Staff Writer

We’ve all lost things. We’ve all found things.

That’s the basic theme of the current exhibit at Nullspace Gallery on East Adams Street near London Bridge Pub. It’s part of the “Off the Grid” partnership among Downtown Vision Inc., the Cultural Council of Greater Jacksonville, Downtown property owners and local artists.

The program unites artists who want to share their work with the public and landlords who have space that’s not currently leased. The combination creates a synergy, creating a marketing venue for artists and a streetscape vibrancy for property owners with empty storefronts.

Through “Lost Letters/Found Regrets,” two artists offer their ideas through what both described as an “alternative” format.

Jim Draper, whose work was recently on exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Art and can be found in galleries and collections worldwide, has created an assemblage of found objects he has collected over the years at garage sales and even by the side of the road. His exhibit is “Found Regrets.”

“It all came from my private collection of stuff. I’ve got tons of it and wanted to share it,” he said.

Draper said his part of the exhibit is different from the visual art that people usually expect at one of his shows. Instead, he said it’s more about “physical manifestations of ideas as opposed to being object-related.”

With “Lost Letters,” Morrison Pierce created a collection of images inspired by the contents of a suitcase he bought for $5 in a New Orleans thrift store. It was filled with World War II-era photographs, letters and newspaper clippings.

“There it was more than 50 years down the road and I was intrigued by the imagery,” Pierce said.

He enlarged and framed several snapshots of an unidentified couple that evoked a feeling.

“The images are from a long-gone era. People don’t look like this or fall in love like this any more. I think this show is very romantic, which art hasn’t been for a long time,” said Pierce.

In addition to providing an opportunity to exhibit, Nullspace Gallery is unique in that it’s also an incubator. The next exhibit will showcase an installation by Matt Allison. Since January he’s been the gallery’s “artist in residence” and is developing “A Future Memory,” which will be an exploration of the Avante Garde movement in art.

Allison has collected a library of books, articles, essays and catalogs along with sound and film recordings devoted to the movement. What he doesn’t use in the exhibit will be available as reference material.

The intent is to “explore the possibility of connecting with what did happen in the past to what may happen in the future,” said Allison. “I want to go back to my postmodern influences and a time when people really believed there were new things. Contemporary art is very much about appropriation, but maybe the world doesn’t need one more ‘thing’ if I can use things that are already here.”

Gallery owner Kurt Polkey said the experience has fulfilled his hopes and those of his partners for Nullspace.

“This is where you never know what will be exhibited or not exhibited and our intent is to nurture new artists and give established artists a place where they can kindle a new flame,” Polkey said.

mmarbut@baileypub.com

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