we don’t believe in. We’re as anti-capitalist as one can get in a capitalist society; for profit, for artists. We have to acknowledge there is no way of truly existing outside of this system, but as creatives we can position ourselves in a more empathetic and caring lens. This was our conceptual framework from the get-go, but we’re also taking the stance that art has zero separation from what’s happening outside of it. You can’t walk into a space that’s a neutral zone; it doesn’t exist. This needs to be connected to what’s happening in people’s lives. A limitation that comes to mind in terms of APTV is that if no one has access to wifi they can’t reach us.

SP: We’ve been talking about this, and I think everything about the apartment gallery is in opposition to the blue-chip gallery. Blue-chip galleries put profit that benefits the galleries before the interests of the artists, which can sometimes lead to these companies taking advantage of artists. On top of this, the blue-chip galleries follow trends more closely, which can limit the type of artist who is deemed successful according to the market. An example of this would be how up until recently the market had shut out say, artists of color, from finding “success.” I also think it’s important to point out that many blue-chip galleries perhaps don’t have the best working conditions for the staff as we’ve seen pointed out publicly in social media accounts such as @cancelartgalleries. I think this is related to this driving idea within these spaces of profit over people.

View of the rooms from A Place to Visit, V. 2, 2020

For us, people come first. We put the artists at the forefront of what we try to do, and the decisions we have made so far are reflections of how we are trying to live these values. For example, we know that application fees to open calls can be a barrier to some, so we are committed to making open call submissions free. Another thing we try to do at Jip is provide promotional support for all of the artists we work with whether they are in a show currently or not. I remember at a studio visit, an artist told me that one of the things that helps them is knowing that there is someone always on their side as they grow in their careers and lives. So if an artist is part of a show we organize, we try our best to keep up with them and cheer them along as they continue on in their practices. We ask the artist, what help do you need from us? And then we see what we can do and go from there. We’re still learning and sometimes make mistakes but we are always driven by this idea of putting artists first.

Something else important is that we work closely with artists to come up with programming ideas and help actualize them. The lens of our programming can be multifaceted and not just about promoting the artist. An example is a live performance we’re putting together with the artist Nathan Hewitt, which is featured in this current volume of A Place to Visit. His work is built on improvisation, which makes it difficult to simply record because it would take away from the ephemeral experience of hearing an improvised work. We are in close conversation to make sure it makes sense. This performance isn’t necessarily to “make money” somehow, it gives an opportunity for the artist to try something new with the safety net of our collectives, and for the audience to see more than just the exhibition.

This applies to others in the ecosystem — we have folks who contact us who have never purchased an art work before. We know that the buying process in the art world is not always clear and can be stressful. So even if it takes more operational effort on the backend, we try to be very communicative and make the whole process transparent and easy for everyone involved.

There are obviously limitations to our model. At the moment, artists can’t rely solely on us to make money. With the communities that we serve, and collectors that we have so far, it wouldn’t make sense for us to have works that could solely fuel an artist’s career. That requires larger structures that the three of us may not be able to handle. However, I can’t help but ask myself why do I see these as a limitation? Isn’t it okay if an artistic practice is sustained by multiple means?

Craig Jun Li, untitled (crossing), 2020, glass marbles and pigmented plaster on bamboo mat, 2.5 x 23 x 70"

DS: That also comes to the question of what it means for artists to sustain their practice completely through selling their work, and if it's even possible for larger galleries to restructure the way they operate.

AR: I think there are going to be gestural moves towards that in terms of larger galleries restructuring themselves. Truth be told, you can’t dismantle history, and so I think this moment is an important one for new organizations, businesses, collectives, and a moment to consider the strengths of just-exchange, meaning a way to think beyond simply currency as a form of exchange.

SP: I think it's really important to reimagine what an artist's life and career could look like versus this strange unsaid career trajectory, that if you don’t follow it you fail. There are so many great artists who are sustaining their practices not just by selling their work, but also existing in other roles in the art world. I’m not sure if larger galleries are thinking about the question of what is the role of a “career” for an artistic practice. So if they’re not asking this question, how can larger galleries even start to think about restructuring?

I admire artists for their ability to be expansive in so many ways. I hope we can serve as a space where artists don’t feel intimidated and are supported. For me, it comes back to these ideas of community and who is the artist in the community, and what is the artist-run space? Obviously we all operate within the system of capitalism, but what can we create within that oppressive structure? How do we create a space where an artist can sustain their practice in ways that are exciting for them? I can’t help but ask, are these larger galleries thinking about these questions?

I personally admire the work of Commonwealth and Council, a gallery based in Los Angeles, California. I’m not sure where in the scale of galleries they fit in but it seems like they truly have a community of artists they are caring for. Their educational materials, like their Institutions in the Art World series of webinars seem to indicate they are having those conversations about the nature of an artistic practice.

In terms of our structural side, I know through Jip I’ve been thinking a lot about how worker-owned cooperatives can create new structures for the art world — one that is built on a solidarity economy. We’re still in the beginning stages of building out what this can look like. What I think is important with this model is that the question of care comes first. How do we care for each other so that we are all successful? What does care look like?

DS: Can you tell me more about the sales structure — how do you maintain transparency and a kind of pragmatism in regards to costs, sales with artists, and donations? What organizations or mutual funds have artists donated to, and has there been an average percentage that artists have chosen to donate? 

AR: In terms of the process, for both artist and visitor, everything is transparent. As the artist, you’re able to decide what cause you want to support and what percentage is donated; we’re not taking anything. My professional experience as an art handler helps because I can be the local middleman that gets the work from the artist’s studio or house to whoever the buyer is, or drop it off to ship. When we’re in communication with the clients, once the transaction has been approved by the artist, we send the collector a receipt of donation. We try to keep it as straightforward as possible.

MF: We’re also flexible if an artist wants to change the organization that they want to donate to, that’s no issue.

SP: Being in the digital world helps, because we don’t have to worry about rent, so it can come from more of a place of support. In the first show a lot of artists gave to COVID-19 relief funds. For example: Ridgewood Mutual Aid Network, Artist Relief, Meals on Wheels, New Sanctuary Coalition for undocumented folks. The second show pivoted toward more specific passions such as the Okra Project, Soul Fire Farm, SUNY Downstate Medical Center. It’s been all over the spectrum. Artists have donated anywhere from 30, 50, to 100% of their sales. I think of the past two shows, in terms of donations, we raised about $2,500 in total.

Home page image from A Place to Visit, V. 1, 2020. Created by Hattie McLean.

DS: I remember being particularly intrigued by these sculptural pieces that were documented on an actual balcony in A Place to Visit 2.0. Was displaying the art installed in their physical spaces also part of your curatorial concept initially?

SP: Etta Sandry was the artist and that was her own balcony where she set up her work. It’s perhaps a nod to those 3D virtual exhibition experiences, but also different. We didn’t really have a say in it. The artist chose to install the way she wanted to. That goes back to our desire to put the artist first. We obviously support and guide from a curatorial angle, but if the artist wants to try something new we try to make it happen. I think it's related to this continuous play of what a virtual space can be and what physicality means. Specifically when we described the show, Etta came up with the idea herself. We’re very open to whatever artists bring to the table.

MF: We’re all very open to re-arranging, as well. For the second edition, we were thinking of what would be included in a summer home because it was launched in July. For the next edition, we’re thinking about including a den.

AR: In the first volume we added pictures of our own homes as navigation hubs (i.e. a photo of Michelle’s closet represented closet #1). I think that having Etta’s work on the balcony was a good first step to incorporate the house landscape into the website.

SP: We also talked about a basement. It depends on the works that the artists submit and which are chosen. Seasons may affect it. The artist and artwork first, then the rest follows. During the summer we talked extensively about what our dream homes would be. We’re all based in the New York City area so we’re normally living in small spaces. So we had fun asking ourselves what would we have in a home that had no limitations physically?

DS: Since the revolution will not be happening over the internet, how has thinking about virtual space translated physically. Has it allowed for you all to reimagine greater possibilities for being together in the world?

SP: As many of us know, a lot of what was going on in the art world was wrong and is wrong. The exciting thing is that folks are trying to imagine new futures beyond the oppressive systems within the art world as we know it now. I think about the various theories of why we as humans have the capability to dream. Theories in neuroscience and psychology suggest it could be a time for our memories to consolidate or for us to rest to prepare for the challenges ahead. Comparing the brain as a network and the digital space as a network, I think there are correlations. I think virtual spaces give us room to examine, explore, and experiment on the ideas that we have, and do it in a collective manner. We can take what we learn from this playground in the virtual space, and bring it back to the physical world to see what changes we can make here. I don’t think it’s a one way street, but multidirectional.

AR: The physical and virtual are no longer mutually exclusive. They inform each other, fuse, and are parallel in their importance for creating community, and building new spaces.