Art Under One Roof

Art shows open and close all the time, all over Sonoma County, but how often does a gallery mount a show designed to showcase to other galleries?

Helen Gillespie, curator of “The Gallery Show: An Exhibit About Exhibits,” running through mid-September in downtown Santa Rosa, knows of no local precedent for her new display.

Head of the exhibitions committee for the Arts Council of Sonoma County for the past five years, Gillespie sent invitations to nearly 70 galleries throughout the county, and about 40 of them each sent her a piece of art for the show. Some were surprised by the invitation, according to Gillespie. “They said, ‘We’ve never been invited before,’ and I said, ‘Well, nobody’s ever been invited, because there hasn’t been a gallery show like this before.’”

The goal of the show is to give art lovers a one-stop sampler of what they can expect to find at galleries across the county. Then, organizers predict, art fans might go visit the galleries that intrigue them most.

“I was hoping to show the breadth and depth of art in Sonoma County, and I was hoping to cover the county from end to end,” Gillespie explained. “And we do have galleries from Gualala, Sonoma, Petaluma, Cloverdale, Sebastopol. This show hits all the corners, and it also covers the range of art.”

From the fine-art print sent by Santa Rosa’s Annex Galleries to ceramic sculpture from the Quicksilver Mine Co. in Forestville, “The Gallery Show” offers a little bit of everything.

Some of the participating galleries aren’t even galleries in the strictest sense.

“We have the sculpture gardens, A New Leaf and Wildwood,” Gillespie said. “So those are not your traditional indoor gallery spaces, although we invited them to provide some free-standing pieces for display here inside our gallery.”

The show even includes a video of the outdoor sculpture at Paradise Ridge Winery, shot by owner Walter Byck, Gillespie said.

“Here’s another unusual one, the Wine Emporium in Sebastopol,” Gillespie said, scanning her list of exhibitors. “They have an art gallery in there. You can go in there and taste a few flights of wine while you look at art.”

Even though the current economic climate for any business, including art galleries, is very challenging, some galleries have demonstrated they can succeed, even now.

“Sebastopol Gallery is doing great on Main Street in Sebastopol, because of all that foot traffic,” Gillespie said. “They’re making it work.”

For “The Gallery Show,” the Sebastopol Gallery contributed a monoprint by Robert Breyer, one of 13 member artists at the downtown Sebastopol exhibit space, which opened last year.

“We have a great number of fabulous artists in Sonoma County, but it’s still hard to reach the public,” said painter Sandy Eastoak, a founding member of the Sebastopol Gallery.

“I think we’re at the beginning of an upward climb. This gallery show is a wonderful step in the right direction,” Eastoak added. “To see other artists and other galleries not as competition, but as allies, is really important. The more galleries we have, the more people will come.”

Gillespie hopes “The Gallery Show” will help speed the growth process for the Sonoma County art scene.

“This should help drive some traffic to the galleries,” Gillespie said.

Gillespie had spent several days helping set up “The Gallery Show.” Having just wrestled a large sculpted head into place at one end of the Arts Council of Sonoma County Gallery, she allowed herself a weary laugh.

“Of course,” she added, “that’ll increase pressure on us to do this kind of show again.”

You can reach Staff Writer Dan Taylor at 521-5243 or dan.taylor@pressdemocrat.com.