AURORA | Susan Gibbons finds an immediate sense of calm when she starts working in this former police substation on Dallas Street.
Her studio space in the refitted building off East Colfax Avenue is humble enough. The 270-square-foot room is nestled behind a larger central gallery; down the hallway, administrators from the Phamaly Theatre troupe and the Aurora Cultural Arts District have their separate offices. But the room might as well be a Buddhist monastery for Gibbons, who’s spent decades making art in galleries and co-ops across the metro area.
“This studio is my sanctuary,” Gibbons said, standing among her books, canvases and brushes. “When I come in here, everything from the world just falls off … It’s quiet here. At the studios I’ve had in downtown Denver, there’s always a lot of hustle and bustle going on.”
Along with affordable rent, that tranquility brought Gibbons from her former haunts farther west to the building four years ago. Much has changed since then. The city’s arts district — a 16-block stretch of shops, galleries and theaters along East Colfax — has seen changes in leadership, title and personnel. The latest push at reinvention has including giving the area a new name and a new public face. Tracy Weil took over as the manager of the Aurora Cultural Arts District earlier, and he’s hinted at big plans for the area.
Part of those plans include turning the former police headquarters into an administrative and creative center of the district, a home for the area’s artists, residents and leaders.
“Generally, what we’re doing now is we’re going through the budget and seeing what kind of income we can generate,” said Weil, an Aurora native who helped establish the River North arts district in Denver. His office is located near the front doors of the building. “We’re trying to create a model that will be able to pay for itself, but will also engage artists.”
Weil and his colleagues will have more freedom to put their ideas into action next month. After it was a police substation, the building served as The Other Side Art’s Aurora gallery, a facility that was once touted as a major part of an arts district that’s seen plenty of fits and starts. The economic downfall that hit in 2008 had its effect, and The Other Side Art moved out of the space. Following their departure last year, the city helped to keep the building open as rentable studio space for local artists.
“I think we’re going to keep it very similar to what it is now. Some of the ideas we’re throwing around is to have some communal equipment the artists can use if they’re renting from there,” Weil said. “We thought about putting a little shop in the front to sell the artwork of the members who are there.
Along with those long-term plans, Weil and the rest of the crew at 1400 Dallas have a list of immediate projects. Weil wants to host a poetry event in September, a series of readings and collaborations centered at the building that would spread to neighboring facilities including The Collection gallery on the other side of Colfax. Weil is also working to set up a temporary exhibit detailing the impact and legacy of the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864.
For the moment, Gibbons has the building’s figurative spotlight. An exhibition running at the building until Aug. 30 titled “From Then to Now” features Gibbon’s creative work from the past decade. The show includes abstract explorations of color on canvas, sculptural experiments with found objects and work rendered of encaustic, an ancient art form that features pigmented beeswax.
Her work represents a wide range of styles and expressions, but Gibbons said the more recent pieces reflect the mood and feel of her home in Aurora. Her most recent work features patterns of black and white ‘interstices,’ simple bands of color that hint at tranquility, focus and harmony.
“I was able to break away from the found object work. I’d been working with that for 15 years. Since being here, I’ve been working in a simpler format, trying to minimize my compositions,” Gibbons said as she stood in front of one of the ‘interstice’ works in the main gallery. “I don’t know if I would have come to this if I hadn’t been here.”
With experiences working in arts districts such as Santa Fe and galleries such as Spark and Pirate in Denver, Gibbons sees another value in working out of Aurora. She’s been in the district for less than five years, but she’s already sensed momentum, one that’s been sparked by cheap rent and more and more high-profile tenants.
Gibbons, Weil and the other members of the community hope that the building on Dallas Street will turn into a focal point for that rising energy. With poetry readings, exhibitions and other events planned for the space, that possibility is looking more and more feasible. Still, some very basic questions about the space remain unanswered.
“We’re throwing around some names for the building,” Weil said, adding that the building is still simply known as 1400 Dallas to many.
“I’m kind of liking the name ‘Arts Dispatch.’ It’s a location that speaks out to the rest of the district and stands out as a hub. It’s almost what the police used to use it for, but more arts-focused.