In 2007, the AJC had just let go their arts reporter and cut the art calendar from the paper. Creative Loafing was doing a top 5 events only. And I was in graduate school for photography with a whole bunch of emerging artists in about every discipline.
As a service to the community, I began consolidating art openings and events around Atlanta into a calendar. I worked with a local designer to create the site's graphic elements and layout, and built it myself using Wordpress.
Then I started showing up at galleries and art openings with a camera and a microphone to talk to artists about their work. I'd never covered art before, or been an on-camera host, or a one man crew, or done real editing... but there I was talking to artists at every stage of their careers. I began live streaming artist talks. It's hard to imagine now, but in the early 2010's doing a live on-location web stream was way more complicated than pointing and pushing a button.
I partnered with galleries, organizations, and publications around town to live stream and record events, such as a series with Atlanta Celebrates Photography or the Contemporary Talks series at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center. In 2012, I helped artist Priscilla Smith live stream an art performance walk all the way around the then wild Atlanta Beltline.
Here's a 2016 interview with artist Jessica Caldas, who is now based in Florida.
Eventually I took advertising on Art Relish, working with advertisers to post banners and support the site each month. Here's a 2010 profile about me in Creative Loafing.
Though I have retired the site, most Art Relish videos are still available on YouTube.
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