Art for art’s sake
Brummell: Not-for-profit galleries are thriving in the recession
One morning in 1494 the residents of Florence awoke to find their city blanketed in snow. On a whim, Piero de’ Medici, the newly installed ruler of the city state, decided to mark this unusual event by ordering an 18-year-old Michelangelo to make a snowman in the courtyard of his palace.
No one, of course, has any idea what the sculpture looked like. But it is a fair guess that the result was the most incredible snowman ever built. Equally, no one knows whether Michelangelo was insulted by the frivolous commission, which is often cited as the supreme example of a patron abusing his or her power over an artist.
The relationship between wealth and art, or patron and artist, is an ancient one. But it has slowly mutated as the relative social standings of those on either side of the equation have fluctuated.
Nowadays, when contemporary artists are treated like rock stars and are far wealthier, patronage is considered an old-fashioned concept. But variations of the dynamic still exist, including the rise of not-for-profit galleries, which add a dash of philanthropy to the mix.
Calvert 22 was the latest not-for-profit gallery to open its doors in London this year, specialising in Russian and eastern European contemporary art. It is the brainchild of Nonna Materkova, a native of St Petersburg who has lived in the UK since the 1990s running Roslink, a corporate finance firm specialising in Russia.
The gallery’s first show, a group exhibition entitled Past Future Perfect, included work from the period between the end of the repression of artists under Soviet rule and the recent boom in contemporary art in the country. The show included installations by Alexander Brodsky and Pavel Pepperstein’s watercolour cartoons.
It is hard to know whether to admire or worry about Materkova’s optimism in launching a not-for-profit gallery dedicated to contemporary Russian and eastern European art in the wake of a credit crunch and without any previous experience in the art world.
But she clearly has impressive business credentials and also believes the gallery’s charitable status will give it a leg-up in an economic environment that is threatening many commercial galleries. Materkova said: “The amount of help I have got and goodwill that this project has generated is incredible. I have no doubt that this is, at least partially, because it is not a commercial venture.”
Philanthropic donations to the arts are nothing new, but what makes Materkova’s enterprise, and others like it, different is that she is bringing not just her money but also her time and business acumen to bear on the project. “I come from St Petersburg where you are constantly surrounded by culture. I wanted more than my career so I started reading about, buying and collecting art. This seemed like a logical progression,” she said.
Materkova remembers going on a Sotheby’s course on contemporary art and was told all about the Indian and Chinese markets, but nothing about Russian artists. When she asked about this she was told that there simply was not a market for it.
She believes that westerners know about Russia’s cultural legacy – the literature, music and ballet – but there is a gap when it comes to modern Russian output. Calvert 22 has been conceived to help fill that gap.
Materkova argues the gallery’s not-for-profit status helps it attract high-profile curators. Many would not get the same freedom if they were organising exhibitions for commercial galleries, but at Calvert 22 they can take greater artistic risks.
The Past Future Perfect exhibition contained the work of five contemporary Russian artists and was curated by David Thorp. There will be a show of Russian video art this month curated by Isaac Julien and Mark Nash.
Calvert 22 is far from unique. There has been a proliferation of not-for-profit galleries opening in recent years. Examples include Raven Row in London’s Spitalfields – which was until recently exhibiting the work of the collagist Ray Johnson and financed by Alex Sainsbury, a scion of the supermarket dynasty – and 176 in north London, which houses the Zabludowicz Collection.
Parasol unit, also in north London, was founded in 2005 and claims to be the first not-for-profit gallery in the capital. Ziba de Weck, the galleries founder and curator, said: “These private undertakings are all slightly different. Crucially, I am not using Parasol to display my own collection.” She is too polite to use the phrase “vanity project”.
De Weck, who is the wife of Pierre de Weck, the global head of wealth management at Deutsche Bank, said Parasol unit was modelled on the Kunsthallen on the continent, which seek to produce high-quality exhibits of cutting-edge art in museum-standard spaces. She said: “We also put a lot of work into the publications as these are all that survives of the exhibitions.”
As with Materkova, de Weck’s enthusiasm for her project is infectious. A curator by training, she describes the circumstances that led to her running her own space as “a series of lucky incidents”.
“It is a way for my family and me to give something back, so, yes it is motivated by a certain amount of idealism but also by professionalism. But ultimately, if people realised how much fun it is to get up in the morning and do what I do, they would never think of opening a commercial gallery.”
It is clear many not-for-profit galleries have benefited from the past decade’s boom years that allowed individuals to amass enough money to fund their own projects. As boom turns to bust, will these galleries be able to survive on individual largesse, fundraising and the occasional government or lottery grant? More interesting, what role are they likely to play?
One argument is that, as commercial galleries tighten their purse strings and stop taking punts on unproven artists, not-for-profit galleries will provide an increasingly important platform for emerging talent. Some will be introducing graduates from art schools, others – as is the case with both Calvert 22 and Parasol – will be introducing foreign artists to UK audiences for the first time.
De Weck believes that the recession – traditionally a time of heightened creativity – will allow not-for profit galleries to provide a vehicle for the artists not being snapped up by commercial galleries, and better enable them to compete for staff.
She said: “Ultimately I think that the downturn will be positive for not-for-profit galleries. In the boom-time, the commercial galleries had lots of financial possibilities and were able to offer higher salaries. It will now become easier for the non-commercial foundations to compete for staff.”
The legions of artists who would otherwise have no means of reaching a wider audience will certainly hope that not-for-profit galleries are more lasting than Michelangelo’s snowman.
• This article appears in the September edition of Brummell, Financial News’ lifestyle magazine, out today.
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