INSTAGRAM ART LESSONS DRAW A CROWD
Illa Gaunt understands that the art world can be intimidating. There’s so much to learn — the key players, the various movements and the terminology. It’s a lot for younger generations to process, which is why Gaunt hosts weekly art history lessons on Instagram: Because if you post it, millennials will come.
Her 13,000 and counting followers (@_ig_art) wake up every Sunday morning to a new curriculum-style Instagram story. Sometimes the subject is a person, such as Robert Indiana, the preeminent artist whose best-known work was the word “LOVE” arranged in a square with a tilted letter “O.” Other times it’s topical, like art at the White House.
“That one was shared a lot because of this tumultuous time in our history,” Gaunt says. “It was something uplifting. And bipartisan.”
The topics vary, though the timing and approach are consistent.
“It’s easy to digest for someone who might not know much about art history,” she explains. “People are drawn to the fact that there’s much story behind an image. Sometimes that gets lost — the relationships between artists and little anecdotes about their lives.”
When Gaunt, who has 15 years of art advisory and collection management under her belt, began crafting Sunday art lessons two or three years ago, the response was overwhelmingly positive. Followers would send her direct messages saying how they would look forward to posts every week. A few would even grab a coffee before settling in for “class.”
“Obviously there’s no monetary gain. And I don’t know anything about algorithms, but Sunday felt like a good time. That’s when people slow down and take time to view them,” Gaunt says. “It’s hard work to make them look simple and easy.”
She spends three days preparing each art lesson. The writing starts on Fridays. Saturdays are for perfecting the PowerPoint presentation-style slides, though because this is Instagram, hers are curated and expertly filtered.
Gaunt’s favorite stories to tell are of the women behind the scenes who took curatorial risks and went against the grain. She muses that without Peggy Guggenheim, we may not have had Jackson Pollock; and without Gertrude Stein we might not know the name Pablo Picasso.
She’ll often post the biography of a single artist. The key is to make each one concise and specific. Take David Hockney: Why does he paint pools and what’s the story behind them?
Conversations with a client might also spark an idea. “It gives me insight about what might be missing from the art history canon.”
Her day job is helping the next generation of Texas’ patrons tell stories with their personal art collections. Gaunt is responsible for installing Oliver Jeffers’ “For All We Know” in the soon-to-open pink dining room at the restaurant March. She also worked with former Texans wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins to place a piece by Deborah Roberts in his Houston home.
“Looking back as a child, the pieces that stuck with me are from my aunt’s house, she had a house full of contemporary art, I still think about them,” Gaunt recalls. “Just because you have traditional furniture doesn’t mean you have to have traditional art. A collection can be it’s own entity within your home — a source of pride and intrigue.”
The goal is for clients to collect work by artists they’re interested in and forge a lasting relationship. She wants to debunk the misconception that art is purely decorative. And expensive.
“You don’t have to spend a lot of money. There are so many emerging artists out there, and Houston has a great art scene,” Gaunt says, pointing to some of her favorite local talents, including Natasha Bowdoin, Joseph Havel and the Hiram Butler Gallery, which often hosts a family-friendly open house on Sunday, complete with a taco truck.
It’s worth mentioning that Gaunt’s Sunday art lessons are also free of charge — though you may want a notepad and a fresh cup of coffee.