Getting Things Done C U LT U R E | V I S U A L A R T
Las Vegas’ women gallerists lead an arts scene surge BY
Jennifer Henry
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f there’s a local arena in which women have long helped lead the charge, it’s the arts. Fifteen years ago, three women — artist-writer-restaurateur Julie Brewer, attorney-gallerist Naomi Erin, and shop owner-curator Cindy Funkhouser — began our longest-standing monthly arts festival, First Friday. Tarissa Tiberti parlayed her success at the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art to a position as executive director of MGM Resorts Art & Culture, the corporation’s multifaceted arts initiative. In off-the-beaten-path North Las Vegas, Vicki Richardson’s Left of Center Gallery is the archetype for the sort of community-minded arts center in which the hard work of creation, curation, and education happens daily. With a roster of diverse shows, a permanent African-art collection, and a weekly open house on Saturdays, this is a place to experience art, learn about art, and create art. A working artist, Patricia Fowler also runs her eponymous gallery in
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AUGUST 2018
CORE VALUES Artist and gallery operator Nancy Good in her sizable space, CORE Contemporary. Above right, Anna Olga Aristova of The One House and Artshop.
Art Square. And add to the list last year’s appointment of Ally Haynes-Hamblen to head the City of Las Vegas Office of Cultural Affairs, and new Clark County Parks and Recreation Cultural Supervisor for Public Art Mickey Sprott, and it seems the local arts are built on feminine ingenuity. The latest: Artist and CORE Contemporary owner Nancy Good came to Las Vegas in 2001 as a musician, but these days she’s focused on the visual arts with her new exhibition space, working studio, and community meeting place, just opened in May. Good’s own work is a conscious nod to her Burning Man adventures, and relationships from the playa have influenced her undertaking at CORE Contemporary, she says. Inspired by participating in fellow Burner and curator Laura Henkel’s annual 12 Inches of Sin arts festival in the world’s most interesting center-city strip mall — New Orleans Square in Commercial Center — Good built out a permanent space on the lightand-bright second floor, just in time to host this year’s 12 Inches juried group exhibit. “It’s so exciting to see how Laura brings together the community, and I knew that PHOTOGRAPHY B rent Holmes