Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
New art gallery celebrates opening
FORT SMITH — After months of waiting, a new art gallery in a recently developed community space in downtown Fort Smith got to celebrate its public debut.
The District Galleries held an opening reception on Oct. 9. It kicked off with Her Voice, an exposition showcasing the works of local female artists.
The reception was originally going to take place April 10, but was postponed in March due to concerns regarding the covid-19 pandemic. Bridget Duncan, artist coordinator for the District Galleries, said despite the delay, the event was “a really great show.”
” I know a lot of artists have been waiting for it, and it’s like a relief,” Duncan said. “It’s like something has finally come to fruition, and so that’s a really great experience after waiting for so long. … At first, I was unsure if it would be able to happen, or if this would be even the best year for it, but with the protocols in place, we still got a really good turnout.”
The opening reception drew 140 people, according to Duncan. However, she noted that the District Galleries is mainly an event space, and due to covid-19 guidelines, is only open to the public during events.
Her Voice will run in the gallery until the end of October, after which a new exhibition will take place, Duncan said. Selected abstractions from the Bakery Collection are displayed in the gallery as well.
THE BAKERY DISTRICT
The District Galleries is the latest addition to the Bakery District in downtown Fort Smith. The district is owned by the Fort Smith-based company KMW Properties.
Tom Hanna, who oversees KMW Properties’ portfolio of properties throughout the state, said the approximately 65,000-square-foot facility used to be the site of the Shipley Baking Company. This bakery operated from 1921 to 1996, during which it manufactured products such as fresh and frozen bread, rolls, cakes and pies, according to the Bakery District website.
“We purchased the facility in 2013,” Tom Hanna said. “It sat vacant for a couple of more years until we determined some concepts we wanted to try out, namely being the event space, and we opened it up informally as an event space for a while. And then we decided that we had better clean up the space a little bit because it was a pretty raggedy looking old bakery, and we started the conversion process in probably late 2018, and had construction going well until this year.”
Tom Hanna said KMW Properties was the developer on this project, Studio 6 Architects was the architect and Petree Construction was the general contractor. Sam Hanna, property manager for KMW Properties, added that Hanna Oil & Gas is behind KMW, with employees at the former supporting the Bakery District as well. Tom and Sam’s father, Bill Hanna, is the president and CEO of Hanna Oil & Gas.
The Bakery District, Tom Hanna said, currently has Fort Smith Coffee Co., a coffee shop and roastery, and Bookish, a bookstore, as tenants, in addition to about 14,000 sq. ft. of event space. Sam Hanna said two food trucks, Big Tasty Burger and See’s Seafood, are also in the district, with KMW Properties “actively trying to find a third.” A bocce ball court is one of the district’s other amenities.
With the district, Sam Hanna said KMW Properties wanted to change the way people looked at Fort Smith.
“… We saw this as a huge change in the city, and something that was really unique, and a way to get kind of a different type of crowd together and hanging out in the downtown area, and revitalizing the city,” Sam Hanna said. “So … what I thought it would be is sort of what it’s become, and that’s just a good place for people to gather, and a place for people not from Fort Smith to come too, and see and think, well, we can hang with the rest of these cities that seem to be growing so quickly around us.”
Tom Hanna said the company wanted to be able to provide a community space.
“We don’t have a lot of open community spaces in Fort Smith, and we’re trying to appeal to a demographic that doesn’t necessarily get appealed to very often, kind of the younger demographic, the college-age demographic, which most industries kind of overlook within this region,” Tom Hanna said.
Future plans for the Bakery District, according to Tom Hanna, include a bar hoped to be open by year’s end, and construction to build out about 10,000 sq. ft. of educational and administrative space for the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith aimed to start by the end of December.
HER VOICE
Although she knows numerous artists, Duncan, being one herself, said she does not know many who are female. She also claimed that it is harder for female artists to get their start.
“And so, the first exhibition for this space, I wanted to make sure that this was a gallery meant for all genders, all races, just really, really open, all sorts of types of art, whether it be representational, whether it be abstract, whether it be street art,” Duncan said. “I wanted to establish this place like that…”
Her Voice, according to Duncan, is a way for the District Galleries to demonstrate that it is open to all kinds of artists and people. She also wanted to highlight both emerging and more established female artists that she knows.
Duncan said the types of artwork on display in Her Voice include architectural screenprints, portraiture, landscapes and still lifes.
”Basically, what I wanted to say was you don’t have to just talk about female empowerment, whether you are a female who makes artwork,” Duncan said. “You can also just be an artist and make portraits and still lifes and landscapes because you can basically make anything that can have its own empowerment.”
“So all of these artists are female, but they’re also very, very talented, so they’re not in the exhibition because they’re female. They’re more in the exhibition because they’re artists that have been, I think, a little bit under the radar, some of them, and some of them, of course, are emerging, but they still have this really unique talent, so I want to highlight that.”
One artist Duncan selected for the exhibition is J. L. Medeiros, 34, of Fort Smith. Medeiros, who works as an art teacher and advisor at the Future School of Fort Smith, said via email that she considers herself a printmaker, installation artist, and draftswoman. Much of her work overlaps different fields of art.
Medeiros has 10 pieces, which she said are mostly considered monoprints, on display in Her Voice. She was “very excited” to be able to show her work in the District Galleries’ first exhibition.
“I love that they focused on local women artists, which are underrepresented in the art world,” Medeiros said.
Medeiros said she was worried that the opening reception might get cancelled, with it being a pleasant surprise that they were able to have the show and have so many people show up safely. She believes the District Galleries is going to make “a huge impact” for both the local art scene and artists.
“This added venue provides us with a place to exhibit our work, which increases the chances for the public to see, experience, and purchase our art,” Medeiros said. “It also acts as a springboard for upcoming artists; giving them a place to get their name out to the public eye.”
Her Voice also features works by such artists as Casi Caton, Hannah Jeremiah, Kiaya Luper, Maggie Malloy, Lious Novicki, Katelyn Smith, Daleana Vaughan, and Sharuq Yasin, according to the Bakery District website.
It is worth noting that the two silos in the courtyard of the Bakery District feature a two-part mural painted by Hilda Palafox, a female artist from Mexico, as part of an art event in Fort Smith called the 2019 Unexpected.