VISIONARIES: Leslie Zemsky
Posted on Thursday, January 7th, 2010
by block club
The region’s flagship arts destination is enjoying an upswing of positive press these days. Just three years after the controversial announcement that the Albright-Knox Art Gallery would auction off some of its rarely seen collection for the benefit of its acquisitions budget, and more recently, news that gallery would cut back hours of operation to just four days a week, things were looking grim. Add to that a recession, and someone in Leslie Zemsky’s shoes might have decided to run. As the gallery’s new president––the first female to lead its board of trustees––Zemsky has a lot on her plate. She couldn’t be more excited to get to work, or hopeful for the gallery’s future, however.
With the announcement of Zemsky’s tenure in October, and word that the gallery would reinstate its six-day-a-week schedule, things would seem to be moving in a positive direction. Zemsky offers her opinions on the current and future states of the region’s most valuable cultural asset. -Ben Siegel
The gallery is rebounding right now from what some may have seen as discouraging news regarding the financial health of the gallery. What are the current financial goals of the Albright-Knox?
Our No. 1 challenge, as with so many arts organizations, is our annual operating budget. We’re fortunate to have a strong endowment for the purchase of new art, which helps to keep us continuing as a contemporary collective museum. But that’s a separate endowment.
One of the challenges and the word we’re trying to get out to the community is, we’re hurting. And so every membership makes a difference. Raising money for our general operations is key. We need everyone in the community to be a member.
How about the health of the gallery’s collection?
We are so lucky at the Albright-Knox and in our community that we are able to collect art, and that we can draw from our modern collection and program it together with our contemporary art. So that’s not new, but that’s something that we’re excited about doing and challenging the curators.
The gallery’s collection is massive. It’s more than just a building with art in it. It’s really an institution.
Something like 10 percent [of the collection] is out at one time. What’s so great is that by the Albright-Knox collecting art of its time, we have really great famous pieces from the modern area––the ’70s, ’60s, ’50s, even ’80s––then we have things people may not be familiar with, so things are always being pulled out and mixed in. One of the other things that excites me about the gallery, we also like to think of ourselves as a community gathering spot and that’s going forward more and more. We have this beautiful auditorium. We have all this great space, and that’s another way we want to be there for the community, to open our doors in different ways.
I would imagine offering free admission [on Fridays from 3 to 10 p.m.] during Gusto at the Gallery is helping the gallery reach its goals.
It’s had a huge impact. We’ve served over 225,000 people through that program, which is just phenomenal. We always have our membership desk, and we would love it if people joined. But the goal of Gusto at the Gallery is to be as open and accessible as possible. It is exciting to see different ages come through. When you see kids coming in from across the street at Buffalo State College, and all ages, young families, a date night for 20-year-olds, high school kids; there really aren’t a lot of other cultural venues a lot of people are coming to on a Friday night. And if it rolls into membership revenue, fantastic.
How do you see the Albright-Knox being a part of the region’s cultural tourism?
We want to be a really strategic partner in cultural tourism. That was one of the really challenging things, the idea of somebody coming from Toronto and having the gallery closed. We feel now that you can come here, go to the Burchfield Penney Art Center, the Darwin D. Martin House. The galleries and museums are working together. (We) are working with the Convention and Visitors Bureau. They are taking on the hat of being our marketers outside of the region.
This is where I really get excited, where the stars are all aligned. We’ve got this museum district. We have these great things that are going to happen at the Richardson Complex, and then we have what people like: Charming shopping on Elmwood, restaurants that aren’t chains… So much of it is so positive. We’re a great place to live but an important place to visit.
How do you think the arts can benefit those who are outside of art circles?
What’s been fun about Gusto at the Gallery is that it’s living proof that you don’t have to understand art to appreciate art. There is a lot of contemporary art that I’d like to have an explanation about. It moves it to another level for me. That’s what’s so nice that we have tours for the general public, too. Now we’re on cell phones for tours. Instead of having a limited number of audio wands, essentially it’s unlimited.
Is the visual arts scene here in a good position right now?
What I’m really excited about is Beyond/In Western New York, [the triennial regional art exhibition]. It’s going to have an expanded component for this fall. It’s still going to stay solid with artists from our region, but it will be bringing in some international artists, which has the potential to bring people from a much wider geographic area to come to Buffalo and Western New York.
What might long-term effects from this event have on the city?
Maybe we’ll end up at some point with an older building that was transformed for a Beyond/In event. One that stays open after for the exhibition of contemporary art. There are lots of possibilities for that show.
Would you like to see more gallery spaces in the city?
Seeing how buildings are transformed for art is exciting. This is more dreaming, but a realistic dream. Maybe it will be a venue that all of the different arts organizations can share. Maybe it will be summer only, so you won’t have the heating. It’s still up in the air, but that’s something that Louis (Grachos, executive director) and I really agree on. It would be natural for Buffalo with its older buildings.
