Artsy Cities: Savannah – Rough Draft Atlanta

When my family and I were thinking about where to go for our summer trip, we decided to visit Savannah. I had only visited the city once before, for part of a day, about 15 years ago, when I visited the Savannah College of Art and Design. I didn’t end up attending the school, but the city left an impression on me.

I had heard so many amazing things about Savannah’s art scene, especially since my friend Sky Benson moved to the city and built a thriving career as a muralist a few years ago.

I was curious to see what another big art-focused Southern city would look like. How would it compare to Atlanta’s art scene? I had a lot to learn.

Before leaving on my trip, I knew very little about Savannah: it is a historic, artistic and haunted city!

Luckily for me, I didn’t experience anything scary while I was there. But I was pleasantly surprised by how art-filled the city is. We stayed near the Starland art district, and I saw cool art around me every time I stepped outside our Airbnb.

Savannah is home to SCAD, of course, as well as a multitude of galleries and museums. But beyond that, art is simply everywhere. I saw many sticker-covered street signs, murals, folk art rebelliously stapled high up on telephone poles, and even the most common signage seemed to be almost exclusively handwritten.

It seems to me that Savannah is unique not only in the support of the arts by local organizations and the community, but also in the way that unauthorized art in various forms is allowed to exist in public spaces. As a result, walking around the city feels almost like walking through an outdoor art gallery, with little surprises around every corner.

One day during our trip, while my family and I were in the historic district and looking for a place to have lunch, we went to City Market. Located on W. Bryan Street, the two-story City Market not only houses an information booth and local shops, but also a selection of art galleries and workspaces.

This is the City Market art center in Savannah.

“The goal of the nonprofit organization when it was founded was and is to encourage collaboration and community among artists,” said Kimberly Phillips, City Market’s executive director.

Founded in 1989, the center is characterized by wide, airy corridors lined with art spaces. Large windows allow one to see inside, even if the artists or gallery owners are not currently in their studios.

“We believe that art centers play an important role in both fostering community among artists and supporting the local economy,” Phillips said.

“In addition, the City Market Art Center is open to the public so the community can interact with the artists. This encourages appreciation of what our artists create and brings their work to the public.”

For some artists, like Brian MacGregor, interacting with audiences face to face is not only enjoyable, it can also become part of their artistic practice.

MacGregor has been a working artist for over 20 years and has lived in Savannah since 2000. He is one of the art center’s longtime resident artists and shares an upstairs studio space with fellow artist Tafy LaPlanche.

In his half of the studio, the walls are adorned with a colorful series of his paintings. A closer look reveals that the background of each work is made up of sheets of paper covered in handwriting. For more than 15 years, MacGregor has collected the dreams of the people he meets in dream journals.

He has accumulated thousands of such pages over the years and sees their integration into his works as a commentary on the concept of collective consciousness. Visitors who enter his studio are one of his most important sources of new dreams that he uses in his works. He has also shared how valuable he finds it to see the real-time reactions of viewers.

“It’s like opening a factory to see what’s going on behind the scenes,” MacGregor says. “In a traditional art gallery, the gallery usually doesn’t want the client to meet the artist, that’s a faux pas,” he explains. Here, in his studio in a busy shopping district popular with tourists, he can connect directly with those who might want to buy his work.

“With our property being heavily frequented by tourists, the artists at City Market Art Center interact daily with visitors from around the world,” Phillips said. “The art center creates a unique environment where visitors can observe the creation of artwork and speak directly with the artists about their methods and process. It’s truly a unique attraction and interaction that can’t be found anywhere else.”

MacGregor, who travels frequently for his exhibitions and mural projects, says he always looks for art centers when visiting a new city. “Over time, these types of spaces are becoming more and more important because they encourage employment and interest in the arts, and promote art as a realistic profession,” MacGregor said.

In addition to SCAD and the City Market Art Center, Savannah is also home to the Telfair Museums, the Savannah Music Festival, the Jepson Center, the Starland Arts District, and a number of historical museums such as the Ships of the Sea Maritime Museum and the Ralph Mark Gilbert Civil Rights Museum.

For a city that is brimming with art galleries (I found over 100 by careful count), they have managed to retain their historic charm, foster a vibrant tourist economy, and still leave room for new artists to grow and flourish.

Learn more about the City Market Art Center on the City Market website and see more of Brian MacGregor’s work here.