Chinatown’s beehive of art galleries just got a little busier. Erica Garcia, Argentinean singer-songwriter turned Californian émigré, celebrated the opening of NewHigh Gallery just last month with an inaugural exhibit by Matt Fishbeck. Now, she’s gearing up for the artist Kottie Paloma and her gallery’s second show.
We tracked her down at Chango, where she enlightened us on karmic return and the joys of multitasking.
How did you come across the NewHigh Gallery space?
The thing is that I had a dream. This was two and a half months ago… My birthday is on April 6th and on April 10th I have this dream that I’m renting out a space to show art. I woke up, and the same day I found the space in Chinatown.
What did it look like in your dream?
It was bigger, of course. (Laughs) It was more like a warehouse.
Did you have any experience with the art world before opening the NewHigh?
No. My first approach to art was music. I come from a family of two musicians. But my parents, they had a trucking business carting around art books. My first thing, I used to see pictures from el Prado, the Louvre, pictures of galleries in Milan, everything when I was five years old. All these books just sitting in the back of the truck.
You've been just as busy with music these days, it seems. Your band Mountain Party has an E.P. out, right?
It’s actually a full-length, and it’s being distributed this week. It’s a process of little by little. In Argentina I was signed to big companies, and when I came here, I decided to start from scratch. Nobody knew me, so I started my own label and I recorded the whole album myself. Once I got my album done, it was a matter of doing the things I’ve always wanted to do.
And now you’re opening your second exhibition this weekend.
This is actually very special to me because this is the first artist I bring from San Francisco. He’s so playful and I feel connected to that playfulness, and also the wildness in his work. I see his paintings and drawings and I think to myself Okay, this is NewHigh. He was really my inspiration, and this was even before the dream. He doesn’t know that. (Laughs)
Who have you met recently that’s really impressed you?
I saw Swami Veda Barahti give a lecture last week. He said Everything you do, whatever it is, you’re performing karma. And this struck me as totally true. When I decided to have the gallery, I’m performing karma in my life. At the same time, people are asking me, Why are you doing this? This is always the first question. And I say Because I want to. Because I like it. And it came to me. Things don’t come to you if you can’t do them.
An act of providence?
Yeah. Because I am an artist with no formal anything, I believe in those people who don’t necessarily have the formation. I don’t care if an artist studied or not. The same is true with my approach to the gallery. I don’t care if I don’t belong to the art world. Because now I belong.
George Ducker is contributing editor for Metromix Los Angeles.
