A Day at the Gallery

Same picture as last week but one referred to
in this post.
Acrylic washes on paper by Phillip Hoyle

Fortunately I found my folder that morning last week. I needed it for the security codes that provide the key to enter and the ability to turn off the security system of the gallery where I was scheduled to work. The gallery sits on the main street of Georgetown CO, a small mountain town high in the Central Rockies west of Denver and just a few miles east of the Continental Divide. The historic town sits at around 8500 feet above sea level, an old place that grew due to the discovery of silver. Today it’s mainly a tourist spot near scenic passes, alpine skiing, and a small lake that is fished all year much of the time through thick ice. Tourists can ride a narrow gauge train to another mining town, tour the train and mining museum attached to the depot, visit the old Hotel du Paris museum, enjoy good food, gather curios, and shop at the two art galleries including the Colorado Mountain Art Gallery where I was headed.

I joined the co-op gallery a year ago and was fulfilling my monthly obligation by working there. My partner for the day had not arrived so I opened the door—successfully I was glad—and began turning on the lights. There are many lights to highlight the art of nearly sixty artists in a building that is about half a block deep. By the time I made it to the front of the building, my partner had arrived and was waiting for me to let her enter. Then we shared the opening process.

I had not worked in retail since I was a kid and found myself facing old but new challenges in my membership at the gallery. With so many owner-members—probably some with even less experience than I—the gallery provides a detailed list of daily duties. It covers opening up, cleaning, clerking, running the credit card machine, and closing the gallery. (If you’re curious, keep reading.)

I was pleased to be working with Lisa who is a fast and endless worker as well as a wonderful and experienced painter. Between us we counted the money, turned on lights in jewelry display cases, started the paperwork that must be done daily, set out the sign, bench, and chair on the sidewalk in front, cleaned the restroom, ran the sweeper, washed the front window and doors, cleaned the glass tops and fronts of the many display cases.

We also had each brought more artwork to replace or change out in our own displays. Lisa decided to re-hang her display. She removed the paintings, pulled out nails, filled the holes with putty, and painted the spackle. Then she worked to hang at least one or two more paintings on the wall. Later, I did something similar except I was not planning to redo my whole display. I simply added to it some smaller pieces and changed what was hanging in the front gallery with another painting, this one of a petroglyph of a Rocky Mountain big horn sheep in preparation for last Saturday’s Big Horn Sheep Festival in Georgetown. Of course, when one hangs more paintings or adds pottery or sculptures or whatever, there is bookkeeping to be done. We adjusted our inventory records and made printed and hung wall tags.

We worked pretty steadily with the many projects through the eight hours we were at the gallery, well until the last hour when we were done with our work, itching to get out of there, and had no more customers. Actually on this midweek day in November, we had only seven or eight customers, but we talked with them, sold a few pieces, and enjoyed both their personalities and the diversion they provided us. Nice people, elders on fall outings, mostly from the Denver area yet also two from England, folk Lisa remembered had visited last year. At 4:00 we sat together in the front gallery and talked—swapping stories and art concerns—until it was time to begin closing up. That last hour the air also began to cool. We were extra glad we were leaving in mild weather and not having to battle a snowstorm on our ways home. On my way out I did remember to gather all my belongings, including the folder that had eluded me all last month!

Denver, 2014