Dust Gathering

By Kristen Peterson

Monday, Nov. 14, 2005 | 8:35 a.m.

Sitting in the back room of Dust Gallery, where an open door frames the industrial charm of the Las Vegas Arts District, Naomi Arin, co-owner of the gallery, said with a laugh, "It's funny, worlds do collide."

The collision to which Arin refers was inevitable.

It happened one morning when an automobile tire was mailed to the law firm where Arin is a partner. The name on the packaged tire matched the name of a client at the firm. Naturally, Arin's assistant contacted the client to tell him his tire was in.

Arin, who overheard the conversation, interceded, grabbed her tire, a $20,000 work of art made from a tire by Betsabee Romero that Arin bought from an art dealer in Mexico City, and then went into her office to look at the new addition to her private art collection.

It was a valuable save and a common overlap for Arin, whose interests keep her tied to her phone and working around the clock.

"I work all the time, and when I'm not working, I'm working," said Arin, an art collector, lawyer and gallery owner. "Dinner is never just dinner, breakfast is not breakfast, lunch is not lunch and coffee is definitely not just coffee."

But the business is all part of the dream. The gallery. The art. The day job at the law firm (Parker, Nelson and Arin), which allows her to support her art collecting. Her role in Whirlygig, the nonprofit arts organization that created First Friday and bought space in the Arts District to use as affordable art studios.

Her "pipe dream," she said, would be to form some type of local artist-in-residence program in one of the area's spaces owned by Whirlygig.

"When there's another 24 hours in a day, that's when I'll do that."

Arin, who opened Dust Gallery in February 2003 with artist Jerry Misko, sees Las Vegas as fertile territory with near-limitless opportunities for art.

"There is something very liberating about Las Vegas," the former Bostonian said. "In New York and Los Angeles, there are hierarchies of galleries. There are lots of dynamics to make a show happen.

"For us, it's about converting a space every six weeks to make an expression."

The newest conversion will be a Nov. 18 opening (6 p.m.-8 p.m) at Dust Gallery, featuring the work of New York artist David X. Levine and Los Angeles artist Antonio Adriano Puleo.

Levine and Puleo met while living and working in Boston. They've remained friends and have exchanged work through the mail.

Levine's abstract drawings represent musicians, songs and sound.

Looking at a somewhat sweet and tender piece titled "Bob Dylan," which incorporates Levine's geometric circles, Arin said, "What I love about this work is how humble it is. It's all about being in high school and loving Bob Dylan.

Arin said of Levine, "All of his work is done while listening to particular music. And they're very music-looking."

Puleo's colorful mixed-media montages, which incorporate vintage fabrics and bird drawings, are also musically inspired, and in a style that meshes well with Levine's work.

"Even though their work is so different, it's so complementary," Arin said. "They kind of bounce off each other. (Puleo's) formal artistic practice is really similar to Levine's practice."

The inclusion of Levine and Puleo at Dust substantiates Arin's efforts to place work by Las Vegas artists in the context of the larger art world. The gallery opened as a space representing Las Vegas contemporary artists, but eventually expanded to include national artists.

"I don't want to ghettoize Las Vegas artists because it's such a huge conversation nationally and internationally," Arin said.

And drawing interest from East and West Coast artists has not been difficult.

"We get submissions from people all over the world," Arin said. "People are fascinated by Vegas, and every artist wants to come here so badly. It's so easy to get space. You can't get space like this in New York. They're blown away by how open it is out here."

New York artist Lisa Stefanelli gushes similarly about Las Vegas.

"There's so much clarity there," she said via telephone from New York. "The lifestyle, the freedom -- that's so valuable to an artist. All the space, the clear light. It's a wonderful place to show."

Other than "the Dave Hickey thing," (a reference to art critic Dave Hickey, who has turned out important new artists while teaching at UNLV) Stefanelli said that she knew nothing about Las Vegas when she ran into Arin at an art fair in New York.

Today she has prints at Godt-Cleary Projects. Her paintings are sold at Dust Gallery, and her work is hanging at the Nevada Cancer Institute as part of its contemporary art collection. In January, Stefanelli curated a group exhibition of New York painters at Dust.

The experience, she said, was refreshing. She had no trouble in getting New Yorkers to participate.

"The people that I didn't involve were upset," Stefanelli said.

Misko also seconds the liberating feeling of Las Vegas.

"We are the Wild West," he said, "It's not that pretentious here. Everybody is making really bright, really smart work."

Art space

Dust Gallery emerged in 2003 when Arin and Misko left the nonprofit Contemporary Arts Collective, where they were board members, to open a for-profit gallery that would sell work by professional working artists, with no graduate students.

Arin is known for her endless mantra on the need to support working artists, often saying, "Artists need a root canal like everyone else."

"She's an art lover, first and foremost," said Las Vegas artist Mark Brandvik, whose work is sold at Dust Gallery and featured in the current issue of "New American Paintings."

"Dave Hickey proved that artists could live here and make art here. Naomi proved that art can be shown here."

Arin grew up in Lexington, Mass. She studied American history and art history at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, then attended Suffolk University Law School in Boston.

Arin moved to Las Vegas in 1992, took the Nevada Bar exam and practiced law. She left Las Vegas within four years to work at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston. She has family in Las Vegas and returned in 2001.

After operating Dust Gallery out of the Arts Factory on East Charleston Boulevard for a more than a year, Arin and Misko moved to the Main Street storefront space, asserting the gallery's independence.

Cindy Funkhouser, owner of the Funk House and founder of First Friday, credits Dust with being the first gallery to show cutting-edge work by professional artists.

"Her gallery changed the landscape of the Arts District," Funkhouser said.

It definitely brought attention to the area. Soon after Dust's move to Main Street, Godt-Cleary Projects moved to the area from Mandalay Place. Michele Quinn, director of Godt-Cleary Projects, said that the decision to move was inspired by Dust heading to Main Street.

Together, Quinn and Arin created a Third Thursday event this year that lasted through the spring. It opened with a forum on collecting that brought in major local collectors and casino executives, then continued with a line of artists and guest speakers who discussed curating, modern dance and high fashion.

But most important is the art that the galleries bring in.

Libby Lumpkin, art historian, lecturer and executive consulting director of the Las Vegas Art Museum, credits the galleries with taking Las Vegas' contemporary art scene in the right direction.

While Dust focuses on emerging and early career contemporary artists, Godt-Cleary represents works by mid-career and established artists.

"Both Godt-Cleary and Dust present works that are part of the larger art scene," Lumpkin said. "They represent the beginning of what will become a much more vital art community."

For now, the two galleries, separated only by a thrift store, are the only galleries in the district showing work by professional artists, as opposed to artist-owned galleries or co-ops that often double as studio space.

In an attempt to get more traffic in the Arts District, Arin has decided to hold openings that are not on First Friday.

"The more opportunities to come to this neighborhood, the more comfortable they'll feel," Arin said. "We just need some more bodies, more energy."

Besides, she said, "An opening is a special night for the artist. It's a big deal and I think that's one thing that First Friday kind of dilutes."

Either way, exhibits tend to resonate. Stefanelli said she doesn't know if it's the big-fish-in-the-small-pond theory or the fact that Las Vegas is not inundated with art, but, she said, "Since I've been involved with Dust, you can't imagine the number of people who know my work."

In May, Stefanelli will be featured with Las Vegan Tim Bavington in an exhibit at Santa Monica's Mark Moore Gallery.

Some argue that a Las Vegas scene is irrelevant given the proximity of Los Angeles. But Lumpkin says, "Las Vegas has its own ideas and its own character."

Of Arin, she said, "Her gallery is a great asset to the city. We want Las Vegas to be a center for contemporary art.

Stefanelli says that occasionally she hears from Angelenos that Las Vegas isn't such a big market.

"Well, maybe that's the case, but it's growing so fast," Stefanelli said.

And Arin plans on sticking around for a while.

Regarding Dust, she said, "It's the single best thing I've ever done in my life.

"This is a great way to see art I want to see."

Kristen Peterson can be reached at 259-2317 or [email protected].