The Kelly

STORY BY KYMBERLY DONOWSKI

Art kickstarts relationships, and Kelly Fitzpatrick Memorial Gallery Executive Director Jennifer Eifert wants to start conversations as the nonprofit gallery and museum relocates to Commerce Street this year.

“We have had such a fabulous year that we have already outgrown our current space. This will enable us to expand our programs and offer more to the community,” Eifert said. “The new building is on Hill St. We hope to be in the new building by late spring or early summer.”

The new facility will include a designated children’s space, allowing The Kelly to better support art education, Eifert said.

“I’m very excited about having a designated children’s space. We’re going to be able to do so much. I want to introduce an art start program for the little bitty ones and eventually all up through schooling,” she explained.

The Kelly opened in 2011 in an airy second floor gallery in Wetumpka’s City Administration Building. When the January 2019 tornado damaged city offices in other locations, The Kelly’s space was neeeded for city services, so the gallery moved to Company Street. This newest downtown space will offer room for expansion.

Children’s art education is essential to Eifert and the gallery, which offers the Sylvia McConnell scholarship to high school students who want to further their arts educations.

“There’s a poem somebody wrote about how they give you crayons when you’re young, and you learn all these great things with color. Then, when you reach a certain age, they take the crayons away. They tell you to do all these grownup things without color or life. Let’s give them back the crayons,” she look at someone and judge them, but you don’t know if that person is a genius or millionaire or just a really nice person. You find this out by talking to them, getting to know them, and the gallery gives us

People interact with visual art in a completely different way than other art forms and disciplines, she

“You can’t have a conversation while you’re watching a show or listening to music. A gallery is different in that way. When I see Shakespeare, I’m not going to talk to 14 people there, but when somebody comes in here, they’re going to talk.

“Some people may have nothing in common, but they have this piece of art to talk about. Maybe they both like the piece, or they both may dislike it, but it gives them something to share and talk about.”

The value of art is in what it provides to its viewers, Eifert said, including understanding, validation,

“I think that the value in art is that it provides something to us, to our soul, really. It gives you somebody else that understands; somebody else has been through it. You see, there’s something bigger than just me or my particular problem,” she said. “Some emotions you can’t necessarily share, or they’re hard to share, but you know how to use them

“In supporting the gallery, we support each other, that’s being local. You build those relationships and

On date nights, couples work together to create projects, like this cutting board