Get ABQ INT'L off the ground with a building permit!

This is a fundraiser to help ABQ INT’L obtain a building permit for the construction of a shared workspace in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

What is ABQ INT’L?

ABQ INT’L is the future home of a community centered arts space in the South Broadway neighborhood of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Currently operating as a gallery, the plans for a 10,000 square foot creative live/work space are divided into 3 main sections - shared fabrication shop, gallery/storefront/courtyard, and private apartments for resident artists. The building will serve as a creative hub where resident artists are encouraged to produce their work at the scale required to sustain them financially, display their work in both a gallery and storefront setting, and offer hands-on workshops inviting the community to participate and engage with skilled crafts such as woodworking, metal fabrication, weaving, ceramics, masonry and more.

With one of the apartments on site reserved for a visiting artist program, ABQ INT’L will bring in artists from around the world to create work in the ideal creative environment of Albuquerque and forge connections that will last a lifetime.

Photographs taken during recent exhibitions in the gallery space at ABQ INT’L

What is needed?

The building has been designed, the gallery has brought in members of the community who have shown enthusiastic support for the vision, and the next step in getting ABQ INT’L off the ground is getting permits from the city to begin construction on the first section of the building.

Having shown the plans to three different architecture firms in Albuquerque, I have concluded that the cost of getting the plans certified by an engineer and obtaining the permits will be in the range of $12,000 - $13,000. Once this hurdle has been cleared, construction can begin and investors will be able to walk through the space and see the impact made on the community that surrounds the structure.

Photograph taken during renovation of the gallery space

Why your donation is important

This project is a labor of love, an ode to my hometown. When I say the words “ideal creative environment” I mean Albuquerque, New Mexico from the bottom of my heart. To quote Georgia O’Keeffe, “Living out here has just meant happiness. Sometimes I think I'm half-mad with love for this place.”

I spent 10 years in New York and 5 years in California, working in world class shops and institutions, and yet I never came across an arts community as supportive, enthusiastic, and inspired as the one I know in Albuquerque. It is a place that deserves to be seen as a viable option when an international artist is dreaming of something big, or when a local artist wishes to plant roots. The key is in the visiting artist exchange, and in developing relationships with cities whose economies are better equipped to sustain our artists financially. Being only an hour away from Santa Fe is a great start, but if we are truly going to forge connections with the art world at large, we need to look further, reach further, and bring Albuquerque into the international conversation.

Photograph taken during recent exhibition at ABQ INT’L