After a years-long hiatus from running the Regina Rex gallery in Manhattan, Craig Monteith and Alta Buden have announced a new gallery in Kingston’s Stockade District named Roundabouts Now.
“I’ve been resistant to doing it again for a really long time,” says Monteith, “but I asked Alba if she wanted to do it with me.”
Buden marvels that she immediately said, “yeah, of course. I want to do this.” Considering the intervening years, she surprised herself with her answer.
“We started in a studio building full of galleries in Bushwick,” Buden recalls. “When everyone got kicked out, Craig found a spot on the Lower East Side and we made the move to Manhattan, which was something we never thought we would do.”
Over the course of seven years, Buden says the middle fell out of the market and art sales paid for the location less and less. Even so, the two managed to make ends meet without going out of pocket. Time ran out in Chinatown before the money did.
“The landlord told us he wanted us to leave. And we said, ‘oh no, we’re going to stay,’ Buden remembers. “So to get us out, he started flooding our gallery from above. He just let the bathroom faucets above leak and water started coming down the walls. It was just one of those things where – we can fight him, but at what cost?”
While Buden drifted into motherhood and Monteith into bowling, art was never far from center. Monteith is an art handler by trade. Buden is a sculptor teaching out of the Art Center of the Capitol Region in Troy.
Monteith estimates the gallery space is an intimate 700 square feet. A giant picture window set in an interior wall left over from the medical practice allows viewers on the outside to look in at those looking at art, or conversely, viewers inside to look out and watch the watchers, watching them.
“Our emphasis is going to be more on conceptual work, whether it’s painting, sculpture, installation or whatever,” Monteith says. “We’re not going to be doing the sort of work that is designed to satisfy the market. That may happen coincidentally. But our primary focus is to show challenging work, not the simple, pretty stuff.”
The opening night show is titled “The Middle Ages” and will feature the works of 19 artists. Kingston Bread and Bar, who bakes their edible sundries in the same building as the art gallery, will serve pizza up at the opening.
Of special note is an infamous kiosk first revealed in the City of Hudson, which will get its debut in Kingston.
“It looks like something you’d see at an airport,” says Monteith. “It has a little computer screen and it analyzes your personality. And then it tells you what your personality is and then it squirts flavors onto the computer screen, and then you lick the flavors off, so you can taste your personality.”
“It analyzes your shadow self?” hazards Buden.
“Is that what it is?” Monteith.
It’s not clear how the screen is cleaned, but Monteith assures us the process is sanitary.
Opening night is the Ides of March, Sat. 15. Gallery opens its doors at 5pm at 25 Barbarossa Lane
Join the family! 
