organizing, arts organizing, artist-run spaces

what's the difference?

We’ve had a steady hum of (delightful) people and projects visit Open Copy each Saturday in February. A zine library is already starting to accumulate at WIP. At this point, it looks less like a library and more like a snowdrift of folded and stapled paper piling up on the shelf. I plan to spend every Saturday for the rest of the forseeable future at Open Copy, volunteering to help people print zines and comics and chapbooks, in addition to teaching an art class almost every other day of the week, sometimes twice a day. It’s a grind, and I’m also convinced that this is a very good life, one I’m lucky to have. Some of my peers from school or residency cohorts appear to have quit making art in any public way. Others are slowly transforming from emerging artists into mid-career artists, celebrating tenure, a solid arts admin job, or a prestigious award. Most artists who manage to stay in the game would probably like the arts sector to be different in certain ways, and yet most artists participate in the arts sector on its terms (not their own).

In the publication “Inter/dependence: Artists’ Personal Impacts Survey Review,” Christine Wong Yap surveyed fellow artists about the impact of their art practice on their subjective wellbeing. One phenomenon that emerged from the survey was a group Yap describes as “self-organizers,” or “respondents who were more likely to organize events or opportunities for other artists—and more likely engage in participatory art projects, collaboration, art-related redistribution of resources, and protest in the art world (strikes, boycotts, walkouts, etc).” Another way of putting that: self-organizers seemed more disillusioned with the art sector’s status quo, so they did something about it, and the same people also happened to report feelings of more meaning, achievement, optimism, and authenticity related to their creative practice.

Yap’s survey is small in its sample size, limiting our ability to generalize from it, but it maps onto my lived experience with a startling degree of accuracy. It’s surprisingly easy, and probably inevitable, for established institutions and nonprofits to overlook things that really matter to artists. Legacy orgs carry out a bounded mission (often well and reliably), but don’t or won’t take risks, limiting their flexibility to respond to audience desires or cultural shifts. In the Midwest, this spurs artists to start their own galleries, spaces, presses, and weird unclassifiable projects—and there are more of those than I ever imagined.

In November 2024, Late Night Copies Press attended MdW Summit; I’ve procrastinated writing about the week because it’s hard to do it justice. Behind every artist-run space is a staggering amount of problem-solving, generosity, collaboration, vision, persistence, optimism, tedium, and hard work. Imagine multiplying that by 100+ artist-run spaces + projects, then putting them all in a room together.

On the first night there were rapid-fire introductions; we met people running art spaces from garages and living rooms and front porches in cities and suburbs and small towns, artists doing magazines and radio stations and newsletters and video production and mutual aid projects. The week was grounded in the social and political realities of making contemporary art inland, while also making another kind of art world feel not just possible, but tangible. Artists were responding to urgent concerns, while also building sustainable, long-term projects with care.

The next issue of Papereaters will highlight some of the artist-run projects that I’m still thinking about, four months later. As a way to frame these thoughts, here’s some vocabulary:

-Artist-run space /// physical, brick & mortar spaces run by artists—often but by no means always a gallery. Could be a domestic space (laundry room exhibition venue), a traditional storefront, a shared studio facility, etc. There’s less hierarchy in most artist-run spaces than in a conventional nonprofit structure, and by comparison they tend to be administratively lean. Behind the scenes, artists who are creatively involved in the space are also doing anything & everything necessary to sustain it. Often but not always facilitates experimental work.

-Co-op gallery /// established model for an artist-run space; usually each artist involved pays a share of the rent, and in return regularly gets a regular slot to program the gallery. A good example of resource pooling in the arts.

-Artist-run project /// event, festival, or media outlet that has similar goals to an artist-run space. Might require similar type/amount of admin work, but may not need and doesn’t have to fund a brick & mortar location. Could exist perpetually, or for a delimited time period after its founding. I’m interested in the relationships between artist-run projects & artist-run spaces, for instance our press is an artist-run project that directly led to an artist-run print shop.

-Artist4Artist platform /// a (probably stupid) term I made up … but I think we need a shorthand term for artist-run projects that exist specifically to platform or connect other artists. I often see these as blogs, publications, podcasts, zines, or newsletters, and often they’re restricted to a particular geographic location, type of art, or demographic of artists.

-Artist-led /// a term that I mostly see being used by established nonprofits to designate that an artist/contractor is leading a public program, perhaps while thinking outside the org’s usual formula for public programs. Just because an artist is the face of a workshop or event doesn’t always mean it’s artist-led, and I think the term implies that the artist is able to exert some autonomy.

-artist-friendly /// pursuing mutually beneficial relationships with artists, especially when it comes contracted creative labor. Specific artist-friendly practices may include but are not limited to: radical financial transparency, ending application fees, removing financial or logistical barriers to diverse artist participation, paying artists generously or as fairly as possible (perhaps via a revenue split), freedom for artists to do something out-of-the-box, exceptionally good project support, making reasonable asks of artists given the amount of compensation available.

-project space /// type of artist-run space that might be as much a venue as a gallery. Perhaps it blends performing and visual arts, or encourages artists to share work in interdisciplinary ways. May be highly experimental.

-arts organizing /// the activity of creating & sustaining artist-run spaces, events, projects, exhibitions, platforms, etc

-community organizing /// organizing neighbors to build power for social change

-labor organizing in the arts /// forming & sustaining labor unions in art museums, art departments, and arts nonprofits

-artist/organizer /// artist who also does labor or community organizing or activism. Their art and activism/organizing may or may not directly relate.

-arts organizer /// Yap uses the term “self-organizer” here, and I’ll quote her again: “artists who organize events or opportunities for other artists”

-artist/contractor /// an artist who is contracted by another entity for specific labor on a freelance basis, often teaching, a residency, public programs, exhibitions, etc

-arts writing /// informing the public about what artists are doing locally. may include interviews, criticism, and reviews, but could be a simple as a regular newsletter.

-resource /// arts organizers take a broad and holistic view of what constitutes a “resource” in the context of an artist-run space, and are often invested in or skilled at stewarding a limited amount of resources strategically.

-sustainability /// participating in arts organizing without burning out your labor force or going under financially

-art scene /// a critical mass of artists who physically gather around a type of creative activity. Often extends to virtual spaces, but doesn’t exist exclusively in a virtual sphere. Suggests something grassroots, and I think of this term as including everyone who participates in some way, like audiences, critics, volunteers, etc

-arts ecosystem /// usually defined geographically, as neighborhood, locality, or region. Encompasses the smallest actors and the largest ones within the geographic scope. Includes audiences.