Chance Connections

The Architecture of Building a Community

Interview by Kadence Englehardt

John Gascon is an architect and artist by trade, he is the director of the Ouch My Eye Gallery and owner of Occhio Cafe, but really he’s so much more than that. Newly elected to the SODO Business Association Board, he is concerned with the community of SODO and its relationship with art. Genuinely interested in connecting with people and promoting their emerging talents, this self-described ‘introvert’ is really anything but ordinary.

Kadence Englehardt: Let’s talk about your history.

John Gascon: Specifically, I have a degree in Architecture from the University of Oregon and have been practicing architecture since 2002 when I moved to Seattle to work for a consultant firm. The work wasn’t very creative so I found myself making furniture in a small carport behind my apartment building, and painting in my living room. When I moved, I lost my makeshift ‘workshop’ and I needed to find some studio space. I came upon the 1020 Building through an ad in the paper.

KE: What were you looking for in a studio space?

JG: I was only looking for a couple-hundred square feet for a modest workspace, but ended it up in a 600sf studio…I fell in love with the building, an old warehouse in a unique location next to the stadiums. I was really trying to push myself creatively, as the architecture work I was doing wasn’t particularly inspiring. Once I had the studio, I immediately got involved in the community. I worked with other artists to open up the building for artwalks and get exposure for our creative work, because I didn’t really know how to get into the ‘art scene’.

KE: Yes – that’s definitely difficult! Especially for those who are on the ‘outside’ of the art world…

JG: It is. It’s a bit of a closed community. So, we decided to build our own community. During that time I grew frustrated with my corporate work and quit for a year to be a starving artist and work on the community at the 1020 Building. From that work, I got involved with the Center on Contemporary Art doing some installation work and helping out. Eventually I was encouraged to join the Board by a friend and got back into architecture at a large Seattle firm. My involvement with CoCA [Center of Contemporary Art] grew and I was elected President, so I had to step away from what I was doing at the 1020 Building. We had a lot of great programming at CoCA and I got a lot of younger people with energy involved, like the Young Architects Forum. We made some improvements to the gallery and worked hard to get attendance up. We had two or three shows that had over 2,000 patrons.

KE: Wow. That’s really amazing.

JG: Yea, it was a huge amount of people; really, really good. We had some great programming, and a lot of artists to work with during that period. But, it was such an uphill battle for a non-profit organization that was losing funding and a Working Board made up of older personalities that weren’t particularly willing to give of themselves and take risks.

KE: The people on the Board weren’t ready for change?

JG: That and they didn’t’ really have a lot of money or energy to do the work. Working full-time and managing CoCa eventually burned me out. I still had my studio in the 1020 Building, so I quit the whole art world involvement for a few months. In the past, I had worked with a couple of guys who started Ouch My Eye down the street at the Bemis Building. We had hung art shows together over the years and the space where Ouch My Eye is now became available so I asked them if they wanted to make something out of it with me.

We ended up building a hybrid design studio/photo studio where we would host art shows every once in a while. I started my own design practice around the same time and we continued producing art shows, but on our own terms. The goal has been to support artists that weren’t represented and maybe didn’t know how to exhibit their work, or just artists we liked who weren’t getting a lot of press. It’s grown organically from there….Trying to see how we can cover the costs and make it sustainable.

KE: Do you get grants or some other sort of outside funding? Have you ever done any kind of fundraising?

JG: No, we haven’t done any fundraising and we haven’t taken any money; it’s all self-funded. It’s pretty crazy and it’s not sustainable long-term. We recognize that we have to get creative to maintain the gallery, which is why we opened Occhio Café, an attempt to engage our neighbors and the pedestrians walking by. We also rent the gallery out for private events, which helps cover our costs like maintenance, marketing materials, and the website. We’ve worked really hard to keep our costs low, and we subsidize the rent through our own personal endeavors. Michael and Bob, my partners, do photography and graphic design, and I do architecture and design, all of which helps cover the rent.

KE: So, this all sort of started as a personal endeavor, which grew into something much bigger?

JG: I think it’s eventually going to be bigger than all of us. There’s a pretty big following now, even bigger than I realized. What’s challenging is that it takes a lot of time and effort, and occasionally we don’t get to devote the time we need to marketing and other things because we are all busy with other projects. When “Ouch” was just a pet project or something we were doing for fun when we started, it wasn’t that big of a deal. But because we have more exposure, expectations have gotten to be much higher.

KE: Unfortunately, sometimes you can do all these great things but no one notices until you forget one thing or another. It’s difficult and interesting how other times you can do so much but it goes unnoticed?

JG: Well, especially the press doesn’t realize that this is a self-funded endeavor.

KE: It’s definitely not a corporate thing either.

JG: Most people have no clue that we aren’t a gallery that sells art to cover our costs. We aren’t a non-profit organization that gets funding from outside sources; it’s completely out of our own pockets. Its something we do for the love of doing it. When we don’t get a call-for-artists or press releases out in time, it’s not because we’re irresponsible. It’s because we are just doing it in our ‘spare’ time.

KE: You said before that you ended up ‘just finding a space here.’ It was all completely by chance and you just ended up liking it?

JG: Yes, it was purely accidental. It was based on looking for cheap studio space but then recognizing the tremendous potential in the neighborhood. Seeing all the artists down here.

KE: It definitely has an art feel, I think.

JG: In this building (1020 Building) alone there are 35 artist studios. Over the years it’s really improved. When I first moved into the building, there was a porn studio, a couple of prostitutes, a guy growing weed on the ground floor, and 3 or 4 drug addicts living in the building. It’s definitely changed for the better and now we have a lot of well-known artists working here. We’ve built a community that people want to be associated with and we are getting people in here that had no idea it even existed. It’s on the radar now and artists that are doing good work want to be a part of it. We don’t have any of the ‘riff-raff’ in the building anymore.

With the Cafe open, we now have a ‘third place’ for people in the building and neighborhood to meet one another. We’ve resurrected the Open House concept and we are working with the Bemis Building to coordinate with their Spring Show. Over the last 7 years I’ve really grown fond of the potential of the neighborhood and wanting to see it recognized as a cultural center. It will take some time, but the artists are here, its just about exposing them to the public.

KE: I think the general public believes that this area – Pioneer Square, SODO and the areas in between, to be rather seedy. The City of Seattle, though, stands behind evidence that it really has the same crime rate as such “safe” areas as Wallingford. Do you think that kind of advocacy would be good for the area, if the public were to know that?

JG: That’s interesting, because this area is both technically a part of Pioneer Square and SODO. One thing that I’m interested in, is defining the transition between downtown and SODO, which may mean defining this area as its own independent district – it’s really a stadium district. But I’m also interested in branding SODO as a place with its own recognizable identity.

KE: This “declaration of place and identity” is where you see SODO going?

JG: Right now, it’s sort of this large ambiguous area that isn’t recognized as an artists’ community, even though there are probably more artists here than any other neighborhood [in Seattle], because of the cheap rent and so many large spaces to work in. When I say artists, it’s not just painters and sculptors, its metal workers, and craftspeople, and woodworkers. I think it will definitely be interesting to see where it grows as people recognize that…Getting all these different organizations together and working together as a collaborative effort, bringing more notoriety down here; I think it will expose people to the artists that are here.

KE: It’s that collaboration of community, as well as the artists that you’re trying to attract here. Because it’s an ongoing circle of logic: if the artists aren’t here, the people won’t come; and if the people don’t come here, the artists don’t show?

JG: That’s part of it. Another aspect is the businesses that are down here. A lot of businesses could benefit from the notoriety that the artists’ community brings to their neighborhood. Their concerns are just as important to be heard, especially on a political level. It will help identify the neighborhood, and bring it together in its unique qualities. There isn’t a residential neighborhood down here, so there isn’t a [recognizable] relationship between the artists’ community and the public. There isn’t a lot of push back – there’s no political pushback from neighborhood associations – which means the potential for a lot more freedom. So, I’d like to see that potential developed in the future. I think the real connection to be made is between investment and political ventures and the creative community here. If we can do that within the next few years, trying to engage the artist and business community here, I think we can all really benefit.

KE: How do you feel about the fact that you came to this community accidentally, and in an effort to get involved you’ve sort of morphed into a community leader of sorts?

JG: It’s a little strange, yes. I haven’t painted in so long!

KE: So it’s become your own sort of art?

JG: <laughs> I think there’s a lot of work to be done – I’m interested in that, and I’ve started to really enjoy making connections for other artists and providing a venue for other artists so their work can grow. Having worked with artists 5 or 6 years ago, who now are doing much better work and are getting that recognition, is really fun. It’s definitely interesting that just by accidentally stumbling upon a studio space, I’ve become a community leader…certainly fascinating. I guess if you were to look at what I was always doing, and what I was always interested in, it’s not much of a surprise. Yea, I’ve sort of fallen into this role of trying to just be part of the artist community by creating our own…Now what?

John Gascon is the gallery director of Ouch My Eye, owner of Occhio Cafe, and a practicing architect at JAG Design. The current show at Ouch My Eye is Coupling VIII: Matches Made. It is presented in conjunction with students of the University of Washington and will be open through May 6th. Visit the Cafe at 1022 First Ave S.

CREDITED

Michael Clinard is a Seattle based photographer originally from the Southeastern US. Born to an Ecuadorian mother and her Southern Gent in 1979, he cut his teeth on Nintendo, Little League Baseball, and bottle rockets. After developing a taste for Ford Mustangs and his grandmother’s LP’s, he made a couple pit stops–acquiring Bachelors and Masters degrees in Photography and Art History–before settling in the Pacific Northwest in late 2005. When not working in his sketchbooks or cooking dinner for the lady, one can find Mike kicking around town pursuing quirky and conceptual photo assignments.