A seven-year cooperative art gallery: Kay Curtis.

Kay Curtis, Reported by Maceo, Brattleboro, Vermont, 6 min

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To quote this piece: Kay Curtis, “A seven-year cooperative art gallery: Kay Curtis,” We Them Media, https://wethem.xyz/watch/a-seven-year-cooperative-art-gallery-kay-curtis-brattleboro-vermont. Each transcript line links to its second.

Brattleboro, Vermont, inside a cooperative art gallery, with the woman who started it. “This was my TMLP-1 project, and I said, I’ll open in 10 weeks, and then I went, holy cow, what did I take on? And it’s seven years old now.” Six months after opening, COVID closed it for two months. Now it has 38 members. When she asks what the camera is for, Maceo gives the shortest version of this site: “Documenting culture and platforming people and surfacing stories that would be lost.”

The rule of the place: “if you have $60 a month and you can come in and work eight hours a month, then you can belong. We’re not going to judge your work. We’re not going to judge who you are.” Members include two people in wheelchairs, an artist who paints with a stick on her head because she has no hands, people in their eighties, and a kid. What it solves for artists is being seen without the establishment’s approval, and the beginners learn from the veterans: “it’s a constant teaching thing.” Her advice for any project, after finding a member who is both an artist and a bookkeeper: “try to get somebody on your team who knows how to do well-keeping.”

They became a federal non-profit this year, “our legal status matches the reality on the ground.” The artists pay 15% of sales, “and that keeps the lights on. Just the lights and the air conditioning.” Maceo asks why a cooperative, “I’d like my media platform to be a cooperative,” and she explains how it survived COVID: “we had 31 people sharing the burden of COVID,” while galleries paying rent with nobody at the door folded. Members covered each other’s dues when someone lost a job. “if you spread the work You spread the rent.” And the artist keeps the money, at 15% instead of the 50 or 60 a commercial gallery takes. The transcript below is from the original audio.

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What is in it?

Jump straight to a moment.

0:02A ten-week project, seven years on
0:49Who belongs: artists of every age and ability
1:36How to join: $60 and eight hours a month
2:08An artist who does the bookkeeping
3:27Why becoming a federal non-profit is a big deal
4:19Why a cooperative survived COVID
5:38Kay Curtis

Transcript

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Transcribed from the original audio and corrected for names. Speaker letters mark turns, not names. Search every transcript

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0:02A: This was my TMLP-1 project, and I said, I’ll open in 10 weeks, and then I went, holy cow, what did I take on? And it’s seven years old now.

0:20B: Oh, congratulations, that’s incredible.

0:21A: Six months after we opened, COVID happened. We had to close for two months and I was like, ah, now what? You know, we just barely got opened in there. But now it’s been around for seven years and we’re happy. We have 38 members.

Read the full transcript ▸

0:35B: Okay. This is for my YouTube. This is my game in the world.

0:38A: Okay, good. A YouTube game?

0:40B: Yeah, yeah. Documenting culture and platforming people and surfacing stories that would be lost.

0:45A: That’s awesome.

0:46B: Yeah, thanks. So you could tell me anything else you want about your game on the world in this place. I’m here to document.

0:52A: And you’re here to document it. Yeah. Well, these are all the different artists. And we have, you know, we have two people in wheelchairs. One person who paints with a stick on her head because she has no hands. Really? And we have people in their 80s. And we have a kid who’s younger. You know, very young. So it’s all over the place. And what happens if you’re an artist? because I’ve been an artist my whole life, is that you get cut out of being seen unless you get approved by the establishment. And in here, we were able to say, if you have $60 a month and you can come in and work eight hours a month, then you can belong.

1:41A: We’re not going to judge your work. We’re not going to judge who you are. We’re not going to do any of that. And as long as we have room, we’ll keep opening it up to whoever shows up And it gave people who had been artists their whole life a place to show work And it gave people who had just started a place And the people who had just started, started to learn How did you do that? And where did you find that frame? And how do you, you know, use that method and all that kind of stuff So it’s a constant teaching thing Anyway, go around and take some pictures

2:13B: Yeah, yeah, yeah Well, can you tell us about this person before I leave?

2:18A: This is the best person that I got in the gallery because she happens to be an artist who knows how to do bookkeeping. Okay. And that was a real missing. You know, if you’re going to have a team for a cooperative and you don’t have the money to pay a bookkeeper, you need to find an artist who’s a bookkeeper. So she and I have been like...

2:38B: And even those are hard to find, right?

2:40A: I haven’t found another one since. Yes. So Kate was like a miracle for us to just run into her and she does you know bookkeeping short but look at her artwork it’s amazing

2:54B: I don’t judge the art but what I’m deeply appreciative of

2:58A: And she makes one daily art picture a day and then they’re dating So, here’s the date. That was in 2018. See? And that’s the one she did that day.

3:12B: That’s incredible. I love that.

3:14A: Isn’t it great?

3:15B: Oh wow, is that a hippopotamus?

3:16A: Yes. Definitely.

3:23B: I like the selfie up here.

3:24A: Kate Carino.

3:28B: Admire her work world.

3:29A: If you’re gonna start a project, try to get somebody on your team who knows how to do well-keeping. Yeah,

3:34B: yeah, yeah, noted, noted

3:36A: That’s my advice to you

3:37B: Yeah, I definitely have some concerns about my taxes already On the drive here, did you guys do your taxes? I said, uh, they found me

3:44A: I forgot to tell you, we just this year became a federal non-profit Congratulations We never did make a profit, but becoming a federal non-profit is a big deal You know, you have to pay lawyers and all that stuff So we feel like, oh god, we finally got a profit

3:57B: It’s like a way to, a way to relief, a sigh of relief What does that, what does that make available?

4:01A: It’s like our legal status matches the reality on the ground. That’s what we are. We don’t make a profit. The artists pay 15% of the sales and that keeps the lights on. Just the lights and the air conditioning.

4:19B: I wanted to ask you, how did you decide you’re going to have it be a cooperative? I think that’s interesting. I’d like my media platform to be a cooperative.

4:27A: Right. So during, I’d had a lot of experience with cooperatives because that’s the model they had in California when I did our venues. The reason we survived COVID is we had 31 people sharing the burden of COVID. The people who were trying to pay their rent with nobody coming through the doors folded because they didn’t have, they didn’t want to keep putting out the money. They didn’t know how long it was going to last And they folded Whereas we could And we had people who said You know, so and so lost his job during COVID So I’m going to pay his rent for him We have a lot of that going on too So if you have If you spread the work You spread the rent So if you’re paying $60 a month To have your work being shown in a gallery That’s amazing And then if people are only taking 15% instead of 50% or 60%, which is what happens at the real galleries, you know, then the artist is making the money.

5:33A: Okay. Go figure.

5:35B: People’s Champion. Yeah. What was your name again?

5:37A: Kay Curtis.

5:38B: Thank you, Kay.

That was the whole tape.

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