Oral History Program Venessa Castagnoli Interviewed by HallieKate Briggs and Kathryn MacKay 16 December 2021 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Venessa Castagnoli Interviewed by HallieKate Briggs and Kathryn MacKay 16 December 2021 Copyright © 2026 by Weber State University, Stewart Library Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description The Weber State College/University Student Projects have been created by students working with several different professors on the Weber State campus. The topics are varied and based on the student's interest or task for a specific assignment. These oral history assignments were created to help Weber State students learn the value and importance of recording public history and to benefit the expansion of the Weber State oral history collections. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Castagnoli, Venessa, an oral history by HallieKate Briggs and Kathryn MacKay, 16 December 2021, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Venessa Castagnoli conducted in the Historic Monarch building on December 16, 2021 by HallieKate Briggs and Kathryn MacKay. Venessa discusses how she came to Utah, her art education at Weber State, and her experiences working as the executive director at Ogden Contemporary Arts during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. Note: Active listening, transitions in dialogue (such as “um,” “so,” “you know,” etc.), and false starts in conversations are not included in transcription for ease of reading. All additions to transcript noted with brackets. HKB: It is 1:06 p.m. on Thursday, December 16, 2021. We are in the personal office of Venessa Castagnoli in the Historic Monarch building here in downtown Ogden, Utah. My name is HallieKate Briggs, and I will be conducting this interview on the history and impact of contemporary art in Ogden as part of my bachelor's of integrated studies capstone project. This project will be housed in the Stewart Library Special Collections at Weber State University. My interviewee is Venessa Castagnoli, and you are the executive director of the Ogden Contemporary Arts nonprofit organization. Also joining us is Dr. Kathryn MacKay of Weber State University's History Department acting as oversight. Venessa, thank you so much for your time and your patience through these technical difficulties and as we fill things out. I really appreciate you're willing to participate in this project. VC: Happy to do it. HKB: Let's just jump right in the beginning. Would you mind sharing with me when and where you were born? 1 VC: I was born in Hammond, Indiana, and that was December, 12/29/1983. HKB: Wonderful. What was it like growing up there? VC: Oh, it was interesting to say the least. I don't know how much you know about that area, but it's... HKB: I've driven through there, and that's the— VC: It's really close to Chicago, right? So, it's like you're right on the border, and it's not necessarily the nicest area. A lot of people consider it the armpit of the world, or of the country. It was all right. I moved around a lot as a kid. Lived in Calumet City, Illinois; Joliet, Illinois, basically surrounding Chicago, you know, outskirts of Chicago. Not the nicest neighborhood, and I probably wasn't the best kid, but I was really good at getting away with stuff. Yeah, no, not much going on there besides getting into trouble [laughs]. HKB: Can I ask what brought you out here to Utah? VC: Out here to Utah? I was eager to get to the mountains. I had visited Winter Park, Colorado when I was 19 and really fell in love with just the skiing culture and just being immersed in a mountain town. After doing that visit and visiting some friends, I was like, "Okay. We're moving there." My boyfriend and I moved to Winter Park, Colorado at that time, and I lived there for three years. Met my current husband there. We worked at a ski shop together, and in the summer I was a whitewater rafting guide. Decided to come to Utah because of... It's really nerve-racking to have something recording you. Like, if this was just a normal conversation, I'd be fine. HKB: We'll throw a jacket over it. 2 VC: No, you're totally good. So, we moved to Utah for the jobs, the mountain. Weber State was here. Again, we visited, checked out the mountain, checked out the city, and we're like, "Okay, I think this is a nice in-between a city and a mountain town where we can make something work here." My husband and I were working at Rossignol in the service center here in the Business Depot over there. My husband still works for Rossignol; he's a marketing director for them right now. Then I gained my residency and went to Weber State. HKB: Perfect. Well, you mention Weber State. That's fantastic. Will you tell me more about your educational background? VC: Yeah, so I was started at Purdue, Calumet University, which is just the Purdue sister school in the area where I grew up. That was right out of high school, and I did a semester, and I was just like, "I just have to get out of here. I need a break. I can't stay here. I need to go experience something." That's when we moved to Colorado, and Colorado was all just life experience, right? Live it up while I'm young, ski and snowboard and raft and just, yeah, enjoy myself. Coming here, I knew I wanted to finish school, and I actually started in the visual arts department, but specifically for... I think they called it... It was like graphic design. I'm not sure what they call it now. They called it visual communications maybe, but now it's graphic design. I don't know. But quickly changed it up to focus on sculpture. KM: Did you study with Jim Jacobs? 3 VC: I did, yep. I know Jim Jacobs very well. I actually did a study abroad in Peru with Jim Jacobs. See, Jim lives in my neighborhood, to top it off. Yeah, Jim and Marianne are good friends. KM: He's a good mentor. VC: Yes, he is. Very good. Yeah, Jim was great. There's plenty of great mentors at the Weber State. I still rely—I mean, we have a really good partnership with Weber State right now and the art department just because of our last exhibition, and I still have plenty of contacts there. You know, I keep touch with Lydia Gravis and Angelika Pagel, and Matt Choberka, and that whole crew. K Stevenson. They're all... See them often. HKB: Well, I am familiar with all those individuals. I have the highest opinion of every one of them. VC: Yeah, they're great people. Weber State, I was really surprised with the art department. At first I was just like, "Oh, you know, it's just a small university in Ogden. Like, it's gonna be okay. I'm gonna go get an education; it's gonna be great." But man, their faculty is above and beyond. I think it really helps that a lot of them are artists and working artists themselves, and to get that real-life experience, it's been great. It was a great department. I enjoyed my time at Weber State. If I could, I'd be a student forever. But I can't afford that [laughs]. HKB: Frankly, I'm in the same boat. VC: Yep. HKB: Tell me, what drew you to sculpture and the artistic field? VC: Say that again? 4 HKB: What drew you to sculpture in particular? VC: Sculpture... I don't know, I've always been hands-on. My grandfather always had a wood shop, so I'd always be down there making stuff. I was into drawing. I've been into art since as far as I can remember. I still keep in touch with my high school art teacher, and she's back in Indiana. But sculpture, it just seemed—like, I didn't want to sit in front of a computer screen forever. That was probably my main motivation to switch to like an actual physical material rather than a computer screen. HKB: What material do you prefer to use for your sculpture? VC: You know, I'm into... I'm a contemporary artist. Well, I should say I was and I will be again; I don't really have time for it right now. But I use a lot of outdoor materials to create fairly beautiful tent-like sculptures. I did a project with Ogden City for the Percent for the Arts program on Kiesel Avenue. It's not there anymore 'cause it was a long time ago, but it was always the tent sculptures that were in the sky on Kiesel Ave. KM: Oh, that was wonderful! VC: Oh, thank you! KM: I loved that! VC: Thank you very much. KM: I was sorry when they took that down, 'cause it was wonderful. VC: Yeah, it was like a seasonal thing. It needed to be taken down at a certain date. You know, it's fabric, and the sun kills everything, so it had a time stamp on it. They still have the structures there, like the actual wires that we put in and 5 everything else, so I hope that the city really utilizes that, 'cause that was a big chunk of cash and time just to get that in place. KM: It really sparked up what is a fairly unknown alley. VC: Yeah. Right? KM: People walking by or driving by would turn and look, and I loved walking down in there. VC: You know, it made it a corridor to walking into the Ogden Twilight shows. It was a street that wasn't used, and that went up, and I was really happy to be part of that. I have a great relationship with everyone at the city. You know, Christy McBride and Lorie Buckley. They're wonderful; I really enjoy working with them still. Yeah, I was happy to do it. I've had some shows down at—I had a solo show at UMOCA [Utah Museum of Contemporary Art] and just some random group shows at the same time throughout the state. They're like... The best way I can describe 'em is sculpture tents. They're not too big, but you can take 'em apart, you can put 'em back together, and utilize tent poles. Sometimes I would use stretchy lace, or sometimes I would use outdoor mesh. I also have a piece—well, an entire hotel lobby down in Park City has my work in it as well. The Yarrow Hotel, which I think is this Hilton Inn. It's a bunch of climbing rope. KM: That's great. HKB: How did you first become involved with the OCA? VC: Well, in March of 2020—well, prior to that, I worked for Tentsile, which is a tree tent company. I was doing some design work with them—using my art degree in 6 a different way, more of a functional way, right?—doing some design and marketing stuff with them. I was pregnant, so I went on maternity leave. Thankfully, it was a British company, and they had an extremely long maternity leave that was—I think I had like seven months, which is unheard of here. So, I had a nice stretch of maternity leave, but in the middle of that, they're like, "Well, we're closing down our US doors," 'cause it's a British company. They're like, "We'll continue to pay your maternity leave and your vacation, don't sweat it, but you will have to find another job later." That was a bummer, but I like to think that everything happens for a reason, 'cause while I was on my job hunt, this position came open. It was actually called Ogden First; the organization was called Ogden First at the time. I ended up getting the job. Again, I think my relationships with—it's all about who you know, right? They say that for a reason. I have a good relationship with Weber State, I have good relationship with Ogden City, and I'm used to working in partnerships, and I have an art background, right? I like to think that my skill set was attractive to the board of directors, because I had both that corporate marketing background as well as an artist background. It's kind of a nice combination for an executive director of a nonprofit art organization. So, I got the job in March of 2020. We all know what happened in March of 2020: a pandemic. Everything shut down, and I got this dream job where I'm like, "Oh, I'm so excited!" But what do I do? We couldn't have in-person events. We couldn't really do much of anything. We didn't have this space that you're sitting 7 in. It was a dirt floor. Nothing was in here. The upstairs didn't exist. Nothing. This was an empty shell. We were always looking at this space to build an art center, prior to my start as an executive director here, but there was still a lot to be done to make that happen: fundraising and design and building and everything. I took the opportunity to use that time to do a rebrand. When I first got this job, I was telling everyone, "Oh, I just got this great position! I'm the executive director at Ogden First." Everyone's just like, "What? What is that?" If you think about it, I mean, what is Ogden First? Sounds like a bank, right? That was a big red flag, so first day in the office, I went to the board president, Thaine Fischer, who's also the founder of the organization. I wasn't sure how this was gonna go, 'cause he's the founder of the organization, right? It's gotta be pretty close to him; he chose this name. I went into his office, was like, "Thaine, how do you feel about a rebrand? Ogden Contemporary Arts"—or, I didn't say Ogden Contemporary Arts, 'cause we didn't pick that name yet. I was just like, "Ogden First doesn't make sense. No one knows what that is." Thaine is so supportive and such a good guy. He's like, "You're right. I'm not creative. It was me and a lawyer in a room, and we just decided this should be the name." I was like, "Okay. Well, then let's start this rebrand process." From there— I'm kind of going off on a tangent. Is that okay? HKB: Oh, please. 8 VC: From there, we pulled together the board of directors. We did a vision session with a local creative here that offers that service. KM: Is that McIntire? VC: It is. KM: Yeah, he's great. VC: Yeah, he's really great. I knew him from my prior art, so we've been in contact before. Connections, it's all about who you know. We got together and asked every single board member, "What does this organization mean to you? How do you see it in a year, five years, ten years? What do you want to achieve?" Looking at our mission statement at that time, it was completely off. It had something to do with architecture, and it just didn't make any sense. Again, a big red flag. We should probably change this. Throughout that vision session, we were able to get the information to actually create a new mission vision and core values and a name. We landed on Ogden Contemporary Arts, 'cause it flows. O-C-A [spelled out], OCA [pronounced oh-ka], Ogden Contemporary Arts. You know exactly what we're gonna do. KM: That's great. He's a talented... VC: Jake is very talented. KM: He's very talented. VC: Yeah, he is. KM: I've been through some of those vision sessions with him before, and he's really good. 9 VC: Yeah. It's just nice to have an outside source come in and do something like that, 'cause it just, you know, everyone's stuck in their own heads. You know, "I have this, and this is what it is." But to have someone on the outside come in and say, "Well, but that doesn't really make sense," yeah, it works. HKB: You really needed that third perspective. KM: How'd you put your board together? VC: At that time, we had five board members. KM: That you didn't pick? VC: No, 'cause they were already here prior to me. We still have three of those board members. When I came on, we really wanted to expand our board. It's really important for a nonprofit organization to have board members that pay a give-get. A give-get is you have to pay so much money to sit on our board. It provides job security for me, 'cause they can pay my salary no matter what happens with the world, like a pandemic, right? That was big. Since we only had five members, I was like, "Well, that's not enough," with our board give-get. Also, it's important to have a diverse board, and it wasn't that. It wasn't a diverse board. It was just not—like, there was nothing wrong with the individuals that sat on the current board, but we needed to add some new faces, some new minds, to really do what we wanted to do. I took it from a five-member board, and now we're at 11, and I'm going for 15. KM: Wow, that's a big board. HKB: It is a big board, but we're a young nonprofit. I feel like once we become more established financially, with hopefully getting an endowment and more stable, 10 you know, general operation grants—'cause general operation grants are so hard to get. They're really hard to get. Like, the state of Utah, they do a great job, but even still, those grants, they're not much. I mean, it's like maybe 10 grand. It can't pay for the staff, right? So, having a large board when you're getting started I think is very important. We do have a process of recruiting board members. The first thing we do is just, like, if one of the board members has a recommendation, or someone is interested in joining the board, we have a nomination committee that consists of the board president, myself, and our resource development chair. So, three people. We also have a third person that isn't on our board, and she sits in when she can, 'cause she's a very experienced board member and nonprofit executive director. She has a long history of nonprofits, so she's very helpful in these situations. I just go through, and we do an interview, and ask everyone the same questions, answer their questions. Then the nomination committee gets together and decides whether we think it's worth bringing it to the entire board, and we state a case and we vote. Well, not me, I'm not allowed vote, but the board votes. But I certainly have a say, because my board supports me. There's never have been a situation to where, like, I wanted to do something and I couldn't. But I'm sure that day will come, and I'll just have to deal with it. But I have a very supportive board. Yeah, so then we pull in a new—that's how we select our board members. Long story short. KM: Can you name the original five board members? 11 VC: Sorry, the original five? Jo Packham, Larry [Beddome]—he's not on our board anymore. Tim Hutter, he's still on our board. Cori Anderson, who is now our board president, and Thaine Fischer, who was the president at the time and is the founder of the organization. KM: Thaine's an intriguing person. He's a mover and shaker in this town. VC: He is a mover and shaker in this town. I feel very fortunate to have him on the board. Yeah, he's a mover and a shaker, for sure. He gets things done. We're very fortunate to have him. He was a big part of getting the Dumke Art Plaza next door up and going. We were able to raise a million dollars for that project because of him. HKB: I will be happy to tell him, in my interview with him, that he was referred to as a mover and a shaker. VC: Oh good, you are gonna do an interview with him! Wonderful, I'm so glad. HKB: Currently, I've got interviews lined up for Thaine, Jake McIntire, and Lorie Buckley. VC: Oh, wonderful. That's really great. Good. Those are some good people to talk to. HKB: In your own words, what is the function of the OCA? VC: Ogden Contemporary Arts brings in internationally recognized artists and we hire our local creatives to work alongside these international artists. We also, in bigger shows, where we're doing group shows, we'll curate in local artists. At times, we're gonna have internationally recognized artists from Utah showing, right? 12 The idea is that we're providing quality art to our community. Not just art, but contemporary art, which is lacking. We have the Shaw Gallery, but other than that, we really don't have any large contemporary art spaces. It's a lot of craft, it's a lot of Western art, it's a lot of landscapes, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with any of those things. They all have their place, and they're all necessary, and I enjoy 'em as well. But we are looking specifically at contemporary art. One way we're helping out our community is we're hiring our local creatives to work alongside these artists. We're contracting out videographers, photographers, copywriters, designers, curators. Like, we're employing our local creatives—and when I say local, I mean Utah in general—to come here and give them opportunity and pay them. We pay everyone. I have an artist background, right? I don't know how many times I've been asked to do something for free or for the exposure, and it's just like, exposure doesn't pay my bills. It doesn't. You wouldn't go ask a lawyer to do your legal issues specifically because of exposure, right? Like, no, I'm not gonna do that. So, it's really important for me and the organization that we're paying everybody involved. KM: You're paying them with money that the board is helping to raise and grants? VC: The board and grants and private donors. KM: Yeah, talk a little bit about the finances. VC: Oh man, the finances. It's an ongoing struggle. Again, we're very young. We just opened our doors in November of 2020 and then had to shut 'em down and then 13 open again in January. So, we've really only been open a year, and can't even really say that yet, right? So, you know, the finances are tough. It's a lot of grant writing. We contract out a grant writer, Kate Bideaux. She's amazing. I work with her, as well as Eden Buxton, who's my new fundraising and marketing coordinator. She works alongside her as well. So, just constantly looking for the next grant to write for. I mean, we write I don't even know how many grants a year. A lot. There's definitely at least one a month, but more like two to three, and sending out letters to foundations asking 'em if we can apply, and it just goes on and on. It's a lot of work. That's probably our main funding source. I would say that probably 60% of our funds come from grants and foundations, and then another 20% comes from board member give-get, and then the rest is through events and fundraising, private donors, that sort of thing. KM: Finances are always tricky with a nonprofit. It's very, very difficult. VC: I'm learning. I've never been an executive director before; this is my first go at it, and it's definitely a learning process. It's a never-ending battle. What we would like to see is a good chunk of cash in an endowment so we have that financial security to take risks and to invest in our infrastructure and hire more staff. I mean, it's just been me up until end of October, and then I hired my first employee. So, I've only had an employee for two months, not even. It's been interesting. HKB: My gosh. VC: Yeah. 14 HKB: Well, you say you've never been an executive director before, but everything I've heard about you has only said wonderful things. VC: You're sweet, you're sweet. Yeah, I don't know. Everyone says you're your own worst critic, but you can always learn. I think it's really important when you don't know something, you just have to be upfront about it. I'm not afraid to ask for help. I do it all the time. KM: Did you go to the Utah Museum Association meetings in St. George? VC: Who has time for that? [Laughs] KM: But you're a member of that organization? VC: We're not, not yet. KM: Oh, not yet? VC: No, we're not. Not yet. We probably need to get on that. There's a lot of things we need to get on, still. HKB: There's a lot to do. VC: There is a lot to do, yeah. We're part of the Utah Nonprofit Association and Nonprofit Alliance. I think those are the two organizations that we're part of right now. Everything comes with a price tag, though. We'll get there. HKB: So, you've mentioned partnerships with like Weber State University. Can you expand on some of your other partnerships that you enjoy engaging with? VC: You know, Weber State's probably our biggest partnership thus far, as well as with Ogden City. I'll go back to the Dumke Art Plaza. That was a big partnership program with the City, and Weber State, and the Dumke Foundation, who were the funders for that—well, they funded a big portion of that project. Then Weber 15 State, you know, just our last show, Vida, Muerte, Justicia was, I mean, so much bigger than I ever could have imagined, because Weber State was able to come on and help us out with that. That was big. HKB: It was amazing. VC: As far as other partnerships, I mean, we have small—like, we try to pull on sponsors for events, like Cache Valley Bank was a supporter for one of our events. We'd like to get Zion's Bank and America First and all of these big bank organizations involved with us, but we're working on that. Partnerships are building, but we're, you know, only one thing at a time. KM: You're only one person. VC: Oh, yeah. Only one person, and we haven't—like, if you think about it, when were we able to start having in-person events again? Like big, in-person events? That's been another struggle. In a pandemic, how do you...? When I first got on, how do I program without having in-person events? We did some virtual series. Now we live in this new world where people still can't come out because they're immunocompromised, and they just can't, right? So, what can we do to still make our programming accessible? We do things like the virtual tours for each show, which I need to schedule for this one. That just reminded me. But the Matterport has really cool technology where they come in and they scan the entire space and you can just walk through the space on your computer screen. It's so cool, and you can get so close to the pieces of work, and you can link videos to it. Doing things like that I think is really important to accessibility and working in a pandemic world. 16 HKB: Can you tell me more about like how you've engaged virtually with an audience during the pandemic? VC: Sure. When I first came on, I was trying to figure out some immediate programming so we just kept the organization name alive, right? This was when we were still Ogden First. What I did was a Social Distancing and Art series. It was a three-part series where we would... Two out of the three were live. The first one was an aerial dancer, Holly Jarvis. She did an amazing, beautiful performance. We filmed it live and streamed it live. She was here in The Monarch at the time, 'cause we didn't have the space. Gosh, so many people tuned in, and we got so much traction for it that I turned it into a series. The next one I did was Jorge Rojas, who curated our last show. It was called Dance for Our Departed. He pulled in like, oh gosh, how many people was it? It was like over 40 different dancers and performers from different cultures all over the country. I think—did he have folks from Mexico too? He might've. He hired a composer to create a beat that everyone can dance to together in their own traditional way, and it was so moving, and really brought to everyone's attention what this pandemic is doing and especially doing to people of color. I mean, it was just so touching, and it was a way to celebrate the cultures rather than like, say, "Look at what you're doing to us," but at the same time having that underlying message. I encourage you to go to our website. It's live; you can go watch it there. Go check it out in our past exhibitions. So yeah, just providing virtual content to where people can get on Facebook and see our shows or go to our website and be able to physically walk 17 through the space with your mouse type of thing. Oh, and also we're happy to provide private tours for those that wanted to come after business hours or before business hours. We mask up, and for a while there we were requiring vaccines. We were making sure that the space was safe. We still require masks, as you can see. HKB: What are some of your favorite projects that you've worked on, or are upcoming? VC: Oh man, it's tough, 'cause I really enjoyed all of 'em. I mean, our grand opening, Lauren Lee McCarthy, it was just such a cool experience to work with her. She's an artist out of LA, and what it was, it was called The Changing Room, and it addressed how we as a society interact with AI. She seriously programmed the entire gallery to like allow you to select an emotion, and then the entire gallery would make you feel that emotion. If someone selected an emotion upstairs, everything would change downstairs. So, if you felt angry or happy or like, I mean, it was over 200 different emotions. It was insane. So cool to see that come together from like an empty space and like... I don't know, every show has just completely transformed the space. That was a really great show. Another one of my favorites was, 'cause how can it not be, is Wayne Coyne from The Flaming Lips coming and doing The King's Mouth. I mean, part of the goal of that show was to really get a new audience, right? Everyone's gonna come up from Salt Lake or come here first before going to the Ogden Twilight to see that show, and it was just so cool. It was this really immersive project where you would climb into the king's mouth. It was literally a king's head made of balloons, and you would walk in and put on these glasses, and it was 18 just this crazy light show in the king's mouth, which was really cool. It was really fun working with Wayne. He was super down-to-earth and just a kind person, and that experience was just really great. I still keep in touch with all of the artists that we work with. I really do. It's just so cool to build these relationships. I think it comes down to the type of artist we select. We try to select artists that don't have egos. We don't have any room for egos. We're all people, we're all trying to accomplish what we want to accomplish, but we can also understand you're another person, right, so I'm gonna talk to you like another person. Oh gosh, and then this last show, Vida, Muerte, Justicia, I mean, it was just such a well-done show, and impactful and meaningful and very timely. Man, I love them all. I can't choose one. I can't. No, they're all great. So, favorite one? No, I don't have a favorite. KM: How do you find the artists? VC: So, a couple of 'em I found and curated the show myself, like Lauren Lee McCarthy and Wayne Coyne. Social Undistance, which is not Social Distancing and Art but a different one, which was a performance art that was one that—I knew some local creatives who brought in a proposal, and it was amazing. So, they came to me. I reached out to Lauren Lee McCarthy just randomly, and because of COVID—like, she was supposed to show in Athens, but she had an opening because it was in the middle of COVID. She was like, "Oh, I'd love to." So, it just worked. We got really lucky getting her for our grand opening. 19 Wayne Coyne, that was through a relationship with Jared Allen. He'd probably be another really good person to talk to, Jared Allen. Jared Allen runs the Ogden Twilight, and I've known him for a long time. So, you know, connect. Who you know. He has a relationship with The Flaming Lips and Wayne Coyne because of the Ogden Twilight, so I was just like, "Can you give me the contact? I want to see if we can do a partnership while he's here playing for the Ogden Twilight and we can show his art." Then these last two shows, so the current show and the show before, I've pulled in guest curators. I can't curate everything. I can't. There's too much that goes into it, and as we continue to grow, I think we're gonna be seeing more and more guest curators in the space, and possibly, hopefully someday soon, just hiring a curator for the space. HKB: Your guest curator for this previous show is Lydia? VC: No, the previous show was Jorge Rojas and María del Mar González-González, and then for this current show is Kelly Carper. HKB: Okay. Do you connect with cities outside of Ogden in a more regional place, or is your focus more on Ogden and an international community? VC: Salt Lake community we definitely reach out to; as far as working with the city, no, not yet. We do see that being something we do in the future. Yes, I would love to go national and be able to partner up with a gallery in New York City, and we're both showing the same artist and it's like a satellite location, right? I think that that could be really great, and it's a way to make us more well known in New 20 York. It's funny, when you look at our analytics, like for our website visits and everything, it's Utah, and then it's New York, and then it's LA. HKB: Oh, wow! VC: It's really cool to see that, right? I mean, there's so much that goes into that. It doesn't just happen. It's about making sure we're utilizing, targeting our Google Ads and social media, and there's ways to make that happen. But it's also like, actually, they're engaging with us. Which, you know, it's not just a random look if they're actually engaging with us virtually. So, that's pretty cool. That comes from my marketing background. HKB: Do you hire a lot of online marketing? VC: The only person I hire right now to help with our online marketing is... His name's Brandon Wright, and he is a freelance person that does Google Ad optimization. I didn't say that correctly. He optimizes our Google Ads so we're getting the right hits, and he's making sure that we're doing it right. I don't know if you've ever gone into Google Ads and tried to create an ad, but it's crazy confusing. So, I'm happy to hire someone to do that. Then we also hire—going along with hiring local creatives—PR agents, agencies, or just freelance PR folks. Like, I started a relationship with Kelly Carper because she did a lot of PR. I knew she also curated shows, but it just built this relationship at the same time, so she came in as a curator this time around. HKB: Have you ever been involved in any state-wide exhibitions or programs, or have you ever considered it? 21 VC: Ogden Contemporary Arts? I don't know if I'm allowed to talk about that yet, but it's coming. It's coming! I'm not gonna say anything because it hasn't been announced on the other party's side. HKB: Okay, wonderful. How can individuals support your program as you continue to grow? VC: Donate, become a member, show up at our openings and events and see the shows. You know, we are a nonprofit organization for our community, and it's really important to us that anyone can just walk in through our doors and feel comfortable. Contemporary art galleries can be really intimidating; we do not want to be that. I don't care what you know about art, come in, enjoy it. Maybe you'll gain an appreciation, maybe you're like, "That doesn't make sense," and you know what, that's okay. But if you have questions, we're here to help. We're free, is what I'm trying to say. We're free to the public. We do have a recommended donation if people wanna donate. It's what makes the light stay on, right? So, we do encourage people to donate to our organization, but if you can't do it, it's not a problem. Come in and enjoy. HKB: So, correct me if I'm wrong, there are a series of artist lofts? Is that under your direction? VC: Yes, upstairs there's two, what we call our studios, we got two of 'em. Right now, we're using 'em for programming for the actual shows. We will have hopefully our first artist-in-residence coming in town in April, and he will likely take over one of those spaces. HKB: Are you allowed to share who that is? 22 VC: It's not official yet, so I prefer not to. I'll just say it's a street artist. We're looking at more of a street-artist-in-residency to kind of [put] just a different spin on the artist-in-residency program. HKB: What is your goal for these artists-in-residency? VC: For this artist, what I would like to see, and this is what we're talking about, is at least one mural within our community, like within the Ogden community, outside street art, and then also a gallery show to top it off. Mainly, they're coming here to create and have the funds to create. We're gonna cover housing, we cover travel, give 'em a stipend. Like, they're not coming here for free. We're paying. To work alongside of our community, as always, we'll hire videographers and photographers and writers to document the process. KM: So, it really is a residency. VC: Oh, yeah. HKB: Can I ask: you clearly have a massive impact on Ogden's community and artistic programs. Do you have any way of assessing how you measure that impact? VC: Yeah, it's a tough one. I think it's something that we'll really see—I don't have any hard steps to say that we're helping our local creatives in this way, or this way or, this way. Not yet. I do think that it's gonna be known—I hope that we recognize it five years from now. We're in a creative district, and I'm sure Thaine is gonna pull this out of his hat when he's talking to you too, but it's been like proven that art districts don't fail, right? Like, throughout the states, a city puts in an art district, and the only way you can really classify it as failing is that it prices out local creatives, those 23 that started it. Because they become so successful that real estate jumps, cost of living jumps, and then the artists down the street that helped do this amazing thing to make this happen can't afford to live there anymore. So, I think that one thing the Ogden Contemporary Arts is trying to do, and hopefully we'll be able to measure it in the future, is that we're gonna continue to hire our local creatives and pay them a competitive wage, and also expand the network. They're working with people like Wayne Coyne from The Flaming Lips, or Lauren Lee McCarthy, internationally known artist from LA. When these artists are like, "Hey, I'm coming here and I need a videographer. I was at Ogden Contemporary Arts, and their videographer really did a great job," or, "Their photographer did amazing," or, "That art writer was so good," or, "That tech guy—" Like, we even contract out our tech guys to come in and help with all the tech for each individual installation. I think that's the small part that Ogden Contemporary Arts can make an impact in our local economy, and I think that's gonna be something we can measure in the future. HKB: It's amazing that you're thinking about this so proactively this early on. It's something that needs to be considered right off the bat. VC: I think so. HKB: I've got one more question for you. Is there anything else you'd like to share beforehand? Or Doctor MacKay, if you have any further questions? KM: I'm just gonna ask you a philosophical question, if I might. One of the things that is often said about Utah arts is that it's the community arts that thrive because of the LDS Church. Symphonies, dance, theater, because that was what they spent 24 their time and energy on, creating community. It's individual art expressions that are not supported, or haven't been supported by that culture, so that includes lots of visual arts. Do you have a sense that that is changing? VC: I do. I think that we have an increased population that is not LDS, and not even that. I know plenty of LDS artists as well that are doing some very compelling contemporary art. I mean, it's called contemporary art for a reason, right? It's contemporary; it's art being created now. If you look at the super broad definition of contemporary art, it's art being created right now, in the present, from this date to this date. Now, you get deeper into contemporary art, it's obviously art with a concept, like there's a reason for everything. I think with the younger generation, you know, it's gonna change. I think it has to change, and it is changing. I mean, even performance art, like dance, right? You look at all the contemporary dance collectives that are going on right now and performances. We've had Ogden MoveMeant Collective, who's a contemporary dance collective here for a show. I think it's gonna continue to transform, and I also think that we're gonna see that more traditional form of art transform to reach a new audience. I do. It's changing. KM: They have to. VC: They do, they have to, otherwise it's just gonna be old news. I mean, again, all art has its place, and I understand, appreciate—like, we need to appreciate that art, and you should, and you should go experience it. But as a contemporary artist, you should go experience, appreciate that art, and then transform it into something that is impactful for you. 25 HKB: I believe that one of the most necessary things that art does is constantly push the boundaries that are imposed upon it. With each new generation, we push more and more and we explore more and into new directions and creativities, and we live on a continuously evolving foundation. Contemporary art has its own unique space in the artistic world in that it is constantly evolving the way that classical or renaissance or any past art is limited. You can study only so much about it, but our interest as humanity is to continuously learn upon ourselves. You mentioned the vision meeting that happened as you transferred from Ogden First to Ogden Contemporary Arts [as] we begin to know it. How many of those goals from that vision meeting have come to pass? What do you see for the future of Ogden Contemporary Arts? VC: I mean our mission, our vision, our core values all came from that meeting, and it's my job to make sure that we're living by all of those things, right? Like, it's my job to make that the program we put in place meets that mission, and that policies are going along with our core values. You know, we're getting there. I don't think we're 100% there. I think we can continue to evolve, and it's gonna take time, and we're never gonna be right there. Otherwise, then we need to come up with something else. HKB: Yeah, [otherwise] what's the purpose of a mission statement? VC: Exactly. So yeah, we are living by it, and we're doing our best. Have we completely met all of our goals and vision? Well, not yet. Give me another 10 years and let's see where we're at. KM: Good. We'll come back and ask you. 26 HKB: We'll come back. VC: Give me another 10 years and let us get some funding. I mean, funding's everything. Again, that's how people can support us is, you know, just any. Like, buy an Ogden Contemporary Arts t-shirt. Come in and buy a coffee mug; we have some really cute ones. You know, that's how you do it. That's how you keep us going and help us achieve our goal, 'cause without that funding we can't do any of it. HKB: What are some massive milestones that you hope to see in the coming years? VC: I hope that in five years we have a nice hefty endowment that gives my entire staff job security. That's pretty important. HKB: That is critically important. VC: Because then we can really—like, to have that, then it becomes so much easier to write grants for programming to make sure we're getting the type of artists we want in here and to continue to pay our local creatives. So yeah, that's a big one. I would also like to raise enough money to put in a wheelchair lift elevator to our second floor, but that's really expensive, and we're in this weird position because we don't own our building, we pay a grant on our building. It's really hard to get funding for a project like that because we don't own our building. HKB: That's something that permanently changes the building. VC: Yeah, it has to come from a foundation rather than a state or a county. So, that's another big milestone, to make our entire space more accessible, completely accessible. KM: Thank you very much. 27 HKB: Thank you so much for meeting with us today. VC: Yeah, of course, I'm happy to do it. HKB: I really appreciate your time. VC: Happy to do it. I enjoyed it. 28