The Smalter Gallery
Join us for our Grand Opening!
March 29th 7-10pm
1802 W 39th St Kansas City, MO
Our Mission
The Smalter Gallery is a resource and advocate for both emerging and experienced artists. The goal of the Smalter Gallery is to create a welcoming space for artists, so that they may make tangible their greatest aspirations. This is accomplished through close relationships with artists and comprehensive support packages that help the artist reach a wider audience. The gallery maintains an open door policy intended to encourage artists to feel comfortable sharing their concerns and questions with the gallery team.
The gallery aims to curate an experience that leaves every patron from a first-time buyer to an avid collector feeling welcomed and comfortable.
Our Vision
The Smalter Gallery is held accountable to both its represented artists and its patrons. We aim to create a space in which our artists feel guided, valued and cared for. Our patrons will feel they have been welcomed into a place where art can be experienced free of the pressure, fear or stress. The Smalter Gallery team is passionate, compassionate, non-judgmental and always enthusiastic about supporting new methods of creative expression. The gallery hopes to serve as a second home and lighthouse for new artists exploring and expanding their craft. The gallery will not exclude, ostracize or shame patrons or artists for any reason, and will encourage patrons and makers of all ages, races, sexual orientations, and socioeconomic backgrounds.
Meet Emily
“I fell in love with art during a tour of a warehouse comprised of dozens of open studios. I was maybe 10 years old, but I vividly remember being totally overwhelmed seeing people have their own space to paint, mold clay and write poetry. It felt like being in a cathedral. Despite that, I never became an artist myself and got my degree in psychology. During my bachelor’s I worked at a local art gallery and loved it more than any of my coursework, but I was committed to my degree at the time and pushed those feelings aside.
You can only run from your dreams for so long. After a few years in the social work and research field I decided I needed to create a space where I could help people feel the same magic I felt when I saw the work in those open studios, the same magic I feel now when I go into galleries and museums – it’s a feeling of connection I don’t think you can replicate in any other way besides standing in front of someone’s original work and taking it in. Art communicates something beyond words, more intimate and personal than anything we can experience online and I think we need that now more than ever.” – Emily Smalter