Name: Ann Berchtold
Age: 42
Occupation/Job Title:
Executive Director, Beyond the Border International Contemporary Art Fair / Gallery Director, L Street Fine Gallery and Beyond the Border Gallery.
Description of where you work, and what you do:
I am launching the first Contemporary Art Fair in San Diego . This event is modeled after the highly successful Art Basel Miami Beach, which is currently the largest art fair in the US. My goal is to make this the largest Art Fair on the west coast. In addition I represent many artist from San Diego and Tijuana through a gallery and by participating in International Art Fairs.
Read more!
Education: Describe the education, apprenticeships, or any learning experiences
that was necessary to learn the skills for your job, to acquire the credentials or degrees, and to qualify you to do your job.
I have a Bachelors Degree in Business Administration, Marketing and a Minor in Fine Art. I spent 10 years working as a Catering Director at the La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla and at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in San Francisco.
I then spent another 10 years launching various initiatives to help promote San Diego artists and raise the level of cultural sophistication of San Diego.
Initiatives started with launching a website called : SanDiegoArtist.com -- which promoted the work of local emerging artists. Launching the San Diego Art Prize - which provided nominated emerging and establishing artists a cash grant and exhibition opportunity. Acting as Gallery Director for two galleries and representing several artists from San Diego and Tijuana. In addition, I was deeply interested in creating more "Art" opportunities in elementary schools so I founded a program called "Inspire" which brought local artists into the classrooms to discuss with students what Inspired them to become and artist and what Master Artist did they most identify with.
History: Describe the history that led you to doing “what you love,” as a career:
early interests, experiences, motivation.
Growing up in an artistic household, I discovered early on that my talent was not in the creation of Art but as a facilitator to bring awareness to artists themselves but also to bring awareness to the idea that Art adds incredible value and richness to our lives.
After living in several cities on the West Coast - first San Diego - a magnificent city in its beauty and beach life but a city lacking in the support of its art community and a cultural identity. I then moved to San Francisco when I was 25 and found San Francisco to be a very rich and diverse city with a strong support for all arts. The city has an amazing energy of diversity and creative talent, which makes it a dynamic place to live.
I moved back to San Diego to get married and start a family when I was 30 - but really missed the creative talent and energy of San Francisco. So I made it a goal to try to infuse that same type of cultural sophistication and artistic support into San Diego. A city that was still very young but had not yet found its "soul".
My interest in launching the first Contemporary Art Fair in San Diego came from attending an Art Fair in Miami Beach - Art Basel. What is now the largest art fair in the US and brings in over 500 million dollars over 6 days to the community of South Miami Beach. I was struck with how similar Miami (five years back) and San Diego (today) were - coastal young cities that had not found a strong cultural identity. And now Miami - through - this one event had developed its identity as the home of the biggest art explosion in over 30 years.
I wanted to bring this to San Diego and test this event out on the West Coast.
Obstacles: Describe any obstacles you had to overcome to do what you do now.
My first hurdle was that no one (not even) our local art institutional leaders felt that San Diego could draw national or international galleries to attend this event. My second hurdle was raising the capital (100K) to produce the event, and gaining civic support to help promote this event.
All that was achieved within six month of breathing life into this idea -- but then the economy tanked and we found it incredibly hard to convince galleries to spend resources to come to an event at this time. Without galleries there was no show.
We had to make a very hard decision in 2008 to postpone the event to 2009. It was hard on me to make that decision but even harder to once again have the optimism and invest the time and energy to try again – with no certainties of success – in 09.
But I never stopped talking to people and trying to find resources and like-minded individuals that could help me make this event come to life. Several “chance” meetings opened up several new opportunities – which changed the direction slightly of the event but actually made it better.
We found an amazing new venue and received the support of several investors and several new people joined our staff. All this looked very positive, but when I reintroduced our plans to launch in 09 to our institutional and civic leaders I found that they had thrown in the towel on this idea and were not as willing to support or assist us with making needed connections.
I had to determine at that time if I could pull this off without their support. I persevered and overtime I think through my determination –I found new support and regained the support an enthusiasm for this project.
We overcame our first year hurdle of getting galleries to participate (even in the worst economy in US history since the depression). We now have a sold out show, and are slated to be the “most exciting new Art Fair on the West Coast.”
Mentors: Describe others who affirmed your goal of doing “what you love,”
and/or helped you in some way to reach your goal.
What I found along the way was that my simple desire to infuse more culture into San Diego -- was shared by many. However no one was quite sure how to do it. But when I described my goals and objectives it resonated enough with them to want to get involved. So my idea, with the input and energy of others, then isnowballed into something that has exceeded my original expectations.
I met several people along the way – you could say “mentors’ who had experienced similar challenges and successes in their past. They inspired me to persevere and overcome the obstacles that I continued to face. I was told that any great project is great because it is hard to achieve.
Advice: Is there any advice that you would give to a young person about doing “what
you love?”
I found that if I wanted to achieve something really great – I had to give it everything I had without hesitation. That at the end of the day (no matter what the eventual outcome of this event was) if I did the best job I could do within my power – I could be proud of that. And ultimately it is not the “event” itself that is the reward but the journey and self-discovery and empowerment of the “doing”.
No comments:
Post a Comment