Alumnus creates mobile gallery

Photo by Dane Sponberg
SCAD alumnus Dan Quinn created the Stand Alone Gallery, a flexible, traveling venue to showcase work by emerging artists.

By: E. Christina Spitz

Published: Friday, March 7, 2008

Savannah College of Art and Design alumnus Daniel Quinn (B.F.A., photography, 2007) is getting his show on the road — literally.

Discouraged by the locations of many galleries and the hassles of negotiations and rental fees, Quinn realized he “needed to eliminate something from the equation to reduce stress and aggravation,” he said. “Overall the most important factor [is] freedom in the sense of construction, placement, art selection, and breaking away from sedentary gallery spaces that get tucked away in art districts and fade away.”

As a result, he conceived and created the Stand Alone Gallery, a portable exhibition space that measures 24 feet square and eight feet tall, and that he can assemble, dissemble and transport in a small truck. His goal is to provide “modular, mobile space … [that] can be assembled on site and ready to house artwork, performances, soirees and many other functions,” he explained. The Stand Alone Gallery is “the embodiment of a dream to uproot from the concrete, tangled wires and pipe work that holds a normal gallery to the ground.

“Space for work is now one of the hottest commodities in urban areas due to a rapid gentrification of inner city warehouses.”

To create the gallery, he employed reusable wood-based materials. The structure features interior and exterior doorways, and a base of interlocking platforms bound together by a sturdy system of latches. To increase the surface area, the gallery has four interlocking rooms, each measuring 12 feet square. Each space can be adapted to showcase traditional fine art, graphic art, film, sound, sculpture, installation or performance, Quinn said.

As fluid in its concept as its structure, the gallery offers space to emerging artists from all disciplines. Contract commissions will vary from show to show, he said.

“I would like [the Stand Alone Gallery] to remain a transient gallery and travel throughout the country hosting shows and organizing events around it when time allows. In that way I would be interconnecting communities and ideas nationwide,” said Quinn. “There is a great search afoot to find a place to call home. The more I talked to far-flung colleagues, the more I discovered a shared and fervent desire for exploration with an undercurrent of an eventual return. I felt the need to premiere the gallery space with a term that would be widely interpreted and easily accessible.”

In keeping with the theme of mobility, he is holding a juried exhibition titled “Excursion: An Exhibition of Transience,” April 17-19. The Stand Alone Gallery will be assembled at the Blue Tower Gallery annex in Atlanta for the show.


Submissions for “Excursion: An Exhibition of Transience” are due April 1, and the entry fee is $25 for up to five pieces. To submit, follow the instructions on the Web site.


Spitz is a senior publications editor.