Artist-curator showcases emerging artists at Piano Craft Gallery ‘Art 100’
Only in Boston for one year so far, Pares Mallis has already made an impact in the local arts community. The artist, arts administrator, and a curator with 30 years of experience in the art world, is the curator and the force behind the ART 100 BOSTON exhibition that opened Dec. 5 at the Piano Craft Gallery on Tremont Street in the South End.
Over the past year, Mallis said, she put a call out to artists to submit pictures and bios, attended all the Open Studios throughout the city, and even went to the homes of local artists, in search of art for the exhibition. Mallis handpicked the exhibit participants.
“What I’m trying to keep here are people with soul, people that have a heart,” Mallis said in a recent interview with the Banner.
An artist by trade, the native New Yorker studied at Boston University’s School of Fine Arts, received her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting from Arcadia University in Pennsylvania and graduated with a Master of Arts in Arts Administration from NYU. She also worked for the Whitney Museum and he New York Botanical Garden in New York, and even worked in public relations.
In 1990, at age 30, Mallis moved to Greece to follow her husband who was a civil engineer. After twelve years of marriage, Mallis and her husband divorced and she hoped to return to the States with her two young daughters, but it was not to be. Due to The Hague Convention International Custody law which prohibits children from being taken from their home country without the other parent’s consent, she had to stay put in Greece. While there, Mallis made good use of her skills as an artist.
Mallis actively exhibited her artwork from 1994 to 2013, organized exhibitions, and volunteered with the Mother Teresa home for refugees and homeless mothers and children.
“Exhibiting was much more accessible. You could do something very impromptu. Marketing, advertising was much more inexpensive and printing was extremely cheap. I had an extensive exhibition history because it was just done. It was off the cuff. There was an artistic renaissance going on in the ’90s, where there were all these little underground places. It just made me more confident in being an exhibiting artist.”
When Mallis finally returned to the United States, it was 23 years later and she made Boston her new home.
Mallis hadn’t planned on curating an exhibit; it came about accidentally through her encounters with artists at Feet of Clay, a ceramics club located in Brookline Village, where recent art school graduates can go and work.
After she had several conversations with the students at Feet of Clay, Mallis discovered that most of them had never exhibited their artwork. It was either too expensive, or they couldn’t get their feet in the door at the galleries on Newbury Street, or they just didn’t know how to do it.
“They were sitting with Master of Fine Arts degrees and they had no exhibition experience,” she said.
In her interactions at Feet of Clay, Mallis encountered this over and over.
“I just kept on seeing all this really good art from young people.” She decided the exhibition was necessary, and used the European concept of an art market as a model. Thus, ART 100 BOSTON was born.
“I felt I had to do it. I felt that it’s my way of giving back,” said Mallis of the exhibition.
ART 100 BOSTON features 49 local and emerging artists (one dropped out just before the exhibit), with over 300 pieces of their original artwork to be sold for $100 each. Artists featured in the exhibition include Roxbury native Ekua Holmes, Sara Reilly, ceramic sculptor Goce Davidov who is originally from the Republic of Macedonia and is now based in Boston, Marilyn Casey, and Kaitlin Thurlow. Each artist created six to ten original pieces for the exhibition.
Mallis is already planning on ART 100 BOSTON becoming an annual showcase. Her hope is that people will realize that art is not as intimidating as they think, she says.
“The idea is to create a platform for emerging artists to share their art where it’s accessible for purchase.”
The ART 100 BOSTON exhibition runs through Dec. 21. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Sunday from noon to 6:00 p.m. Admission is free. For more information about the Art 100 Boston exhibition and the Piano Craft Gallery, visit facebook.com/ART100BOSTON or www.pianocraftgallery.org, or call 617.595.5638.
