From Art History to Art Fair: Marnie Girado on Connecting People and Art

Today, I have with me in the studio Marnie Girado, who is the fair manager and exhibitor relations of Affordable Art Fair NYC in Boston. But we're here to talk about you and your art experience, and thank you so much for coming in today. Thank you so much for having me. It's such a beautiful place. It's so nice to meet you. Yeah, you too. I'm really adoring, and I just have to say this, for anybody who's listening, you'll want to see actually how well put together your colors are. You've done a great job. This sweater is a fantastic shade of, I don't know, what would you call it? Yeah, like red Would that be appropriate? Yes. Love it. Lately I've been doing a lot of work on color and color theory, the history of color. Oh my And it's one of the things ... So when you talk about Carmine, I'm automatically thinking like, oh, back in the day, this particular color came from this pigment that came from this thing. Have you read that book, The Secret Lives of Color? I have it next door. It's so good. Absolutely. So I know you and I both went to Bowdoin. You have a background in art history from Bowdoin. You have an additional advanced degree in art. So why art? What was it that drew you to this? I mean, I think early on I was always a voracious student. I loved English. I studied everything I could in school, but I realized the one thing I didn't have access to in my high school was art history education. My parents loved going to museums. I'm from Toledo, Ohio. We have a fantastic museum, Toledo Museum of Art. So I spent a lot of time there as a child and a teen and went to every museum I could traveling. So I decided even before college, I'll try out a few things, but I really want to major in art history. I want to know the context behind these fabulous paintings and works of art and sculpture. And I'm sure it was your experience at Bowdoin as well, that only the more education you received, it only fed your desire for more. I had fantastic professors who opened my eyes to just the vast amount of things you can study in art history, whether it's political history or medical things at the time. It just goes on and on and on. So as a student of life, it was perfect for me and I wanted to continue it as long as I could. You ended up getting additional training in Victorian and Eduardian art at the Courtauld Institute of Art. That's a very specific timeframe. So tell me about that interest. Well, I took a course in Victorian Arts at Bowdoin and it was really eye-opening for me because I thought I didn't like that kind of art, but it turns out it's my favorite and it's my favorite period of history. And I think it lends ... It's often kind of looked down on in at least up until like maybe five, 10 years ago, modern art, modern contemporary was really upheld as the standard and Victorian was kind of looked down on as a little trite or sentimental, but I think it is such a rich period that has a lot to do with where we are today as far as like industrialization and fashion and really there's so many close links and it's not as far in the past as we think it is. And also, I just think it's really, really beautiful. I love fabrics. I love fashion. I love depictions of society and characters and really piqued my interest. So I took a class called Flesh and Fabric: The Victorian and Edwardian Interior, and it was all about the domestic interior and decorative arts and depictions of interiors. I got to see a lot of amazing estates and houses that were preserved, so that was really special to me. And what about symbolism? Is there a lot of symbolism in Victorian and Edwardian art? Everything is a symbol, which I think really I love. It's like you can stare at a painting for hours and just pick it apart. And in my grad program, that's pretty much what we did. So yeah, from flowers to gems to colors to poses where someone is standing in a room, it's like everything is intentional and means something. And I think that that for me is one of the things that I ... I mean, I've enjoyed learning about that from a color standpoint, but when you see a piece and you're like, oh, that's just a person sitting next to an apple, what's the big deal? But then when you actually understand the quote unquote hidden meanings and what the artists were intending to portray on in addition to like, here's this visually beautiful piece. I think for me, it's like knowing the secret language that somebody's speaking through the years that I find really intriguing. And it tells a whole story, but I mean, a lot of the figurative Victorian painting, it's so dramatic anyways. So even if you're not clued into the symbols, it's like, okay, I can understand this even if I'm not trained in art history and I don't know all the intricacies. But then if you really want to study it, you can find out more. So I appreciate the point of accessibility of Victorian art, but also just like the layers and layers of hidden meaning. So Marnie, tell me about the way you've been able to incorporate your background and education to bringing art to a larger audience. I mean, the work that you've done before, the work that you're doing now, I mean, it really is about accessibility. I mean, it's funny because obviously I'm not doing anything with Victorian art at the moment or with art history. My focus of my whole career has been contemporary with the exception of some antique jewelry and silver experience, which was very cool. But yeah, I think the main through line has been putting art in spaces and whether those be private residences or public spaces. I did some work as an art consultant prior to the fair and worked a lot in Portland with Maine Medical, which was very special. But yeah, I think I love just seeing new art being put on the walls every day. That's like the joy of the fair, seeing art walk out with an owner, seeing what people are interested in buying, what speaks to them. And obviously there are trends that come and go throughout the years, depending what's going on in the world, whether those be price points or subject matter, what speaks to people. I love witnessing that. I think it's really interesting. But yeah, our fair is all about accessibility, like you said. Just our price points start around $100. The cap for us is 10,000, but what we really focus on is price transparency, making sure that our visitors see the prices on the walls, that they're not deterred, thinking that they can't purchase something that has caught their eye, that they love. And it really has been a model that works. I think what you're describing is something that many people are probably familiar with where you walk into an art gallery and there's no way to know how much it costs. And you're like, "Well, if it's not listed, it's probably not something I can afford." And it's kind of like going to a restaurant that doesn't have prices on the menu like- Am I in trouble? Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Which is sort of the opposite of what we'd really like people to have as an experience when it comes to art. I mean, don't we want people to be able to bring art home and put it on their walls? And don't we want artists to have their work be more easily accessible to the public? And from there, once an artwork is purchased, it's put on a wall, it's there for everyone's friends to see. They're introduced to different communities. So for me, the fair has been, I think, so important in introducing artists, supporting local galleries. And we also have our fair share of wonderful national and international galleries who do a lot of our fairs and they get to be introduced to a new market. So I think just this hyper visibility of galleries, artworks, artists, and letting people know that at least some of them are accessible. There's a price point and a subject matter for everyone. What are some of the trends that you've seen since you've been working with this organization? I haven't been working at Affordable Art Fair for that long, so it's only been a year for me, but the trends vary a lot from city to city. In New York, we see a lot of more pop art than we would say in Boston. Boston, there's a real focus, I'm sure, as you can attest to on nature. That's why there's a huge love of Maine artists at our Boston market. People want to see the nature around them reflected and the scenes around them reflected on painting and photography. I find that there's a real shift just in all markets towards the representational, which for a while I think we were seeing so, so much abstract only. And now I think that there's been a balance where you see like a good balance of abstract and representational art, whether that be portraits or just all kinds of things. Our last fair, I was just shocked by the variety. I was like, everyone's offering is different, but it all looked so seamless and exciting. So that is one thing that I'm also very interested in is this idea that you can have a variety of pieces. And somehow, even though one might be an abstract landscape or one might be a figurative charcoal sketch, but somehow you can create and curate an experience for people so that they're able to see how things work together. They're complimentary and they're also juxtapositional and still be appealing to people. Yeah. I mean, I think our exhibitors are just masters at that. I mean, a lot of them have their own galleries, their own gallery spaces that they're curating for themselves every day that usually host a variety of mediums, vastly different art styles. So you really have to, I mean, use things like color and scale to put things together in a way that's cohesive and appeals to the human eye. And yeah, I think our exhibitors are just so good at that. I love walking through the fair and being like, "Oh, I never would have thought to organize things this way or put these two artists together, but it really works and I'm always excited to see who's going to be interested in what booth and ... " How do you attract the people who are exhibiting the affordable art fairs? I mean, we try to make our presence known in a city, but for something like Boston where affordable art fair didn't have as much brand recognition, it was me going door to door, talking. I've been all through Portland, talking to galleries. "Have you ever done a fair? Is this something you could be interested in? "I just try to strike up conversations and provide as much information as I can because I think it really is an incredible opportunity, not just for sales, but for marketing, for putting you and your artists out there. And that's been so rewarding for me. I love having conversations with people and dropping in. I try to announce myself, set up a meeting first, but I also love to drop in unannounced and see the galleries, see how people are working and meet a lot of people. We also have an amazing advertising arm, a marketing arm, I should say. So they're pretty great at their jobs. We recently had a book signing with an interior designer named Erin Gates, and she was asked questions about color and specifically the color brown, which I think a lot of people ... So there's been this sort of beige phase. Recently we've had this very rich sort of brown phase and then Pantone yesterday announced the white. Yes. Well, you and I look at it as white, but what is it called? Like cloud dancer or cloud dancing? Cloud dancer. Yeah. I think you're right. Do you see when you're, because you go to a lot of different galleries, are you seeing any sort of impact on what are considered sort of the tones of the moment on the type of art that's coming out of these galleries and being brought to the affordable art fairs? That's so interesting. I have not thought of that, but now I'm going to look for it. I want to say not really. I mean, I think there are ... It depends from exhibitor to exhibitor. I have seen some more beige or white or earthy tones, but oftentimes that's their aesthetic and it doesn't fully ... I mean, there's definitely more of a demand for it during this period of an interest in neutrals, but a lot of our work is very bright, colorful eye catching. It's not typically what I see from stand to stand. There's definitely some more natural tones sprinkled in, but I think I've yet to see an entirely white or beige or brown huge stand. Well, and I'm thinking about our artist group and I don't ... I mean, my experience seems to sort of parallel yours, and then it seems like artists who have an interest in a particular palette, maybe they will use that palette, but they're not necessarily responding to the pantone color of the year, and yet somebody is. Yeah. So what do you make of that? Well, for fairs, I think it's really interesting. It's like you just never ... You can try to use trends as a marker of how you should arrange your stand and what kind of art you should put up, but you just never know who's going to come in and look at something that's maybe neutral colored and say," Gosh, I love this, but I wish it were blue. "And then maybe you have something blue in the back you can pull out for them and say," Well, I have this for you. "Or you can contact the artist, maybe there's a commission opportunity here, but you just don't know who's going to fall in love. And then sometimes there's like this color distance where they're just searching for a color, even though they've fallen in love with a piece. So I don't ... It's just so hard to predict. Are there ways that you ... Let's say you're walking through the affordable art fairs and you're seeing the variety of ways that people are putting their displays out there. Are there ways that you're able to kind of help translate that knowledge or that kind of visual impact from one place to another? Are there ways that you can help with ... I mean, it sounds like you're bringing people in and you're giving them the space to bring their pieces to a greater audience, but I'm sure you're learning things as you're visiting each of these places that might be useful. So how are you putting that knowledge and information to use? I mean, I offer stand workshops to our exhibitors and it's to talk about any sort of layout they want to discuss with me on their stand, whether that be the stand itself or the artworks they're putting in or how to arrange them or the artists they're bringing. So we do try to ... We're a huge company for metrics, so we try to track what selling, keeping in our mind what stands are really selling and what their layout looks like. And it just works differently for every exhibitor. Some stands, you're like, " I would space those paintings out a little bit more, "but it works for them, whatever their layout is that they're comfortable with. So I try not to say too much, but if I'm asked, I'll always offer advice based on what I've seen. Some artwork really translates well in a full salon hang and some really translates well, spaced out maybe two paintings on a wall with quite a bit of distance apart. So you just never know what people are going to respond to. All I can offer is trends I've noticed and what seems to be working for most people. I find it interesting that you're taking a concept that I think a lot of our artists at the Portland Art Gallery have experienced on a smaller scale. We have several artists who have actually done smaller kind of art fairs and they'll go around New England and here in the town of Yarmouth, we have the Clam Festival. The Clam Festival has a little art fair and so- Oh, that's awesome. Some of our artists, they are very used to putting up their pieces and talking with the public. And I love the fact that you're doing this on a much bigger scale and making it available to a much larger audience in New York and Boston. So how did this sort of concept arise? It arose with our founder, Will Ramsay, in London, actually. It's a British-based international fair that's been going on for 25 years now, I think. In New York, we're coming up on our 24th year, and then for Boston, it'll be our second year. We just had the first fair in October, which was amazing. So yet over time it's just expanded internationally. We're in 16 cities, I believe. And yeah, it just starts ... I mean, we start small. We had 56 exhibitors in Boston, and we plan to grow it from there, whatever that looks like. In New York, in the spring, we'll have 85, and we're in a much larger space than we've been in before. So it's really just time spent cultivating these communities and always having a mix of international and national and cultivating a local base. I think that's the healthiest and the most exciting mix for visitors when they can see, oh, like a gallery in New York or Boston I've never heard of and they're right down the street and I can go and visit them next week or a gallery from Paris who I won't be able to visit and I'd better buy something or a place in It's really cool being able to ... I think for most communities, I got this feedback from Boston a lot that they were so happy that something like this was here, that they had access to it as a visitor. I'm thinking about the number of people I've spoken to over time who have been able to work with art in different ways. And I kind of love your story because there's being an artist, there's working as an art consultant, now ... I mean, there's working for gallery specifically, there's working for art museums. There's so many different ways to access art, but what you're describing where you're working for affordable art fairs is an entirely different way of interacting with art and making it available to people that I hadn't really thought of before. So if you're talking to somebody else who went to Bowdoin, for example, and they're thinking about, "Oh, well, I'm going to get this graduate degree, and then how can I make a living in art without being an artist specifically?" Is there advice that you would give them? If they're open to it, just try as many things as you can because like you said, I think most coming out of graduate programs especially, but also coming out of undergrad as an art history major, you just think museums and galleries and that's my exposure, therefore those are the jobs and auction houses, but there's so many nonprofits. Art consulting was a very cool opportunity for me and working a fair is just the best. So it's just like, open yourself to opportunities, try things out. Don't be afraid to say, "Okay, I tried that out and that wasn't for me and now I'd like to pivot." I have a variety of work experience that definitely doesn't flow seamlessly altogether, but I'm just so happy when I look back at my career because I learned ... I saw art in so many different environments and worked with it in so many different ways and that has led me to now be in this environment where I'm seeing the most art every single day. And yeah, just I would say also talk to as many people as you can. I talk to Bowdoin students all the time. I'm sure you do as well. I never know if I'm giving any sort of good advice, but I love talking to people and it can't hurt. I think that's actually Great advice, what you just suggested, which is do things that seem interesting and kind of follow them to their natural conclusion. Sometimes you'll conclude, "Oh, this is great. It's exactly what I want to do. " Sometimes you'll think, "I don't know why I did this. It doesn't make any sense, but maybe it'll make sense later." So I love the idea that you've, as a result of being open to pivots, you've just collected these very valuable skills along the way that probably are going to continue to positively impact all the things that you do moving forward. I totally agree. I wouldn't have changed a single thing even though it was not what I set out to do. I think if you talked to me in college, I would have said, "I'm going to work at a museum, full stop." But I would have missed out on a lot of cool learning opportunities. Well, Marnie, I really appreciate your taking the time to come in and have this conversation with me today. Thank you so much, Lisa. This was wonderful. It's been a pleasure. And how can people learn more about the work that you're doing? Well, you can come to our fair. Our next one is at the Starrett-Lehigh Building in NY, March 18th through the 22nd. It's going to be phenomenal, so I hope to see you there. You can also email me or visit our website, if you're an artist or if it's interested in exhibiting or want to see how you can get involved, highly encourage you to do that. Very Good. I've been speaking with Marnie Girado and her title officially is Fair Manager, correct? Yes. Fair Manager and Exhibitor Relations, And she does her work with Affordable Art Fair, New York City and Boston. She's provided some ways that you can get in touch with her. And I would highly recommend that you do so, especially if you're somebody who loves art and maybe is trying to interact with and promote art in a different way because I continue to really enjoy the different ways that we're able to bring beauty into the world. And it sounds like Marnie has found yet another one that I hadn't even thought of. So thank you for coming in today, Marnie. I really appreciate it. Thank you so much.