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Birth of a Gallery
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19524 |
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Section : |
THE ARTS
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| Issue
Date : |
11 / 1991 |
1,486 Words |
| Author
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Gary Lee
Gary Lee is a Washington-based journalist who occasionally
writes on the arts. |
With its French name, SoHo-style design, and a regular diet of exhibitions from both sides of the Atlantic, Washington, D.C.'s Le Marie Tranier Gallery is a perfect mélange of European and American artistic traditions. And that, says director Marie-Pierre Le Marie (nee Tranier), in English garnished with a tiny spray of her native French, is precisely the effect she is seeking to achieve. "What we want," she says, "is to capture the very essence of both cultures. To blend French taste with the American palette, to have a clientele from all over, to be a truly international gallery."
After having spent a year finely calibrating the ambience, adding touches of East Village zaniness and Right Bank chic, Le Marie finds the balance just about right.
The key is the artists exhibited there. Since its opening in September 1990, the gallery has sponsored a geographically broad range of painters and sculptors. French-born sculptor Benoit Luyckx was the first, with his painted marble works that sometimes resemble abstract Miniatures of the Paris suburb La Defense. American giant Robert Rauschenberg was the latest, with his wax fire works--images of Americana branded on stainless steel. In between came Canadian, Venezuelan, and English painters, among others.
The objective, Le Marie explains, is to exhibit a little bit of everything the contemporary art world has to offer, including both famous painters and those just emerging, some Old Masters from Europe and new talent that has grabbed her imagination.
The gallery space, located in the heart of Washington's fashionable Georgetown district, has also helped Le Marie achieve the atmosphere she wants. But she had to build the ambience from the ground up. When she first saw the building, it was an abandoned toy store, with exposed brick walls and a soiled green carpet. Most unsettling was one leftover toy--a huge, unsightly four-seater Grumman airplane that was colored red, yellow, and green and hung from the ceiling.
The renovation was an ordeal. It cost $75,000, lasted two and a half months, and engaged a full-time construction crew. The carpet had to go. Windows were decreased in size. Walls went up, creating four different spaces. A stairwell was added for dramatic effect. And everything was painted white.
The facelift worked wonders. The space now has an airy, sophisticated aura, which is
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