JENELL TAYLOR
Staff Writer
At 6:30 p.m. tonight in Hultquist 101, professional art consultant Garrett Klein will speak to Chautauquans about the inner workings of his career and “peel back the traditionally opaque layers of the gallery world,” he said.
For the past eight years, Klein and his wife, Ryan Massey, have served as co-owners and directors of contemporary art exhibition space Massey Klein Gallery, which found its home in New York City’s Lower East Side.
“In our view of what makes our gallery and artists successful is knowing that we all need to grow together,” Klein said.
Through an open, collaborative approach, the two said they are committed to fostering genuine and long-lasting partnerships with their artists and clients. Klein said, “Sharing and educating our artists with what we’re doing behind the scenes is a big portion of that.”
Their process also involves several studio visits with artists before their exhibitions, during which they provide feedback and have face-to-face conversations about the work.
“It’s less of a surprise what we’ll get for a show, and more of us and the artist building a show together,” he explained.
When working with clients, Klein said the process is similar. He and Massey explore clients’ collections and listen intently to their specific wants and needs to match them with artwork that aligns with what they already know and love.
“We do our best to introduce them to new artists and educate them on the artists’ concepts and practices,” he said. “It’s a mixture of understanding what their collection currently is and seeing which artist could fit in well with that collection and why.”
Their clients range from established collectors, to emerging artists, to those who may be purchasing art for the very first time. The couple aims to develop and maintain strong, long-term relationships that keep the gallery from feeling like a “store for art,” Klein said.
The gallery’s vetting process for artists varies on a case-by-case basis and can take anywhere from six months to a year to complete.
“We’re looking at multiple touchpoints,” Klein said. “Like an artist having a very clear, unique, individual voice — but also references to art history or other contemporary artists.”
He said it’s important to notice a conversation happening within the work that the artist is actively pushing forward.
“Beyond that, we follow the artists’ work over time to see if they’re developing and what direction they’re going in,” he said. Some artists are ready for a show right away, but for others, Klein said the seeds might be there and they have to take some time to see if and when they sprout.
Before opening the gallery, Klein worked as a trained artist. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Fashion Institute of Technology in 2008 and focused on sculpting, painting and drawing.
“I didn’t really get into art as a professional career until 2012, and I had done some jobs that I’d gotten as a result of FIT,” he said. “One of them was a mold maker for a plaster company, where I learned a lot of cool mold-making and building techniques.”
Klein said the job was niche and interesting, but not particularly well-paying.
“So I found myself in high-end retail and custom clothing, then a gallery job kind of fell into my lap,” he said.
Before Massey Klein, he worked as a consultant and assistant director at Bertrand Delacroix Gallery, then found a position as senior art consultant at DTR Modern Galleries. He said his experience in mold-making, retail and his former gallery jobs prepared him to open his own gallery.
I was comfortable talking about numbers and talking with clients about high-end things that they were going to buy,” he said. “I found that I liked working with clients, introducing them to new artists’ work and facilitating the acquisitions and the education of those artists to the clients.”
Massey Klein Gallery displays artwork from figurative and abstract artists, sculptors and multi-media artists, but focuses primarily on paintings.
“When we first started, we were really into process-based abstraction,” Klein said. “I think that’s the best way to describe what we were seeking out.”
He said this meant the artists’ processes informed the abstract result of their pieces; these artists don’t necessarily attempt to replicate a specific scene or image, and they loosely adhere to typical rules of art-making. Klein said he and his wife were interested in the lineage of abstraction and modernism and how those ideas developed over time.
“I think we were both interested in that, and more specifically, contemporary artists who follow that lineage and push it along,” he said. “We try to have a well-balanced program and not show just one type of thing.”
The gallery aims to show works that demonstrate an “awareness and a sophistication of the language of paint and art making on a visual scale,” Klein said. “The connection with art history is really important for us.”
The lecture will conclude with a Q-and-A segment in which Chautauquans will have an opportunity to ask Klein all of their art and gallery-related queries.
“I’ve learned a lot over the years being an art dealer and working with artists, so I always encourage people to ask questions,” he said.
