Michael Binkley – Artist Spotlight (2020)

After seven months of preparation and build-out, I am finally ready to open the doors of my new gallery and studio in Squamish, Canada—right in the middle of a pandemic. Although the timing is less than ideal, my dream of the past three years is finally coming to fruition.

In September, 2019 I was able to take occupancy of my industrial unit, which I bought in 2017. Huh? Well, through a series of events, (which is another story—search “Moodyville 2016” on YouTube), I had to vacate my previous studio and gallery of thirty-two years, and then my wife Michelle and I travelled for a year during 2018-2019.

After our home and studio/gallery/sculpture garden of thirty-two years sold, I could no longer afford new digs for my studio in the Metro Vancouver, Canada area. Looking farther afield, I settled on a new-build industrial unit in the town of Squamish, about a forty-five minute drive north of Vancouver where our house is. I was to take possession in the fall of 2017, but due to construction delays, I got the keys at the end of February 2018. As Michelle and I had planned the year abroad to travel and work in Europe beginning in June, I decided not to move my equipment into the brand new unit. Instead, we found a non-art-related tenant to rent the space from us in our absence.

Upon returning from travel, all went according to plan and our tenants ended their contract on August 31, 2019. I was presented with a huge, empty shell in which to start my new gallery and studio. I had stored my entire studio and raw materials at our North Vancouver home. The bulk of the heavy stone and equipment was transported on crane trucks over a two-day period, and the remainder I took in multiple loads in my truck. I thought, This set-up should take two months, tops. How hard could this be? It’s now been seven months and the tent is still going up.

The beauty of buying a new build was that I could customize the interior to fit my needs. Since I am a self-represented artist, I had a demising wall installed giving me one-third of the space for my exhibition gallery and two-thirds for my production studio. I installed my cable-track lighting system that I took from my old gallery, and it works well in the new space. I thought long and hard about how I would set up my studio workspace, but you know what they say about the best-laid plans. For three decades, I had worked in a garage studio at the back of our home. I worked in an outside space on large projects, relying on very accommodating neighbors and the fact that I could blow my dust and stone slurry into the small forest across the alley. I don’t have that luxury in this new environment of an industrial complex, as I know my new neighbors would not be as accommodating as my last location. Thankfully, working in some Italian studios taught me how to work differently in an interior environment. I bought a very effective dust extractor, devised moveable walls to create a flex-space dust room, and I had a drain floor and sump installed to collect the slurry from my wet work. These have combined to contain my carving mess so the rest of the studio is relatively dust-free. But there is still some tweaking I need to do to keep the gallery as dust-free as possible.

I am now at a point where I can open my door to the public. But as we are all experiencing, the middle of a pandemic just isn’t the time to be trumpeting your presence. Michelle and I had planned a grand opening for late spring, however with the COVID-19 virus, the big shebang will have to wait until later in the year. In the meantime, I have devised a “soft open”, and my door is open in case an interested customer comes a-calling.

This current virus situation is certainly frustrating. What compounds it for me is that after a soul-and-creativity-crushing period of change for Michelle and me from 2011 to 2016 that resulted in losing our former home and creative space, I incurred a frighteningly-deep creative block. A big part of our year abroad was to heal and hopefully get out of my funk. We nicknamed the venture “Back to Epiphany”, as forty years ago, I had my epiphany to pursue a career as a sculptor in Florence, Italy. Thankfully, two months of carving in a Seravezza, Italy studio and a two-month residency in an Andalusia, Spain sculpture garden were the catalysts I needed—my Muse reawakened, and I found my juju again. I was so excited about presenting the new “me”, but now I must wait even longer.

For the past three years, Michelle and I have been planning how to roll out our next chapter and best utilize the new studio and gallery space. What is exciting for us is the diversity of projects we can pursue. We want to create a sort of “art hub” and offer opportunities for other artists and art patrons.

A large part of my former brand was offering my patrons the opportunity to “come to the artist’s house,” and we built a beautiful gallery space and sculpture garden onto the front of our home for that purpose. Patrons were able to visualize their potential art purchase in the environment of a home. However, in our new chapter, Michelle and I want to separate the business from home life completely. At our new location, we want to concentrate our patron’s attention on the artist’s own gallery and studio, and focus on the artwork itself.

Often, I get the request to see how and where I create my sculptures. To this end, I can now show visitors from the gallery through to the studio, something I could not do at my last location. Now, I can simply slide a beautiful, fir, barn door to the side, and in one easy step, go from gallery to production space!
There are several other ideas we have in store for how we can utilize the new gallery and studio, and we’ll roll those out in the future, once this virus situation is resolved. We have to save some surprises for you!

Another benefit is I now have space to provide for workshops and mentoring. After forty years in the business, I would like to give back to my community. Just as I was given the opportunity to learn the business of stone sculpture from George Pratt, it’s time for me to pass the baton.

I’m developing some five-day workshops for all levels of experience in stone carving, a mentorship program, and rentable workspace for traveling sculptors. I’ve led several workshops of my own, at symposiums, and on cruise ships. These were all at other locations. Now that I have the space, I’d like to offer instruction at my own studio. For those sculptors that have experience but may want to bone up on their skills, I’d like to offer mentoring sessions. And just as I like to combine travel to Italy with renting studio space to work, I am hoping there are sculptors from other parts of the world who might like to carve short-term while visiting Canada’s west coast.

For the moment, I’m using this time to my best advantage. I’m creating inventory (both 3D and 2D), building and launching a newly-designed website, and refining workshop syllabi. And after over three decades of producing only original art, I’m honing new skills in the realm of 3D virtual sculpting for limited edition art and to lighten the rough-out stage of my sculptures.

After being without a work and exhibition space for two years and in honor of this new gallery and studio, I’d like to present an exhibition theme around metamorphos is and muse awakening. When appropriate, I’ll announce my grand opening.