For no particular reason, I found myself thinking back to the days when we had the brick-and-mortar Red Dragonfly Gallery... and to the monthly "Art Walks" in our small city.
Art Walk happened on the first Saturday of every month, where all the galleries and art spaces would stay open late and feature new work from the artists they represented, or have show openings.
Art Walk was generally a hit-or-miss proposition from a commercial standpoint, but there were certain "personalities" you could pretty much always count on to attend.
A look inside the gallery during the early days
Novelty Seekers
They were always among the first to show up, and they only cared about "what's new?" Typically, they were also capable of keeping an active "inventory" of every artist's work... and had zero interest in anything that wasn't just "shiny out of the package." They were rarely buyers of anything... they just wanted to make sure they had seen "the very latest."
"The Artist's Friend"
These good folks mostly would show up to make a "public statement" about what good and close friends they were with a particular artist.
They would typically fill up on the free wine and strategically place themselves near their "friend's" work and regale any admirers with tales of how friendly they were with the artist.
Naturally, they would never dream of buying anything from a gallery because they get all their art directly from the artist. Whom they are very close friends with.
The Serial Drinkers
I was never entirely sure whether or not these folks even liked art, but they certainly liked going from location to location to consume as much of the free wine as they possibly could.
Depending on where in their "route" you were, they would arrive in various states of inebriation, sometimes looking for people to socialize with.
Free Dinner and Entertainment!
Close cousins of the Serial Drinkers, these folks essentially used Art Walk as a way to get a free dinner in the form of snacks, with accompanying wine.
Interacting with other visitors was evidently a major part of their social calendar, as well!
Your bad luck if your gallery happened to be the last stop on their tour.
Social Drama Queens
A somewhat rare species who would show up and latch onto innocent people to lament — at great length — how horrible their lives were, and how many things were going wrong in their world... and how much they were suffering.
To listen to them, you'd think they'd never had a good day in their entire lives.
Particularly difficult to dislodge at the end of the evening... because they would inevitably have "just one more tragedy" to share.
Living in the Past
An interesting but relatively small group of mostly older people who had in common that they had lived in town all their lives (usually) and would spend a lot of time talking about how "Art Walk just isn't nearly as good/interesting as it USED to be."
Much of the time, I got the impression that they were living in a past that actually never existed.
Living Works of Art
Certainly my favorite group to look at, these visitors saw Art Walk as an opportunity to put themselves on display, typically wearing clothing (or "outfits") that were occasionally very difficult to describe... but certainly very interesting to look at.
Commonly, they were far too wrapped up in being "Legends in their own minds" to actually talk to or otherwise engage with anyone... being greeted or even offered a drink was almost an imposition on their being.
Asides...
Of course, we would also get a few visitors from the local homeless population, and we always tried to be as kind as possible to those with genuine needs.
In fact, we kept to-go boxes in the back and would sometimes send people off with "care packages" of snacks that would clearly be left over.
All in all, I'm grateful to have had two art galleries in my lifetime... and grateful that I am no longer in the art business!
Thanks for stopping by! Feel free to leave a comment, if you feel so inclined!
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