On October 9, 2009, fifteen years ago to the day, Institute 193 opened its doors to the public for the very first time, welcoming guests to see Selections From The Archive by beloved Lexington artist Louis Zoellar Bickett. The show was promptly mistaken for a new antique store, making abundantly clear exactly how much we had our work cut out for us. Fifteen years is a long life for any institution, and doubly so for a non-profit art gallery with such a small team behind it. We’ve made it this far by staying nimble, efficient, and focused on our mission and by the commitment of our employees and community – and, at times, through sheer stubborn unwillingness to throw in the towel. Over one hundred exhibitions later, we’re proud to still be here introducing the world to the very best of Southern contemporary art, and even more proud to be at the forefront of a wave of new attention and appreciation for Southern artists.
We feel a deep sense of responsibility to the art and culture of the South, and it's that responsibility which will continue to drive us through the coming fifteen years. For all of us on the 193 team, this milestone is certainly a time to look back on our work so far, and to celebrate all that we’ve accomplished – but more importantly, it’s a time for the renewal of our commitment to share our expansive vision of the best of what Southern art has been, is now, and could be.
So on our fifteenth birthday, Institute 193 is reaffirming our commitment to the artists we've worked with so far, as well as to all those friends and collaborators we’re excited to connect with over the coming weeks, months, and years. Today, we’re asking you to join us in making that commitment, and to join us at the outset of fifteen more years of Institute 193. Your support will help us carry on our vital work: collaborating with artists, musicians, and writers to document the cultural landscape of the modern South. We’re just getting started.
Installation
view of Muscle Memory by MC Sparks, currently on view at
Institute 193
Perks
Shot on a variety of mostly pocketable cameras over the course of 4 years, In The Round is a collection of Mahan’s street and domestic photos in and adjacent to Lexington’s not so historic inner beltway, New Circle Road. In The Round was first displayed at Institute 193's gallery in downtown Lexington, Kentucky from August 9 – September 14, 2024. This postcard set contains the 28 images from that exhibition, alongside an additional 12 photographs from Mahan's series.
In honor of our 15th birthday, we're excited to release the first ever Institute 193 logo tee. Many have dreamed of this day. Now, you can be the first to claim this long-awaited item and share your love for 193 everywhere you wear a shirt.
Comfort Colors Heavy Duty Pocket Tee in Granite. Features the Institute 193 logo on the front pocket, with our addresses and contact information on the back, so you'll always be able to find us.
At this level of donation, we will be thrilled to thank you by placing your name in vinyl on our official 15th birthday Bathroom Wall of Honor. Guests will think fondly of your support each and every time they use the services in our downtown Lexington gallery space.
Tag Christof, Virginia Ham, 2020. Archival inkjet print, 11 x 14 inches.
This photograph was used as the press image for Southern Democratic, currently on view at The Carnegie in Covington, KY and curated by Phillip March Jones, Institute 193 founder and curator-at-large. Prints supplied courtesy of the artist.
Lonnie Holley, I Knew Him Before The Breakdown, 2013. Archival inkjet print, 17 x 22 inches.
This original photograph by Lonnie Holley, printed in an edition of 30, was made in 2013 at the time of Stepping In The Footprint, Holley's solo exhibition at Institute 193. The prints are numbered, signed, and titled by Holley. Prints supplied courtesy of the artist.
Dianna Settles, The dogs lined up for dinner, right before a fight, 2024. Acrylic and colored pencil on panel, 16 x 12 inches.
Dianna Settles exhibited at Institute 193 in 2021, with Olly Olly Oxen Free, a collection of paintings exploring parallels and relationships between spaces of incarceration, rest and care, and physical training. Since then, she has been subject of solo exhibitions at March Gallery (New York City) and Galerie Marguo (Paris, France). Most recently, her work was presented by Galerie Marguo at ASIA NOW Art Fair in Paris, with a solo booth of paintings completed during a 5 week residency in Menorca, Spain. Settles's work is in the permanent collection of the ICA Miami (Miami, FL), X Museum (Beijing, China), Le Consortium (Dijon, France), and the Longlati Foundation (Hong Kong, China).
For more information, contact info@institute193.org.
Claudia Keep, Memphis, September 14, 7:12 PM, 2024. Oil on Masonite panel, 8 x 10 inches.
Framed by DOWNING in Brooklyn, NY.
Claudia Keep has been a longtime supporter of Institute 193. Working from both life and personal photographs, Keep illuminates the intricacies of simple scenes: light falling in a quiet room, the shapes that a modest object casts onto the sidewalk, infinite beads of water resting in a spiderweb. This painting is based on Keep's time in Memphis, Tennessee in 2021, around her solo exhibition at TOPS Gallery.
Keep's recent solo exhibitions include Somehow, Somewhere, Someway at Galerie Marguo (Paris, France), In Bed at 12.26 (Dallas, TX), Almanac at Parker Gallery (Los Angeles, CA), Aubade at MARCH (New York, NY), Day In, Day Out at Tif Sigfrids (Athens, Georgia), Claudia Keep at Tops Gallery (Memphis, TN), and Night Moves at MARCH. Keep has also exhibited at Blum & Poe (Los Angeles, CA), Venus Over Manhattan (New York, NY), Fortnight Institute (New York, NY), Château La Coste (Provence, France), The Painting Center (New York, NY), and Ablebaker Contemporary (Portland, ME).
For more information, or to inquire about international shipping, please contact info@institute193.org.
Lonnie Holley, All Of Their Chains (Kicking Them Around), 2011. Spray paint on paper, 26 x 20 inches.
This original painting by Lonnie Holley was made around the time of Holley's exhibition at Institute 193, Stepping in the Footprint, an early highlight for both Holley and 193. At that time, Institute 193 helped to organize one of Holley's earliest live performances of his music, for which he is now known across the world.
Today, Holley’s artwork is held in the collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The National Gallery of Art, The Smithsonian American Art Museum, and several other major museums. Recent solo exhibitions have been held at Edel Assanti (London), BLUM (Los Angeles) and the Camden Arts Centre (London).
Holley has collaborated with the likes of REM's Michael Stipe, Moor Mother, and Bon Iver (amongst many others) on his recordings. His most recent album, 2023's Oh Me Oh My, was named to many critics' best-of lists for 2023.
Institute 193 is deeply grateful to have been a small but meaningful stepping stone on Lonnie's path so far, and for his continued support of our mission to provide similar opportunities to all the artists we work with!
For more information, or to inquire about international shipping, contact info@institute193.org.
Richard McCabe, Hong Kong, Pensacola, Florida., 2022. Pigment print, 8 x 8 inches, 16 x 16 inches framed.
This framed photograph is available thanks to the generosity of Richard McCabe - Institute 193's next exhibitor! Perdido, his ongoing exploration of place, time, and memory in the Florida Panhandle, will run in our main gallery from November 8 - December 21.
Richard McCabe is a curator, photographer and writer based in New Orleans. He was born in England and grew up in the American South. In 1998, he received an MFA in Studio Art from Florida State University. Since 2010, he has been the Curator of Photography at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. He has organized and curated over thirty exhibitions including: Seeing Beyond the Ordinary, The Mythology of Florida, The Rising, Eudora Welty: Photographs from the 1930s - 40s, The Colourful South, Self-Processing: Instant Photography, Memory is a Strange Bell: The Art of William Christenberry and New Southern Photography.
Richard McCabe’s photographs have been included in gallery and museum exhibitions throughout the United States including: Size Matters, Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, Alabama, Instant Joy, AM Richard Fine Art Gallery, Brooklyn, New York, and Once Around The Sun, Boyd/Satellite Gallery, New Orleans, Louisiana. In 2017, AINT - BAD press published LAND STAR, a monograph of McCabe’s photography. McCabe’s thoughts and writings on photography have been published in the New York Times, Time, National Public Radio(NPR), Louisiana Cultural Vistas, Spot, The Bitter Southerner, AINT - BAD, Hotshoe, Huck and LENSCRATCH magazine. In 2018, he contributed the introduction essay -The Reality on the Ground for the University of New Orleans press publication: New Southern Photography: Images of the Twenty-first Century South.
For more info or to inquire about international shipping, please contact info@institute193.org.
Highlights
See all activity170
Shot on a variety of mostly pocketable cameras over the course of 4 years, In The Round is a collection of Mahan’s street and domestic photos in and adjacent to Lexington’s not so historic inner beltway, New Circle Road. In The Round was first displayed at Institute 193's gallery in downtown Lexington, Kentucky from August 9 – September 14, 2024. This postcard set contains the 28 images from that exhibition, alongside an additional 12 photographs from Mahan's series.
In honor of our 15th birthday, we're excited to release the first ever Institute 193 logo tee. Many have dreamed of this day. Now, you can be the first to claim this long-awaited item and share your love for 193 everywhere you wear a shirt.
Comfort Colors Heavy Duty Pocket Tee in Granite. Features the Institute 193 logo on the front pocket, with our addresses and contact information on the back, so you'll always be able to find us.
At this level of donation, we will be thrilled to thank you by placing your name in vinyl on our official 15th birthday Bathroom Wall of Honor. Guests will think fondly of your support each and every time they use the services in our downtown Lexington gallery space.
Tag Christof, Virginia Ham, 2020. Archival inkjet print, 11 x 14 inches.
This photograph was used as the press image for Southern Democratic, currently on view at The Carnegie in Covington, KY and curated by Phillip March Jones, Institute 193 founder and curator-at-large. Prints supplied courtesy of the artist.
Lonnie Holley, I Knew Him Before The Breakdown, 2013. Archival inkjet print, 17 x 22 inches.
This original photograph by Lonnie Holley, printed in an edition of 30, was made in 2013 at the time of Stepping In The Footprint, Holley's solo exhibition at Institute 193. The prints are numbered, signed, and titled by Holley. Prints supplied courtesy of the artist.
Dianna Settles, The dogs lined up for dinner, right before a fight, 2024. Acrylic and colored pencil on panel, 16 x 12 inches.
Dianna Settles exhibited at Institute 193 in 2021, with Olly Olly Oxen Free, a collection of paintings exploring parallels and relationships between spaces of incarceration, rest and care, and physical training. Since then, she has been subject of solo exhibitions at March Gallery (New York City) and Galerie Marguo (Paris, France). Most recently, her work was presented by Galerie Marguo at ASIA NOW Art Fair in Paris, with a solo booth of paintings completed during a 5 week residency in Menorca, Spain. Settles's work is in the permanent collection of the ICA Miami (Miami, FL), X Museum (Beijing, China), Le Consortium (Dijon, France), and the Longlati Foundation (Hong Kong, China).
For more information, contact info@institute193.org.
Claudia Keep, Memphis, September 14, 7:12 PM, 2024. Oil on Masonite panel, 8 x 10 inches.
Framed by DOWNING in Brooklyn, NY.
Claudia Keep has been a longtime supporter of Institute 193. Working from both life and personal photographs, Keep illuminates the intricacies of simple scenes: light falling in a quiet room, the shapes that a modest object casts onto the sidewalk, infinite beads of water resting in a spiderweb. This painting is based on Keep's time in Memphis, Tennessee in 2021, around her solo exhibition at TOPS Gallery.
Keep's recent solo exhibitions include Somehow, Somewhere, Someway at Galerie Marguo (Paris, France), In Bed at 12.26 (Dallas, TX), Almanac at Parker Gallery (Los Angeles, CA), Aubade at MARCH (New York, NY), Day In, Day Out at Tif Sigfrids (Athens, Georgia), Claudia Keep at Tops Gallery (Memphis, TN), and Night Moves at MARCH. Keep has also exhibited at Blum & Poe (Los Angeles, CA), Venus Over Manhattan (New York, NY), Fortnight Institute (New York, NY), Château La Coste (Provence, France), The Painting Center (New York, NY), and Ablebaker Contemporary (Portland, ME).
For more information, or to inquire about international shipping, please contact info@institute193.org.
Lonnie Holley, All Of Their Chains (Kicking Them Around), 2011. Spray paint on paper, 26 x 20 inches.
This original painting by Lonnie Holley was made around the time of Holley's exhibition at Institute 193, Stepping in the Footprint, an early highlight for both Holley and 193. At that time, Institute 193 helped to organize one of Holley's earliest live performances of his music, for which he is now known across the world.
Today, Holley’s artwork is held in the collections of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The National Gallery of Art, The Smithsonian American Art Museum, and several other major museums. Recent solo exhibitions have been held at Edel Assanti (London), BLUM (Los Angeles) and the Camden Arts Centre (London).
Holley has collaborated with the likes of REM's Michael Stipe, Moor Mother, and Bon Iver (amongst many others) on his recordings. His most recent album, 2023's Oh Me Oh My, was named to many critics' best-of lists for 2023.
Institute 193 is deeply grateful to have been a small but meaningful stepping stone on Lonnie's path so far, and for his continued support of our mission to provide similar opportunities to all the artists we work with!
For more information, or to inquire about international shipping, contact info@institute193.org.
Richard McCabe, Hong Kong, Pensacola, Florida., 2022. Pigment print, 8 x 8 inches, 16 x 16 inches framed.
This framed photograph is available thanks to the generosity of Richard McCabe - Institute 193's next exhibitor! Perdido, his ongoing exploration of place, time, and memory in the Florida Panhandle, will run in our main gallery from November 8 - December 21.
Richard McCabe is a curator, photographer and writer based in New Orleans. He was born in England and grew up in the American South. In 1998, he received an MFA in Studio Art from Florida State University. Since 2010, he has been the Curator of Photography at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art. He has organized and curated over thirty exhibitions including: Seeing Beyond the Ordinary, The Mythology of Florida, The Rising, Eudora Welty: Photographs from the 1930s - 40s, The Colourful South, Self-Processing: Instant Photography, Memory is a Strange Bell: The Art of William Christenberry and New Southern Photography.
Richard McCabe’s photographs have been included in gallery and museum exhibitions throughout the United States including: Size Matters, Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, Alabama, Instant Joy, AM Richard Fine Art Gallery, Brooklyn, New York, and Once Around The Sun, Boyd/Satellite Gallery, New Orleans, Louisiana. In 2017, AINT - BAD press published LAND STAR, a monograph of McCabe’s photography. McCabe’s thoughts and writings on photography have been published in the New York Times, Time, National Public Radio(NPR), Louisiana Cultural Vistas, Spot, The Bitter Southerner, AINT - BAD, Hotshoe, Huck and LENSCRATCH magazine. In 2018, he contributed the introduction essay -The Reality on the Ground for the University of New Orleans press publication: New Southern Photography: Images of the Twenty-first Century South.
For more info or to inquire about international shipping, please contact info@institute193.org.
