Behind the scenes: Finding a community at the SOAG

Admittedly, I wasn’t sure what to expect when I stepped into the State of the Art Gallery on a Saturday morning. I’m a senior, but I’ve only spent four semesters on campus over my past three years — thank you COVID-19 and study abroad — so I haven’t spent much time in downtown Ithaca, much to my chagrin.

A view of the State of The Art Gallery from across the street/Source: Syd Pierre

With my beat for Ithaca Week, I’ve been hoping to dive into gender equity within the Ithaca community, but also into different parts of the community that I haven’t been able to explore yet, like the local art scene. So far, it’s been fun to research possible story ideas and learn more about the variety of ways that gender plays a role in opportunities for women and queer folks within the community.

I have a strong news background, so while I wanted to push myself out of my comfort zone and report on a different area — arts and culture — I was worried that my story topic wouldn’t relate enough back to my beat and be “newsy” enough.

But, back to that Saturday afternoon.

The gallery was warm and welcoming, just like my interview subjects — four local women artists who are members of the SOAG. As soon as I got my camera set up and started chatting, I was reminded about why I love journalism so much, because the ability it gives you to listen to people’s stories.

A few sketches that are displayed in the gallery/Source: Syd Pierre

The interview process was unique — the gallery space was small, so while I did individual interviews, what you didn’t see behind the camera was the other three women tucked away offscreen, sitting nearby and listening in to their friends talk about their art journeys.

That process added to the communal effect of the story and created depth within the interviews. I could tell that everyone was impacted by hearing about each other’s stories and the ways that they had helped each other within their community of women artists at the gallery. Sitting on the hardwood floors listening to each other’s stories, they’d created a safe space to share their thoughts and I was grateful to be a part of it. By the time we’d reached the fourth and final interview, it was partially moving to hear about Jane Dennis’ thoughts about how her identities as both an artist and woman intersect. Oftentimes in interviews, a source will say something and I’ll tuck it away in the back of my mind as a strong quote to come back to. This was one of those moments. “Art is where I feel freedom that I don't think I have in the real world,” Dennis said. “In art, I can just do what I want to do and there's a real sense of freedom in that.”