There is a line in the great 1932 Greta Garbo movie, Grand Hotel, when a jaded habitué off-handedly says, “People come, people go, nothing ever happens here.” The irony of his remark is soon obvious as dramatic events, long bubbling below the surface, unfold on the silver screen. For the New Orleans art scene, 2016 was that kind of year, a time when it was easy to take everything for granted, at least until some big anniversaries caused us to look back and see how far things have come.
Among other significant anniversaries, the Stella Jones Gallery--New Orleans premier African-American art gallery—which turned 20 this year, deserves special commendation. Featuring the most historic names in black American and Caribbean art, it has long doubled as a low profile educational facility as much as a gallery and incubator of local talent, and for this we are indebted to Dr. Jones' longstanding and seemingly indefatigable dedication.
But the biggest anniversary might be what I think of as the “Recovery Arts District,” which refers not to any official district but to the activist post-Katrina art transformation that began in 2006, most famously in the St. Claude area, but which now covers much of the city. The New Orleans Photo Alliance began that year as an attempt to preserve the local photography community but now has its own gallery space and produces an important national event, PhotoNOLA, with some 60 gallery and museum exhibitions spread all over town. The St. Claude Arts District began when Jeffrey Holmes installed some pointed ad hoc assemblages on the median outside his flooded gallery, and Kirsha Kaechele staged pioneering exhibitions in her St. Roch former bakery, but now features numerous co-op and collaborative art spaces and more events than anyone can possibly follow. That ad hoc "just do it" spirit also animates Michael Manjarris' Sculpture for New Orleans project featuring a wide array of work by major regional and world artists like Jim Surls, above left, in prominent locations about town. European curators like the Rotterdam-based Delta Workers group have also made significant, if low key, contributions to the cultural life of the city. But when it comes to low key activists who have had a significant impact, the Joan Mitchell Center, above, under the direction of Gia Hamilton has subtly yet profoundly influenced this city's increasingly diverse and inclusive visual arts culture. It is all part of a citywide arts expansionist trend that is evident even in historically underserved neighborhoods like Central City, where O.C. Haley Blvd. now features exciting new developments like Pelican Bomb's Gallery X and the Creative Alliance of New Orleans' Myrtle Banks gallery as community based art expands into a pervasive if not omnipresent citywide phenomenon. ~Bookhardt