Gallery closings leave a dimmed Mpls. arts scene

As the year approaches its end, several Minneapolis galleries have announced that they are closing their doors, either temporarily or for good.

The closures underscore the fragility of the local art gallery scene:

Burnet Gallery shutting down for good at the end of the year

Burnet Gallery is located in Le Meridien Chambers — an art hotel that has lots of contemporary art throughout the building and in the hotel rooms. The original owner of the hotel, Ralph Burnet, was a huge art collector who often hosted dinners in the gallery space. But the current owners don't have that same passion.

The gallery has provided a high-profile space for contemporary art, right on Hennepin Avenue in downtown Minneapolis. And a large number of the artists whose work gallery director Jennifer Phelps has shown have come from Minnesota.

Soap Factory 'going on hiatus' at year's end

Costly renovations to the gallery's 130-year-old building created a serious budget problem. On top of that, the departure of executive director Ben Heywood in June caused an interruption in funding from one of the Soap Factory's major grants, because the terms of the award stipulated that it can't be used by an organization run by an interim director.

The Soap Factory's strength in many ways has been the flexibility of its space, which allowed artists to create mind-boggling installations and sculptures. It's been home to a great deal of risk-taking over the years, and that's an important element in any art scene.

However, before the hiatus begins, Soap Factory has promises to put on at least one more show in March.

Franklin Art Works won't return from hiatus

The gallery went on hiatus in 2013, and on Tuesday announced that it's not coming back. It has dissolved its assets and made donations to the Minneapolis Institute of Art and the Walker Art Center.

Franklin Art Works did an amazing job both presenting local artists and bringing up-and-coming artists to Minneapolis. Examples include a solo show of work by painter Kehinde Wiley, just a few years into his now highly acclaimed career.

Franklin Art Works had promised that it would eventually reopen in a higher-traffic area than its former location on Franklin Avenue. Months later, the only employee, director Tim Peterson, took a job in Georgia. Now, after two years, the organization is finally folding in an official sense.

These are and were three cutting-edge galleries, and each has been around for a decade or more. These losses are significant.

However, there are also some great new galleries that have popped up over the past five years; Public Functionary and Instinct Art Gallery are two that come to mind. The future of the Soap Factory is still being figured out, and a certain amount of turnover can be healthy. So the real impact may not be known for a while.

But when you combine these closings with the Minneapolis Institute of Art's recent decision to cut back its Minnesota Artist Exhibition Program — that's a lot of wall space no longer available for local artists.