February 21, 2005
Arts inclusive | Andy Verzosa chats about Portland's First Friday Art Walk, and its impact on galleries
By Taylor Smith
On a typical Friday night, the crowd is steady at Norm's Bar & Grill, a Portland institution on Congress Street just a few doors down from the State Theater and within spitting distance of the Portland Museum of Art. But on the first Friday of every month, it's nearly impossible to get a table at the restaurant, thanks to the hundreds of people taking part in the First Friday Art Walk, a nearly five-year-old tradition in Portland in which galleries, studios, museums and other venues open their doors to the public from five o'clock until eight.
Andy Verzosa, owner of Aucocisco Galleries on High Street and in the Eastland Park Hotel, is the man largely responsible for the success of the First Friday Art Walk. A native of Portland, Verzosa spent four years in New York City before moving back to Maine in 1998 and opening his first gallery. That gallery was down the street from the Skinny, a short-lived but well-loved music venue that shut down in 2003. In 2000, Verzosa and Skinny owner Johnny Lomba compared notes on their recent stomping grounds in New York and Seattle, respectively, and started batting around ideas for organizing an art walk in Portland.
Verzosa says a handful of galleries had tried unsuccessfully to get art walks off the ground in the arts district, a section of Portland anchored by the PMA and the Maine College of Art and populated with dozens of galleries and art studios. They failed, he says, because they were exclusive, opting to cater to a small slice of the Portland population. Instead, Verzosa and Lomba figured that being inclusive was the recipe for longevity.
Five years later, the First Friday Art Walk has grown to include dozens of spots all over the map of Portland, from East End coffee shops to Bayside galleries. Verzosa took time out on a recent Friday afternoon ˆ just a few hours before the February art walk ˆ to speak to Mainebiz about his expectations for the art walk, the difficulty of getting people to go experience art and the importance of generating goodwill. The following is an edited transcript of that conversation.
Mainebiz: Back when you and Johnny Lomba were first talking about getting something going in the arts district, what did you envision? What did you see the art walk becoming?
Andy Verzosa: I was hoping it would be what it is today: a self-guided, non-exclusive experience for people to sample what was going on in Portland's arts scene. In 2000, I rented the conference room at the Downtown Beautification Center on Free Street on two different dates and invited everybody that put listings for art openings and anything visual-related into the Casco Bay Weekly, the Portland Press Herald and the Portland Phoenix. I also invited people from the [Maine] Department of Tourism and the chamber of commerce, the executive director of the Portland Arts and Cultural Alliance, Barbara Hager [then the director] at the Portland Downtown District ˆ all those people who are always trying to develop business and tourism in the city.
It was people of all different ages, people who had a stake in what could happen in the arts district. I had them all come in and asked the leading question of what we could do to support the arts district here in Portland. Different ideas came up, and it gave us an opportunity to talk about doing an art walk in a way that we could get a lot of input and really define what that event was going to look like.
What expectations did you have when you were developing the First Friday Art Walk?
I just figured it would be a success if we had between 30 and 100 people. If we just had some kind of traffic coming through, my gallery would always be happy. When I have a reception at my gallery, I have anywhere from 80 to 300 people, depending on a number of variables. I thought that if I could get the numbers up to what my receptions are like, I'd be very happy.
So far, we've exceeded that, which is really great. We'll get about 250 people per gallery during the art walk. We try to do a head count, and we encourage people to leave comments in our guest book, which can tell us how well a particular show is received. We also check Web stats on how many hits the website, firstfridayartwalk.com, gets in a particular month. Last year, I think we had 32,000 hits overall, which is a couple of thousand hits per month.
Who does the art walk attract?
What's interesting is that every venue draws its own unique group of people. Those people will usually go to a gallery and stick to that neighborhood. Maybe they'll get a card in the mail inviting them to a gallery event, and if there's something else to see, they'll plan their evening around that, go meet their friends and maybe get a bite to eat. It's sometimes difficult to get people in front of artwork. It's not like going to see music in a club. Somehow, going to a gallery or going to a museum is a little tougher.
Why do you think that is?
For one thing, at a gallery or another venue, the artwork doesn't talk and the artist isn't usually around to talk about the art. More frequently than not, the artwork is pretty much unattended ˆ it's kind of fending for itself. There are so many things to do with your recreational time, and that was another thing we were trying to do in planning an event around visual art. We wanted to provide an opportunity for people to meet the artist and also to see other people looking [at the art].
I don't know how you feel when you walk into a gallery and you're all by yourself, but it's kind of weird. I guess some people like that, but Joe Public likes to see other people and see how they respond to things. So the art walk became a very social thing; they're generally a lot of fun. Tonight you'll see groups of people walking together with their friends, and it kind of takes the edge off of being a connoisseur of art.
When I do a show, we capture people's comments in a book, and the artists get to see first-hand how people are responding to the work. They can overhear people talking and remarking about the work and see their body language and see if people like something or dislike something. The artists can engage people if they want to, and a lot of the artists will talk the whole time through, getting a lot of great insights on how people take in their work that might be different from their own perceptions about how people should see their work.
With all the people filing in and out, I would expect the art walk to generate a lot of business for galleries and artists. Do cash registers ring up big sales during First Friday Art Walks?
We don't have a tremendous amount of sales that are generated from the art walk, but we generate a tremendous amount of goodwill. And we have repeat people come; we have a couple of dozen or more that come every month, and other groups that come four or five times a year. Then we have people that we've seen in years past, and that's good. But we have a regular following ˆ we look at it that way.
So does the art walk help galleries like Aucocisco?
Can you draw a line from the art walk to a sale? Sure. During the art walk there might be group shows or fundraising events where they're thought out and planned around an art walk. If you plan your event during the art walk, you're pretty much guaranteed to have X number of people come that you may not have reached through other normal means We don't sell a lot of art, but we get a lot of great feedback and great camaraderie. The artists love to see people interact with their work. It's a feel-good type of event. You cultivate interest, and you try and develop that.
My business is growing Aucocisco Gallery, and I'm trying not to get sidetracked by the art walk. But I'm doing the art walk partly out of necessity. I see how good this event is for the art scene and, if it's properly directed, it's going to be a good thing for the gallery. So I have a vested interest in it, and we've gotten really good results.
Is it difficult to keep the art walk going without a lot of financial support?
No; it's very inexpensive. It probably costs less than $2,500 a year for raw costs like printing and design. But that doesn't include targeted advertising and other extra things. We just started doing some advertising in conjunction with the Portland Downtown District, taking out a page [of advertising] in a local magazine, Port City Life, and we're putting a full-page ad in the Maine Gallery & Studio Guide. The money for those ads come from advertising revenue from the monthly art walk brochures.
The galleries don't have to pay a membership fee or be part of an elite group. It's very accessible, and there aren't the economic barriers that would prevent people from getting involved. The ads are $20 per spot. Where else can you advertise your event to a guaranteed audience for $20? And when we don't have enough people to advertise, I'll think thoughtfully about who might need a leg up and give them a spot. Probably in a couple months, it will pay for itself for the rest of the year and we'll still be able to do these extra [advertising pages]. It's designed to get maximum participation, because without participation, there's no event.
Speaking of maximum participation, does each venue pitch in to organize the event?
Every venue does its own promoting, and the art walk doesn't pay for that. When time allows, I have my staff people jump on the phone once or twice a month to check in with people or to pick up brochures.
We've designed something on the website where galleries and artists can manage their own information. They can get their own username and password, and it's up to them to get their information in on time.
We're also trying to automate advertising, so people can pick their ad spots on the map side of the listings. In January and February, I've been paying out of pocket for all this design work on the brochure and the website, but now I want to make sure it can sustain itself and generate a little income so we can do other things.
What do you think the future holds for the event?
I don't want to be Mr. First Friday Art Walk. When I was on the [Portland Arts and Cultural Alliance] board, I wanted to turn it over to them, but they weren't ready. Maybe the Portland Downtown District or someone else will find it attractive enough for them to assume control of it. And it could have a real value; it generates a lot of interest from the people in the arts community, the business community, local people and people from away. I think it's a great thing for someone else to assume down the road.
Andy Verzosa, owner of Aucocisco Galleries on High Street and in the Eastland Park Hotel, is the man largely responsible for the success of the First Friday Art Walk. A native of Portland, Verzosa spent four years in New York City before moving back to Maine in 1998 and opening his first gallery. That gallery was down the street from the Skinny, a short-lived but well-loved music venue that shut down in 2003. In 2000, Verzosa and Skinny owner Johnny Lomba compared notes on their recent stomping grounds in New York and Seattle, respectively, and started batting around ideas for organizing an art walk in Portland.
Verzosa says a handful of galleries had tried unsuccessfully to get art walks off the ground in the arts district, a section of Portland anchored by the PMA and the Maine College of Art and populated with dozens of galleries and art studios. They failed, he says, because they were exclusive, opting to cater to a small slice of the Portland population. Instead, Verzosa and Lomba figured that being inclusive was the recipe for longevity.
Five years later, the First Friday Art Walk has grown to include dozens of spots all over the map of Portland, from East End coffee shops to Bayside galleries. Verzosa took time out on a recent Friday afternoon ˆ just a few hours before the February art walk ˆ to speak to Mainebiz about his expectations for the art walk, the difficulty of getting people to go experience art and the importance of generating goodwill. The following is an edited transcript of that conversation.
Mainebiz: Back when you and Johnny Lomba were first talking about getting something going in the arts district, what did you envision? What did you see the art walk becoming?
Andy Verzosa: I was hoping it would be what it is today: a self-guided, non-exclusive experience for people to sample what was going on in Portland's arts scene. In 2000, I rented the conference room at the Downtown Beautification Center on Free Street on two different dates and invited everybody that put listings for art openings and anything visual-related into the Casco Bay Weekly, the Portland Press Herald and the Portland Phoenix. I also invited people from the [Maine] Department of Tourism and the chamber of commerce, the executive director of the Portland Arts and Cultural Alliance, Barbara Hager [then the director] at the Portland Downtown District ˆ all those people who are always trying to develop business and tourism in the city.
It was people of all different ages, people who had a stake in what could happen in the arts district. I had them all come in and asked the leading question of what we could do to support the arts district here in Portland. Different ideas came up, and it gave us an opportunity to talk about doing an art walk in a way that we could get a lot of input and really define what that event was going to look like.
What expectations did you have when you were developing the First Friday Art Walk?
I just figured it would be a success if we had between 30 and 100 people. If we just had some kind of traffic coming through, my gallery would always be happy. When I have a reception at my gallery, I have anywhere from 80 to 300 people, depending on a number of variables. I thought that if I could get the numbers up to what my receptions are like, I'd be very happy.
So far, we've exceeded that, which is really great. We'll get about 250 people per gallery during the art walk. We try to do a head count, and we encourage people to leave comments in our guest book, which can tell us how well a particular show is received. We also check Web stats on how many hits the website, firstfridayartwalk.com, gets in a particular month. Last year, I think we had 32,000 hits overall, which is a couple of thousand hits per month.
Who does the art walk attract?
What's interesting is that every venue draws its own unique group of people. Those people will usually go to a gallery and stick to that neighborhood. Maybe they'll get a card in the mail inviting them to a gallery event, and if there's something else to see, they'll plan their evening around that, go meet their friends and maybe get a bite to eat. It's sometimes difficult to get people in front of artwork. It's not like going to see music in a club. Somehow, going to a gallery or going to a museum is a little tougher.
Why do you think that is?
For one thing, at a gallery or another venue, the artwork doesn't talk and the artist isn't usually around to talk about the art. More frequently than not, the artwork is pretty much unattended ˆ it's kind of fending for itself. There are so many things to do with your recreational time, and that was another thing we were trying to do in planning an event around visual art. We wanted to provide an opportunity for people to meet the artist and also to see other people looking [at the art].
I don't know how you feel when you walk into a gallery and you're all by yourself, but it's kind of weird. I guess some people like that, but Joe Public likes to see other people and see how they respond to things. So the art walk became a very social thing; they're generally a lot of fun. Tonight you'll see groups of people walking together with their friends, and it kind of takes the edge off of being a connoisseur of art.
When I do a show, we capture people's comments in a book, and the artists get to see first-hand how people are responding to the work. They can overhear people talking and remarking about the work and see their body language and see if people like something or dislike something. The artists can engage people if they want to, and a lot of the artists will talk the whole time through, getting a lot of great insights on how people take in their work that might be different from their own perceptions about how people should see their work.
With all the people filing in and out, I would expect the art walk to generate a lot of business for galleries and artists. Do cash registers ring up big sales during First Friday Art Walks?
We don't have a tremendous amount of sales that are generated from the art walk, but we generate a tremendous amount of goodwill. And we have repeat people come; we have a couple of dozen or more that come every month, and other groups that come four or five times a year. Then we have people that we've seen in years past, and that's good. But we have a regular following ˆ we look at it that way.
So does the art walk help galleries like Aucocisco?
Can you draw a line from the art walk to a sale? Sure. During the art walk there might be group shows or fundraising events where they're thought out and planned around an art walk. If you plan your event during the art walk, you're pretty much guaranteed to have X number of people come that you may not have reached through other normal means We don't sell a lot of art, but we get a lot of great feedback and great camaraderie. The artists love to see people interact with their work. It's a feel-good type of event. You cultivate interest, and you try and develop that.
My business is growing Aucocisco Gallery, and I'm trying not to get sidetracked by the art walk. But I'm doing the art walk partly out of necessity. I see how good this event is for the art scene and, if it's properly directed, it's going to be a good thing for the gallery. So I have a vested interest in it, and we've gotten really good results.
Is it difficult to keep the art walk going without a lot of financial support?
No; it's very inexpensive. It probably costs less than $2,500 a year for raw costs like printing and design. But that doesn't include targeted advertising and other extra things. We just started doing some advertising in conjunction with the Portland Downtown District, taking out a page [of advertising] in a local magazine, Port City Life, and we're putting a full-page ad in the Maine Gallery & Studio Guide. The money for those ads come from advertising revenue from the monthly art walk brochures.
The galleries don't have to pay a membership fee or be part of an elite group. It's very accessible, and there aren't the economic barriers that would prevent people from getting involved. The ads are $20 per spot. Where else can you advertise your event to a guaranteed audience for $20? And when we don't have enough people to advertise, I'll think thoughtfully about who might need a leg up and give them a spot. Probably in a couple months, it will pay for itself for the rest of the year and we'll still be able to do these extra [advertising pages]. It's designed to get maximum participation, because without participation, there's no event.
Speaking of maximum participation, does each venue pitch in to organize the event?
Every venue does its own promoting, and the art walk doesn't pay for that. When time allows, I have my staff people jump on the phone once or twice a month to check in with people or to pick up brochures.
We've designed something on the website where galleries and artists can manage their own information. They can get their own username and password, and it's up to them to get their information in on time.
We're also trying to automate advertising, so people can pick their ad spots on the map side of the listings. In January and February, I've been paying out of pocket for all this design work on the brochure and the website, but now I want to make sure it can sustain itself and generate a little income so we can do other things.
What do you think the future holds for the event?
I don't want to be Mr. First Friday Art Walk. When I was on the [Portland Arts and Cultural Alliance] board, I wanted to turn it over to them, but they weren't ready. Maybe the Portland Downtown District or someone else will find it attractive enough for them to assume control of it. And it could have a real value; it generates a lot of interest from the people in the arts community, the business community, local people and people from away. I think it's a great thing for someone else to assume down the road.
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