I’d like to share my art studio and gallery with you. My art studio and gallery is in the Racine Business Center in Racine, WI. The building is a Civil War era building that has been a business incubator for over 100 years! The current owners are very supportive of the arts and the building is now home for over 40 artist studios and over 60 artists. The studios, known as the 16th Street Studios, have two open houses during the year, one in December for the Holidays and one in April for our annual Get Behind the Arts studio tours. You can learn more here: Racine Business Center Art Studios and 16th ST Studios tumblr site.
My studio serves several purposes:
- It is a gallery for my finished work (paintings and photography) and its size helps me plan exhibitions on the walls before they are set up in other exhibition spaces.
- It is a working art studio and its size gives me the opportunity to easily work on and store large scale work. It has a station for me to do all of my own matting and framing.
- Finally, it has a work area for conducting all of my photo shoots with lighting and backdrops.
I’ve had several studios in the building over time. My current studio is on the first floor and very close to one of the main entrances to the building and a short walk to the loading dock. The current space has 2 rooms, each about 20 x 20 feet in size. I use the main room as my gallery and photo shoot room and the second as my storage and work area. There are two galleries below, one shows what the space looked like before I moved in and the second shows what it looks like now after my updates and move-in.
