My posting on galleryphobia has been getting responses from gallerists as far as Canada, Uruguay and the UK!
But best is this one from photographer James W. Bailey from the Greater Reston Arts Center in Reston, Virginia:
I wanted to recognize your scientific identification of galleryphobia. I believe that I have identified a sub-species at the Greater Reston Arts Center.Funny!!!
It just so happens that the most popular cigarette break spot at Reston Town Center is right in front of our largest window. There’s a concrete planter that sits facing our window and the smokers congregate for their isolationist rituals 6 to 8 times a day.
During the course of their smokes breaks, especially when their thin conversations have worn thinner, many of them will walk right up to the glass, plaster their faces against the glass, raise their hands above their heads to block the light so they can see better and stare through the glass while puffing away on their cancer sticks.
But they never come in! There’s this one girl whom I’ve been watching for 2 ½ years through the damn glass! She’s never stepped foot in the gallery.
Yet, everyday she’ll stare inside. I’ve tried opening the door, stepping outside and asking people to come in and take a look and even offered wine to them.
They are terrified of actually walking into the gallery. If you have no objection, I’m naming this sub-species, galleryphobia smokerterrifiedicus.
By the way, a $38,000 life size statute was brazenly stolen this last weekend from an artist's booth, in front of thousands of art lovers at the Northern Virginia Fine Arts Festival.
