191 Miles on I-90: Cleveland, Buffalo, and Common Currents

Buffalo artist Gary Wolfe met Cleveland artist John Sargent in 2012, when Sargent briefly lived in the Queen City. Both were involved with the Buffalo Society of Artists—an organization founded in 1891 to help advance the cause of artists in that part of the world. They got to know each other over the space of about six months, and kept in touch after Sargent returned to Cleveland. They’d talk about the challenges artists face in cities like these, where the decline of steel and manufacturing jobs has meant loss of population and loss of wealth. Buffalo and Cleveland have a lot in common, besides sharing Interstate 90 and the shore of Lake Erie. Sargent says it was before the pandemic—“five or six years ago”—that they started talking about an exhibition that has become known as Common Currents.

As Wolfe says, “we’d talk about this—wouldn’t it be great to help Buffalo artists get out of Buffalo, and Cleveland artists get out of Cleveland and find another venue. And to have a larger viewing audience, and potentially a larger purchasing audience. In small cities like these, once you’ve seen your local artists, you see them at all the venues.”

The need for regional connections between artists, curators, institutions and markets has been among the most consistent interests reported to CAN in anecdotes and surveys (and by every means information is gathered from artists) through the years. It was one of the key motivations behind the CAN Triennial Exhibition Prizes, which brought curators from regional institutions—the Erie (Pennsylvania) Art Museum, the Butler Institute of American Art in Youngstown, the Akron Art Museum and many others—to look at works of Northeast Ohio artists and choose from them artists for solo shows.

To make their idea work, Sargent and Wolfe needed a venue in each of the cities. They had connections: Sargent is on the board of directors at Artists Archives of the Western Reserve (AAWR); besides his involvement with Buffalo Society of Artists (and being president of the organization more than once), Wolfe knew people and had exhibited at the Burchfield Penney Art Center. Sargent says an early idea was to have two venues in each city, to extend partnership and collaboration. He recruited the Galleries at Cleveland State University—which was a willing partner, until the CSU gallery closed. The university remained supportive of the project, however.

“When the CAN and FRONT triennials ended, we saw a window,” Sargent says. “There was a fellow who had not yet become permanent director of Burchfield Penney—Scott Propeack—who really thought it was an important thing to do regionally. When Gary and I proposed it, it was a shoe-in. That is when it really came together. Then a cast of characters coalesced and planning progressed.”

The Burchfield Penney gets part of its name from a well-known Cleveland School painter: Charles Burchfield was born in Ashtabula and graduated from the Cleveland Institute of Art in 1916. He moved to Buffalo in 1921. In addition to Burchfield’s work, the art center is dedicated to regional art of Western New York. It makes a good partner, then, with Artists Archives of the Western Reserve, which is dedicated to preserving bodies of work from archived artists of Ohio.

Artists Archives Director Mindy Tousley—an artist herself—embraced the prospect. “The idea is that these cities, Cleveland, Buffalo, (Pittsburgh, etc.) that are outside of the major art centers, have a lot to offer, but no one knows about it. So what can we do in a grassroots effort to change that? Well, this is one idea—we start getting the work out en-masse through exhibitions, and as it benefits the artist in both cities, it makes for a good partnership.”

Making more regional connections is an idea with history. Burchfield Penney Senior Curator Tullis Johnson recalls that in the early 2000s the organization was part of a series of exhibitions called Beyond/In Western New York, with as many as a dozen museums around the region exhibiting curated shows featuring artists from that part of the world, extending to Toronto. “It was a really big, complicated process. This is the first attempt to reach out again.”

As his colleague Associate Curator Tiffany Gaines says, “there’s this rich cultural ecosystem that hasn’t gotten the exposure. This is bringing [artists and audiences of the two cities] into conversation with each other. I think it is a really interesting way for the community here to see what is happening in Cleveland and vice versa.”

The partners began to develop the parameters of the show. They identified a curator from each city: Clevelander Grace Chin, executive director of The Sculpture Center; and Kyle Butler, assistant professor of fine art at Villa Maria College in Buffalo. They put out a call for artists in each city. To be eligible, artists had to live in one of the Northeast Ohio counties surrounding Cleveland or the Western New York counties surrounding Buffalo. There were no entry fees. In the initial round of selection, each curator considered artists applying from the other city, through their images submitted online. After that round, the two organizations facilitated studio visits, and the curators approached curation together.

“One thing I said to curators is that [works in the show] would be at their discretion,” Sargent recalls. “There were no guidelines. Artists are the instruments; the curators are the conductors or arrangers. It was up to them.”

The resulting list of artists is not a “best of,” or an exchange of artists that the curators or organizers thought should have broader renown. Instead, Tousley says, it’s an exhibit connected by ideas the curators found. “In looking at the work, the curators discovered themes and made their choices based on what they saw.”

Common Currents—the result of those conversations and many others—features work by contemporary artists of Northeast Ohio and Western New York. It will be on view April 10 through June 21 at Artists Archives of the Western Reserve, and then will travel to the Burchfield Penney Art Center in Buffalo, for a run July 11 through November 2.

Northeast Ohio artists in the show are R Kauff, Jen Harris, Mark Keffer, Timothy Callaghan, Sarah Paul, Nicole Condon-Shih, Chauncey Hay, Katy Richards, Michael Hornyak, Susan Danko, and Jean Kondo Weigl. Buffalo area artists are Frani Evedon, Robert Pitts, Bob Fleming, Dennis Bertram, Chantal Calato, Sun Young Kang, Matt Kenyon, Robert Hirsch, Mizin Shin, Lydia Boddie-Rice, Jeffrey Vincent, and Paris Roselli.

The model Sargent and Wolf set into motion is one to pay attention to. In announcing the call for art, AAWR described the model for the exhibition as having the potential to lead to “an ongoing series of unique exhibitions in different cities, building institutional relationships while providing collaborative forums for regional artists & artistic excellence.”

It’s something other organizations could riff on, especially in cities throughout the Great Lakes region, where multiple arts scenes—each serving hundreds of thousands of people—are located within just a few hours’ drive of each other. By partnering across the miles, could more organizations create relationships and exhibitions that proliferate and endure?

“There is substantial cost to do this,” Sargent acknowledges. “But this is really an exciting opportunity for what we do in Cleveland to get out into the world. You have to do it in partnership.”

“Whether we seek other partners or do it again—it’s too early to say,” Wolfe says. “I think the impetus to get to other cities like Pittsburgh and Toronto is there; it’s finding partners, finding resources. Will it happen again? I hope so.”

Common Currents
Artists Archives of the Western Reserve, Cleveland
April 10–June 21
Panel Discussion: Hillary Gent, Jeremey Johnson, Jordan Wong, Rhonda Brown. Moderator Michael Gill
May 17
Burchfield Penney Art Center, Buffalo
July 11–November 2