With a mixture of emotions Echo will close its doors in Johnson City this Sunday, September 19th. We have had an unexpectedly great run here, particularly in the historic Ford building for the past five and a half years. Miraculously we’ve experienced our most profitable year to date.
We’ve had quite an adventure since our last letter to you. Following our amazing Spring Show at Round Top, we had the great furniture sale in May to thin out our storage. As we rounded the corner (we thought) on the pandemic, we hosted a fundraiser art auction in June for one of our patrons in need. Significantly, we switched from being the owners to tenants of our wonderful gallery building as we sold it to the new owner, Gordon Massie. Gordon has been a great landlord and friend of the gallery, and he will transform the building into the Texas Vintage Motorcycle Museum next year.
July found us acquiring our next business location in Blanco. More on that later. August saw the installation of The Breast Show II. The juried results of that exhibition were: First Prize to Jenni Belotserkovsky of Plainfield, VT, for Censored, a work of wool, wire, fabric and cardboard; Second Prize to Aletha St.Romain of Austin, TX, for the painting Wash Day; Wilmington, DE, artist Jen Hintz Eggers took Third Prize for her painting Mammary Study I. Honorable Mentions included: Brenda Thomas of JohnsonCity, TX, for Kabuki Lady (Reworked); Kristy Lynn Gallup of New Haven, CT, for Boobs7; and Chantal Danyluk of Conway, AR, for Don’t Be a Pussy. Winning the Visitors’ Favorite was Brenda Thomas for her painting Sustenance. We’re grateful to our juror, Elyse Gonzales, Director of Ruby City Contemporary Art Center in San Antonio for lending her expertise and time to make TBS II such a success.
We will be sad to see our sister gallery, JL Haynes Studio Gallery, also close on Sunday. Janet has been a pillar of both Echo and our local art community, setting a high bar as the first executive director of the Art Association of Johnson City. We are grateful for her invaluable, selfless support.
Next week will see the retrieval of the last of our consigned artwork and the transition to storage amidst development of our new location at 1725 S US Hwy 281 in Blanco, TX. We will have pretty deep discounts on many fine home or office furnishings, as well as artworks that are gallery-owned. We invite you to drop in to say goodbye to Echo in Johnson City this weekend, and to hear more about our plans to open doors next year at Echo in Blanco. Next week you can tune into our new website (www.echoinblanco.com), and start looking for a switch soon from “EchoinJohnsonCity” to "EchoinBlanco" on our social media.
