Photo: Courtesy, Art Ventures
A longtime local artist collective and gallery has found a new home on downtown Fayetteville.
Art Ventures, formerly the Fayetteville Underground, recently announced that the group will relocate to the Putman House at 20 S. Hill Street this winter.
The gallery and artist studios had been located on the Fayetteville square since the group was founded roughly a decade ago in the basement of the East Square plaza building. The group changed their name to Art Ventures in 2017, and were most recently stationed in the GCM building at 101 W. Mountain St. before that building sold last year.
The group was without a space briefly, until New York resident Kevin Curry, aFayetteville native and friend of the gallery reached out with a solution.
“(Kevin) knew our attempt at finding new gallery space before the pandemic didn’t work and that we still had interest in finding a new home,” said Art Ventures board president Sharon Killian. “He called me to ask about our interest in 20 S Hill Avenue as a possibility. Our good fortune is unmeasurable!”
Killian said the new space will open up new possibilities for the gallery, including outdoor sculpture and installations.
Photo: Courtesy, Art Ventures
“We are thrilled to receive this extraordinary opportunity to have a new gallery space that we can call home, where staff can conduct business within our own framework, where we can have our gift shop, Gallery exhibitions, where our artists feel they belong,” she said.
The group is also working through ways the artists may be able to safely begin using the new building for studio space soon.
For now, though, the group is focused on virtual events and shows to showcase artists online.
“We are going to continue using virtual media as an integral part of our gallery experience and are working out a rhythm for doing that,” she said.
Killian said the group does have an in-person event in the works for next month, a holiday show set for sometime in December. The show will include timed entry, and masks will be required for attendees.
More information on that will be released soon, Killian said.
The collective’s current show, “Discarnate Landscape – A Virtual Exhibition” is on view at their website through Jan. 31.
For more information about Art Ventures, visit artventures-nwa.org.
