About

Inspired by the open source initiative and the ease of interactivity on the web, we share a transparent agenda at Open Source. We offer creatives, their families and our neighbors access to a project space, a creative community, and regular opportunities to make art part of their daily lives. We welcome input and contributions focused on offering challenging commentary via the process of artmaking.

ABOUT OPEN SOURCE – THE GALLERY:

OPEN SOURCE is a not-for-profit organization founded by Monika Wuhrer and Gary Baldwin in 2008 as a participant driven art initiative. In our new space, we will continue to provide a community and conceptual context for creative play and critical commentary.

HISTORY:

Since opening its doors in February of 2008, Open Source has presented work by various artists. Shows have presented conceptually driven painting, installation, sculpture, new-media, and performance. Open Source has also organized participatory events that included Soap Box Derby an camp, a workshop, where kids build amazing box cars out of materials they find in the trash. 17th street, the gallery’s former address, has enough of an incline to race the cars. Another annual event is the Soup Kitchen, which invited a different artist to cook a one-pot meal for the public each night in December.

In November of 2010 a 5-alarm fire in the gallery’s neighboring building devastated the Open Source project space. After six months of being itinerant, we now have a new permanent space in Park Slope, at 306 17th St. Brooklyn, NY 11215.

THE PEOPLE:

Originally founded by Gary Baldwin and Monika Wuhrer, parents of Oskar, Hugo, and Peter. After receiving a Bachelor of the Arts degree from the University of Texas at Austin, Gary came to New York City in 1994 to study at the School of Visual Arts, where he earned a Masters of Fine Arts in Photography and related media. Monika is from Austria, and after studying in Milan, Italy, returned to her native country where she completed her Masters of the Arts in sculpture from the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna.
In March 2011 Frank De Leon-Jones joined the team, just in time to help co-curate the site specific group show ASSOCIATED in a fire damaged brownstone.
Hilary Bentley joined the Open Source staff in November 2011 during the Borderland Collective project. Like Gary, she was born in Texas and studied photography in Austin.

OPEN SOURCE GALLERY BOARD:

Executive Director: Monika Wuhrer
Monika Wuhrer founded Open Source Gallery with her husband Gary Baldwin in 2008. She is originally from Austria, and after studying in
Milan, Italy, returned to her native country where she completed her Masters of the Arts in sculpture from the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna. She is a passionate mother, curator, artist, art educator and director.

Chair of the board: Conrad Lower
Conrad Lower is a lawyer who currently works with the Worker’s Compensation Board. He has been an ardent fan of Open Source since Open Source opened its doors in 2008.

Secretary: Michelle Jaslow
Michele Jaslow is principal curator at Radar Curatorial, an arts curatorial team based in Brooklyn, New York, dedicated to working with artists, museums, galleries, arts institutions, corporations, and private clients to help meet their exhibition needs. Michele has curated for the Exploratorium Museum, Cranbrook Museum, the Museum of Television & Radio, Brooklyn Artists Gym Gallery and the Brooklyn Arts Council. She has served on the boards of the Volunteer Coders For The Arts, The BAG Fund, the Park Slope Afterschool Center and Open Source Gallery. Michele holds an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art and a BFA from SUNY Purchase. She studied Interactive Multimedia Technologies at New York University, Drawing at the Arts Students League and Applied Physics at the University of California San Francisco.

Treasurer: Charlotte Mendelaar
Charlotte Mendelaar has been working in New York as a consultant and business coach since 2008. Prior to that she has worked as a database application consultant with many not-for-profits nationally, and as an accounting software consultant for small businesses in the metropolitan area. Since 2008 she has been studying Neuro-Linguistic-Programming (NLP) to use as a tool in her consulting work and she has completed the Master Practitioner class at the NLP Training Institute in New York. She is interested in how organizations can change realistically and responsibly, how staff can be motivated to change with the organization and how organizations can grow in an organic and sustainable way. She is very excited to work with Open Source and has been working with Monika Wuhrer on organization and growth.

MEMBERS

Lorna Clark
Lorna Clark is a practicing artist and educator living in Brooklyn, NY. She is currently completing her MA degree in the Art & Art Education program at Teachers College, Columbia University and will be graduation in 2012. Lorna is a student teacher at The Children’s School and previously at The Brooklyn School for Collaborative Studies. She has taught Photography and Photoshop in the after-school program at The Children’s School and was a Photography Instructor at the Rhode Island School of Design.
Lorna received an MFA in Photography from the Rhode Island School of Design, and a BFA in Communication, Arts and Design from Virginia Commonwealth University. She has been a Contributing Artist and Digital Retoucher at Vanity Fair Magazine since 2002.

Sheryll Durrant
Sheryll has been involved with the arts for over two decades. She was co-owner of Hummingbirds, an art and craft gallery in Soho during the 90s, after which she curated group shows independently in and around Brooklyn. She was a Senior Relationship Manager for St. John’s University from 2004 until she resigned in 2010 in order to pursue her emerging passion — sustainability.
She is currently Director of Community Outreach and Program Director of the Urban Farm and Garden for Sustainable Flatbush, an organization that “brings neighbors together to mobilize, educate, and advocate for sustainable living in our Brooklyn neighborhood and beyond.” She is also co-president of the Board of Trustees for Brooklyn Free School, a school she helped to found along with her artist husband and other parents. Sheryll brings her substantial marketing expertise to Open Source Gallery and is very interested in working on fundraising initiatives.

Kate Harwood
Kate Harwood is the principal owner of Kate Harwood Design, a design and architecture firm in Brooklyn. After a long career as a graphic designer and involvement in the art scene in the East Village in the 80’s and 90’s, she received a degree in architecture from the Rhode Island School of Design. She is passionate about design and art and is interested in helping out with numerous aspects of Open Source.

Nick Kline
Nick Kline lives and works in New York. He has exhibited his photographs in solo exhibitions at Museum of Art of Puerto Rico, San Juan, PR; Momenta Art, Brooklyn, NY; The Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton, NJ; Uno Art Space, Stuttgart, Germany, and others. Upcoming solo exhibitions include Project Room Normanns, Stavanger, Norway; and Centre d’artistes Vaste et Vague as part of the 2012 “International Meeting of Photography,” Gaspésie, Canada. Group exhibitions include venues: Smack Mellon Studios, Brooklyn, NY; Allentown Art Museum, Allentown, PA; Hirschl Contemporary Art, London, England, Plus Ultra Gallery, Brooklyn, NY. Reviews of his work include: The New York Times; The Philadelphia Inquirer; Lift Magazine; Time-Out NY; Lapiz Magazine; and others. Kline was awarded a grant from Foundation for Contemporary Art, NYC, in 2011. His work has been featured in numerous publications including Frankfurter Rundschaue Magazine, Phototecknik Magazine and Performance Research Journal. Nick received an MFA, Cranbrook Academy of Art, and BFA, University of the Arts. Kline is an Assistant Professor, Photography, Department of Arts, Culture and Media at Rutgers University-Newark.

Gesa Kudlack
Gesa Kudlack received her Masters in Arts Administration and business degree in Germany and has lived and worked internationally for almost 20 years – as an artist, producer, co-producer, host and contributing writer in music, media and theatre.
Among her work she produced and co-hosted short-films and TV documentaries, worked with Alte Oper Frankfurt, Goettingen Symphonic Orchestra, Jazz festivals in Great Britain and Music Schools in the Republic of Maldives. In Educational Outreach she worked on international exhibits for the Roemer-Pelizaeus Museum and co-founded the subordinated Children’s Art Museum.
In 2000 she left her position as the Executive Director for State Youth Orchestra Nds., Germany, to move to New York. She has since worked as Production Associate for EOS Orchestra, founded Woodenbike.us, is the North America Representative for Holz-Hoerz, GmbH, and is holding the position as Radio Production Assistant for the Metropolitan Opera. She lives with her husband and two children in Brooklyn.

Lily White
Lily White is a jazz saxophonist, composer, and educator. She has also been a huge fan of Open Source since it’s inception. She is currently working towards a Masters in Non-Fiction writing and uses her writing skills to help out with the website, press releases and grant writing. She is married to Conrad Lower, the chair of the Open Source Board and they live in Brooklyn with their daughter Jolene.