Locals only

Just as many of Atlanta’s contemporary artists are preparing proposals for the High Museum, which is seeking a local artist to create a month-long exhibition outside the museum’s traditional gallery space next year, local organizers have announced plans to offer homegrown artists opportunities to exhibit year ‘round inside the new Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia, scheduled to open in early 2001. Longtime Atlanta artist and arts consultant Annette Cone-Skelton and David Golden, president of CGR Advisors, a Buckhead-based real estate investment advisory company, are spearheading plans to create a new art museum, which Cone-Skelton will direct.

“I envision this museum as one that will encourage participation of artists from all around the state. The museum will interact with the artists’ community as well as with the community at large through programming and outreach. Our emphasis is really on Georgia,” says Cone-Skelton.

At the heart of the museum will be the impressive CGR art collection. In 1989, Cone-Skelton began working with company founders, David Golden and Cecil Conlee, to develop a Georgia collection. When the company discontinued collecting in 1996, Golden kept on acquiring art. The combined collections now number more than 240 works in all media dating from the early ’40s to present.

CGR and Golden’s support for Georgia artists didn’t stop at acquisitions; the company has sponsored scholarships for Atlanta College of Art students and awarded grants to Art Papers and the Hambidge Center, an artists’ retreat in North Georgia.

With Golden as chairman of the museum, that commitment to the arts will be shared by a larger public. “We hope to provide a real forum for the artists of Georgia, which is something that is currently missing from our cultural environment,” says Golden.

The privately funded museum is already incorporated and has applied for non-profit status. Organizers are looking for a museum location that will be near a MARTA station to facilitate public access. “It’s very important that this is our museum and that we all participate in what it becomes,” says Cone-Skelton, who adds that the museum will also document and archive important works by Georgia artists.

The director plans to curate six temporary exhibitions a year to complement a permanent rotating exhibition from the permanent collection, which includes works by Radcliffe Bailey, Genevieve Arnold, Beverly Buchanan, Harry Callahan, Kevin Cole, Harris Dimitropoulos, Cheryl Goldsleger, Stefanie Jackson and Rocio Rodriguez.

Represented locally by the Fay Gold Gallery, Rodriguez has paintings in collections of the New Orleans Museum of Art, the High and the Ft. Lauderdale Museum of Art. Now, she can add the Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia to the list. “This is great because the total focus will be the development of artists in the state. Annette will be able to organize shows that feature Georgia artists in greater depth than in typical regional exhibitions. It’s wonderful to have another public exhibition space.”