Agora Gallery, NY

I did post this on NENP, too, not sure how much the member-traffic overlapps, I post it here, too:
Does anybody know Agora Gallery (in Chelsea)? And if yes, any impressions you can share, - even better: experiences? preferably via Email.
Many Thanks in advance!
Georg

http://www.agora-gallery.com/

They contacted me multiple times (I believe they look for potential candidates on the Internet and cast a pretty wide net). Unlike most galleries, they charge you a large sum of money upfront for representation. This seemed suspect to me. Most galleries vet their artists and represent what they believe is worthwhile work and make their money on commission. Agora doesn't seem to care who the artist is and instead is looking to make money renting out wall space. Not that there's anything inherently wrong with that, but I was not comfortable with this approach. As far as I can tell they are a legitimate business, though.

Guy

My impression is the same as Guy's. There is something wrong with that approach, not legally, ethically or morally but it is bad marketing from the perspective of the artist/photographer. You aren't getting your work presented to a targeted audience of likely buyers. It's the gallery equivalent of putting your stuff on the net in a generic site for anyone who happens to wander in. A website is much cheaper though.

Likewise had several contacts from them over the past year, and posted the question on NPN... got some mixed feedback from people here and artists I know, and haven't followed up on it.

I know a gallery/fine art printer that's local to me, a good local one, has gone this route. Of course, their fees are nowhere near Agora's (nominal actually) and they are also a printer whose business I believe has suffered with the economy. They don't just put up anyone's work, in fact, their "vanity" opening was one of the best shows I've seen there.

But I keep hearing more about vanity galleries being on the upswing...

yeah, I already suspected that. got contacted a couple of times by them now, but the website looks fine and I know some names on their lists. but also not sure if this is something worth considering for me.
thanks folks.
georg

i think it's a case of they are what they purport to be, just depends if you a) think it's worth that money to be in a show in NYC and b) are philosophically ok with it (i know many think it's stupid!!)

I believe Anil Rao had a show with them and wrote about it here. He publicly places his email on his web site so I don't think he'll mind my posting it here. info@anilraophotography.com

There is a lot of money in NYC but being an ex New Yorker, it doesn't appear that there's a lot of interest in comtemporary color landscape photography.

- Dan.

Great. Many Thanks, Dan.
georg