When Donovan Johnson and his new partnership cohort stepped in to renovate and relaunch the once-venerable Bill Lowe Gallery—transforming it into the buzzy and ambitious Johnson Lowe Gallery of today—it signaled more than a changing of the guard at one of Atlanta’s high-profile art spaces. It was emblematic of a sea change in the national and international aspirations of the whole city’s art ecosystem. Of course, art in Atlanta is not new; it’s been a cultural capital in music, sports, tech, film and television, food, and fashion, and there have been some exceptional galleries in business forever. But there has been a more recent, specific push to up the visual art game, as evidenced by both the arrival of UTA Artist Space to town and the recently held absolutely blockbuster second edition of Atlanta Art Week—a destination affair activating galleries, institutions, pop-ups, and studios across the city in the model of the Gallery Weekend programs familiar to New York, Los Angeles, Berlin, Miami and etc. But, unlike others, Atlanta’s version achieved a more intentional buy-in from the city’s many and glorious public collections and university museums (such as the High Museum and the Spelman College Museum of Fine Art), as well as its several artist studio complexes like Murphy Rail Studios, Temporary Studios, Day & Night Projects and at Atlanta Contemporary.
