Artists Space Gallery was an Australian art gallery showing mainly photography, as well as other media, through the 1980s in Melbourne.
Foundation
The gallery was founded in 1978 by Melbourne painter and photographer Wes Placek. He was joined in the early 80's by his partner Sophie Nowicka a textile designer and artist, who assisted in administration of the gallery and in curatorial selection of exhibitions.
Location When it opened, the gallery occupied the top floor of a 1920s shopfront in the main street at 127 Buckley St., near the railway station in the working-class suburb Essendon. In 1987 the Gallery was relocated, closer to Melbourne CBD and amongst a growing number of other galleries.Cason, J. (1991). The photo gallery & workshop handbook. New York, NY: Images Press. Though it also showed other media, it was among contemporary specialist photography galleries The Photographers' Gallery, Brummels and Church Street that revived the medium as an art form. The new space, with four times the floor area,Beatrice Faust, 'Getting enough space is only half the job,' The Age, Wednesday, 19 Aug 1987, p.14 was in a former warehouse in North Fitzroy at 150 Park Street on the corner of Best Street, opposite a linear park created from the Inner Circle Railway Line which had closed in 1981.
Reception A range of exhibitions included emerging artists and those well recognised nationally and internationally. While located in Essendon, in the opinion of The Age newspaper art reviewer Beatrice Faust, Placek's exhibitions "accumulated a lot of critical capital," as it "showed small collections of consistently good and sometimes excellent work," including Robert Mapplethorpe's 1983 photogravure suite 'Flowers', and also Bettina Rheims. However, in her 1987 review, just after the relocation, Faust feared the extra space would affect the quality of the work shown, though favourable reviews continued.
It signifies the impact of the Gallery, that founder Placek was himself included, among many of the past exhibitors at Artists Space, in the landmark survey show and publication of photography of the 1970s and 1980s, The Thousand Mile Stare.
Closure Artists Space Gallery closed in 1990.
Exhibitions included 1984: Ryszard Otręba, prints (the poster from this solo exhibition is in the collection of the National Gallery of Australia) 1986, 11 October – 9 November: Sol Weiner 1986, 17 November – 14 December: Displaced Objects - Works by Chris BarryListing, The Age, Friday 14 Nov 1986, p.40 1987, to 30 August: Lauren McIntyre 1987, from 4 Nov: "Just Wot”, an exhibition of visual poetry. Incl. Mimmo Cozzolino, Norma Pearce, Anthony Figallo, Julie Clarke-Powell’Briefs’, The Age, Tuesday 3 Nov 1987, p.14’Visual Poetry’, The Age, Friday, 20 Nov 1987, p.37 1987, to 31 December: Urban Structures, Janina Green, Lita Los Angeles, Bernice McPherson, Craig McGee, Wes Placek.Listing, The Age, Friday 18 Dec 1987, p.40 1988, to 29 Feb: Michael Caddy, Di Clark, Ann SlaterListing, The Age, Friday 5 Feb 1988, p.36 1988, 3–27 August: Wes Placek, Paintings 1988, 7–25 September: Portraits by Paul Cox, Ben Lewin, Wolfgang SieversThe Age, Friday 26 Aug 1988, p.48 1988, September: Double ExposureThe Age, Wednesday, 7 Sep 1988, p.17 1988, to 29 October: Peter Shaw, A Year of Bad WeatherCalendar. ‘Captured’. The Age, Friday 7 Oct 1988, p.33Good Weekend, The Age, Saturday 8 Oct 1988, p.67 1988, to 22 October: Louis Geraldes and Graham Willoughby, PaintingsThe Age, Wednesday, 12 Oct 1988, p.14 1988, to 18 November: Anthony Figallo and Lloyd Jones; Images of La Mama, and Photographic Collages by Chris BarryThe Age, Friday, 18 Nov 1988, p.50The Age, Friday 25 Nov 1988, p.14 1988, to 18 December: Graduate Show, Victoria CollegeThe Age, Friday 2 Dec 1988, p.54 1989, to 7 April: Still Life, photography by Janina Green, Robert Mapplethorpe, Wes Placek, Bettina RheimsThe Age, Friday, 31 Mar 1989, p.40Beatrice Faust, 'Wide range in black and white,' The Age, Tuesday, 7 Mar 1989 p.14 1989, to 29 July: Wes Placek, Works from the kitchenBeatrice Faust, ‘Exhibitions with a touch of the unusual,’ The Age, Thursday, 6 Jul 1989, p.14 1989, 6—31 August: Grant Hobson, Transcending Toughness, and work by Paul WatkinsMurphy, Carmel. Male order: The photographic series from conception to practice [online]. Metro Magazine: Media & Education Magazine, No. 79, Autumn 1989: 26-29. Availability: <https://search.informit.com.au/documentSummary;dn=281285890128663;res=IELAPA> ISSN: 0312-2654. [cited 16 May 20]. 1990, to 28 July: Kodak Five Visions, Bill McCann, Charles Radnay, Janina Green, Wes PlacekGreg Neville, ‘Images explore myths, dreams and human reality,’ The Age, Wednesday, 18 Jul 1990, p.14 1990, to 25 August: Ian McIntosh ‘Affection’; Rick Wood ‘Fugue’Greg Neville, ‘A world of fragments and isolated parts,’ The Age, Thursday, 9 Aug 1990, p.16 1990, to 30 November: Phillip Institute of Technology 1990 Photography GraduatesThe Age, Friday 9 Nov 1990, p.38Greg Neville, ‘Photographic artists risk leaving viewer out of the picture,’ The Age Tuesday, 20 Nov 1990, p.14 1990, to 22 December, Paintings and sculptures by Wes Placek, Erika Vike, Sophie Nowicka, Graham Willoughby, Brian McNamaraListing, The Age, Friday 14 Dec 1990, p.44
References