COLUMBUS, OHIO, might be best known for its football obsession. It is, anyone will tell you, Buckeye Country.

It might also be known, at least among those fond of tracking such inanities, for its wacky traffic mishaps. Consider the past 15 years or so: a gigantic pothole swallowed a Mercedes Benz on a major downtown street; two million dollars flew out of the back of an armored truck on a busy freeway; and, most recently, slaughtered animal parts slopped onto the hoods of cars in the wake of a truck as it headed for the rendering plant. Ick.
More often than not, though, Columbus is seen as a big small town, surrounded by cornfields, smack dab in the middle of Ohio’s “real” cities, Cincinnati and Cleveland. Its residents call it Cowtown—some with a disparaging tone, others with just a hint of self-effacement. Yet there are a few individuals who would like the city to embrace its Cowtown essence, to take pride in the flat, gray landscape. Indeed, Columbus residents have too long endured an inferiority complex.

“We all want to be like New York. Well, let’s get over it,” says Ray Hanley, executive director of the Greater Columbus Arts Council (GCAC). It’s not just Columbus that wants to be the next big thing west of the Big Apple, it’s every mid-sized city from here to the Pacific Coast. So conventional wisdom would have it that the next best thing to do is focus on what you’ve got.

“In the context of a national arts community, I think (Columbus) is headed in the right direction,” says Linda Gall, executive director of the Ohio Art League. “We have so much talent here.”

It’s that kind of hometown pride that has strengthened the Columbus arts community over the past decade, and probably is what separates it from other sectors of the city. Many artists have taken up the Cowtown banner without apology. While the city’s leaders argued that the new National Hockey League team should be named the “Columbus Blue Jackets” (what on earth for?), the rest of us rooted for the “Mad Cows” as the team’s sobriquet.

And where else, by god, could you possibly find a life-sized butter sculpture of famed zookeeper and frequent David Letterman guest Jack Hanna?

SO WHY DO ARTISTS settle in Columbus in the first place? And do any of them find success? The community’s civic leaders would point out the obvious benefits of living in Columbus: low unemployment, reasonable rents, abundance of services, decent school system, central location with easy access to more glamorous cities. A major university, and several smaller ones in surrounding towns, each with a commendable fine arts department, not to mention our own art school, the Columbus College of Art & Design (CCAD). The Wexner Center for the Arts, that bastion of all things postmodern and good. The Columbus Museum of Art, dozens of galleries, theatre companies, a symphony, and BalletMet.

Lightner, whose job as the museum shop manager at the Columbus Museum of Art enables him to keep up with the art world, rents a half-double apartment in the city’s German Village neighborhood.
“There was sort of this drive, like, I gotta get out of this town...But the longer I’m here, I realize it’s really good to be here. It’s cheap to live, you can go wherever you want if you travel—that’s kind of my goal right now, to travel.”

Kenneth Burris, a painter, also attended CCAD. “I saw about 10 of my friends leave Columbus and then come back,” he says. So he stayed. He got a job as an illustrator for a local billboard company which helped him maintain his interest in painting and make money at the same time. The turning point for Burris came when he considered opening a business. “My financial advisor asked me one question and that was, ‘ What do you want to do?’ I wanted to paint and draw.”

And painter Betsy Defusco stays because her family is here—she has children and her husband owns an insurance company in Columbus. Defusco has a studio above an art supply store in the middle of downtown. She shares the space with several artists. Just 10 years ago, however, Defusco had a commercial art business that created calendars and cards. “I never really made art for myself,” she says. It was that awareness that led her to drop the business and pick up the paintbrush. Defusco has concentrated on fine art ever since, working in her studio at least four days a week. Her abstract paintings—many are large canvases of plaid patterns immersed in color—have been shown in several commercial galleries in Columbus.

Lightner, whose work was recently shown at the nonprofit gallery Roy G Biv [see dialogue’s Recap section, July/August 1998], is disappointed with the public’s lack of appreciation for challenging art, especially at the monthly “Gallery Hop” gatherings that attract suburbanites to the city’s art district, the Short North. “Does anybody sell anything at gallery hops? You stand in the gallery and people file through and you hear them making fun of everything.”

Indeed, many a snicker can be heard as visitors make the tour of Short North galleries. Local artists, like Lightner and Defusco, are puzzled by the public’s bemused reaction to abstract art, installations, and other less familiar artistic territory.
“I’ve been told (my painting) might be more accepted out West,” says Defusco. “I don’t know why. I mean, it’s not really outlandish.”

Local organizations have teamed up to help create a new base of educated collectors. The city’s nonprofit galleries—the Ohio Art League (OAL), Roy G Biv and Acme Art Co. —coordinate four events per year for people interested in learning more about collecting local art. Each event is held in a collector’s home and features a guest speaker. The first program attracted roughly 40 people. OAL’s Linda Gall believes that the city needs to recognize the quality of art in its own backyard. Ironically, says Gall, “collectors would go to New York to buy work by Ohio artists.”

Gall is optimistic about the community’s ability to support local artists, however. Already, “sales have more than tripled in the past couple of years,” she says. OAL, formerly known as the Columbus Art League, has 489 members. In addition to providing a variety of services to artists, the organization invites both members and non- members to curate and exhibit work in its gallery on a monthly basis.

Yet, most artists will agree that the community has made vast leaps in learning to appreciate art and foster its growth. A 20-year resident of the city, Defusco says, “I think it’s getting better all the time. I’ve seen a huge change since we’ve moved here.”

Hanley, whose GCAC organization oversees individual artist fellowships, the Artist-in- the-Schools program, and other opportunities for artists, says, “It’s hard not to buy art in Columbus. It’s affordable, the galleries are accessible, and the quality of the art is good.”

LIKE MANY CITIES, COLUMBUS has limited space and support for artists and alternative spaces living on the edge. The Short North district has become such an attractive retail spot that high rent increases have pushed several of the more interesting galleries, such as Roy G Biv and Acme, further north. Hanley is quick to note that Columbus, however, was never an industrial town and that eliminates the kind of lofty, open spaces so conducive to exhibiting art. “We just don’t have that kind of architecture. It was never here.”

A corollary problem is that big artwork can’t be shown in small spaces. Burris’s work—for example, one piece features two surreally swervy, pregnant prostitutes atop a large Mondrian-like grid of color—is big and loud. He asks, “How do you sell a 5’x15’ painting in Columbus, Ohio?”

There are easily more than 50 galleries in the Central Ohio area, but few actually cater to contemporary art and feature new exhibitions. And of these, even fewer exhibit local work. Roy G Biv, Acme, the Ohio Art League’s gallery, the Columbus Cultural Arts Center, the Martin Luther King Jr. Performing & Cultural Arts Complex, and surrounding universities and colleges—nonprofits all—are the best bet for getting a show. Says Burris, “In nonprofit galleries it’s much easier because they are much more liberal. But in the for-profit galleries, I see a whole different ball game.”

(Unfortunately, those nonprofits—the alternative spaces—not affiliated with a major institution are constantly struggling to keep their doors open. Acme recently sent out a frantic call to members for immediate financial support. It remains to be seen whether or not Columbus’s alternative spaces will survive where others across the country have not.)

Lightner also sees limitations in getting exhibitions. In fact, not long ago, he and fellow artists Greg Sandor and Chris Herren decided to create their own exhibition opportunities with a series of “Hit and Run” shows. The trio organized three such events in three different studio spaces. According to Lightner, the shows were popular and actually resulted in sales, not something the artists anticipated. Lightner hoped that the concept would be expanded with other artists hosting exhibitions and promoting them under the “Hit and Run” theme. “We couldn’t get that rolling. It’s a lot of work to do.”

Lightner still believes that artists need to take responsibility in promoting the visual arts. “I think we need to rely on each other a little bit more. The galleries do what they can.”

But taking time from one’s artwork to run an organization for visual artists is something many artists are reluctant to do. Burris says, “I have a tight, little world and I’m pretty self-centered and focused on what I want to do.”

Hanley thinks that the type of leader or “catalyst personality” needed to organize and promote visual artists has not emerged. He admits his disappointment in the artist-run organizations that have struggled to survive. “We’ve invested numerous times in management improvements. If you’re serious about it and you’ve got a plan, we’ll help. But a lot of that has not been successful.”

One way for local artists to obtain more exhibitions and sales is through representation from a dealer or agent. Defusco works with three different dealers, for example. The truth is, however, that Columbus dealers are still developing their clientele base and creating a niche for themselves, and while some might be happy to represent local artists, the opportunities are limited.

WHILE EXHIBITION OPPORTUNITIES vary according to the artist’s style and business savvy, studio space is a precious commodity. Pockets of rental spaces can be found surrounding the downtown and Short North areas. Burris lives in the Buggyworks, a rough-and-tumble labyrinth of a building that once housed a buggy factory and now contains studio spaces, commercial offices, a health club, and a popular nightclub. There’s Milo, a former school building that now provides live-in (albeit, drafty and a bit dank) studios for artists, and Belmont Caskets, another former factory-turned-atelier. Most studios have little heat, barely functioning bathroom facilities, and few amenities aside from electrical service.

MOVING BEYOND COLUMBUS is a goal for some artists. Says Lightner, “I think Columbus is great for getting your feet wet and showing your work...meeting artists, getting your name around. But I really feel there’s sort of a cap to it.”

Hanley is realistic about his challenge to keep artists in town. “Sometimes we lose artists who I wish would stay, but on the other hand, I recognize, whether you’re a dancer or a painter, it’s good for you to get out and get other experiences. It doesn’t mean you can’t come home.”

There’s also the idea of using Columbus as home base—trying to exhibit art outside the state but not moving with it. Says Defusco, “The ultimate goal would be a show in New York City. But I think I’m going to try Chicago first. I think that’s more do-able.”

Lightner would like to see galleries offer “swaps” where artists from Columbus could exhibit in, say, San Francisco, and San Francisco artists could exhibit here. Such an arrangement has occurred in the past at Acme Art Co., and GCAC has an international exchange program for a limited number of artists.

“I just want to see where I fit in with the rest of the world,” says Lightner. “It’s great to hear good things (about your work) in your hometown, but you kind of want to hear what the rest of the world says.”

Former Columbus resident and CCAD graduate Wendy Minor did, in fact, leave—though she didn’t go far and it certainly isn’t New York. Minor and several friends bought land in Amesville, Ohio, and founded Standing Stone, an artist colony about 70 miles southeast of Columbus. Says Minor, “We weren’t making it (in Columbus). We were working anywhere from two to three jobs and paying for these apartments. We were just getting by and there wasn’t any time for art anymore.”

Today, Minor works only 20 hours a week at a health food store and spends the rest of her time creating. She has, in effect, the best of two worlds—she’s far enough away from the distractions of the city to focus on her work, yet close enough to still get exhibitions.

COLUMBUS HAS HAD ITS SHARE of artists who have made names for themselves beyond I- 270—Ann Hamilton, for example, who represents the United States at this year’s Venice Biennale. Or Todd Slaughter. Or Gilda Edwards and Queen Brooks. It is building a fine reputation for photography and other media arts.

It also has had a tradition of amazing folk/outsider/naive art—from Elijah Pierce and William Hawkins to Smokey Brown, Rick Borg and Levent Isik. The Wexner Center for the Arts takes a step toward recognizing this talent with “Self-Taught Artists of the 20th Century: An American Anthology,” an exhibition organized by the Museum of American Folk Art, New York. Scheduled for 15 May-15 August, the show will feature more than 300 works by 32 artists, including Columbus’s Elijah Pierce and William Hawkins. The Ohio Art League will present an exhibition of folk art to coincide with the Wexner’s show, while Roy G Biv is curating a show of naive art.

Columbus has made some great leaps to enrich its visual arts resources, pushed forward by the larger institutions (the Wexner, the Columbus Museum of Art) who have brought such vaunted contemporary art names as Gerhard Richter and Bruce Nauman to our doorsteps. Says Hanley, “(Columbus) has wealth. It has intellectual capital. It has a good infrastructure in terms of facilities and organizations. We just need to believe in ourselves. I think that time has come.”

IN THE END, of course, it doesn’t really matter where you live. The important thing about creating art is creating art. Says Defusco, “I’m trying now just to take it day by day and do what I think should happen next on the canvas, and not worry about selling it.”

“If you want to make it, you’re going to work for it or not. No one’s going to give you anything,” says Lightner. “That’s the big thing I’ve learned in the past couple of years. Just because I say I’m an artist doesn’t mean anything. It means a lot to me, but it doesn’t mean I deserve any special treatment. You gotta work for it.”

Says Burris, “It’s a really lonely life. If you’re not willing to sacrifice every damn thing—your wife, your children, your house, your job, everything—to do what’s important, then you’re not going to get there.”

“I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not going to stop making art,” says Minor. “It will be with me always, whether I make money on it or not.”