Kevin Freitas - Jim Yuransky

Kevin Freitas: Art As Authority

Kevin Freitas has been involved in the arts for most of his professional life (not in any particular order) as: a gallery dealer, artist, art transporter, curator, and arts writer. He writes for San Diego's weekly CityBeat on occasion, and posts other reviews on his art blog at Art As Authority. He spent over a decade living in Europe, between Paris where he worked at the Louvre, in Brussels running a gallery, closely working with a neighborhood cultural center to establish stronger ties between the arts and the community, and in the south of France picking grapes.

Question #1 What is your highlight Visual art experience from the last year?

#1 "Christine Lee's Shims: Thousands of Uses - Use #3 exhibit at Art Produce Gallery, and Lael Corbin's two person show at L Street Fine Art. On a personal level, my being reviewed by Robert Pincus for the COPY exhibit held in Simayspace Gallery."

Question #2 What is your vision of the future of the Visual arts for San Diego?

#2 "That San Diego becomes another pole or axis in the larger national and international wild world of art. That its public and tourist profile goes beyond a city for sea sex and sun, the Padres, Midway, ComicCon, and the Gaslamp. That there is more to San Diego than the weather and Cow Parade 2009. That the artists and individuals who have been working behind the scenes, come out and take the scene. How? By sharing what they've discovered with their peers. That a few select museums rid themselves of anything remotely 'bureaucratic' in exchange for independent thinking and a caliber of exhibitions that could rival the Pompidou - since we are after all, talking about visions. And in turn, we would gladly exchange these past and present conditions FOR a future where artists want to establish their careers here first, L.A. and the rest of the world second, a responsive and informed public, support by artists for artists, card carrying collectors with ID that states 'I belong, I buy art, do you?', the building of an international cultural center for exhibitions, dance, music and theater. And finally, San Diego becomes the west coast Miami/Basel in the international art fair arena. But more importantly, artists who make their home and art in San Diego, with all their unbridled freedom to create, must have the opportunity to do so through greener economic and collaborative pastures."