I think any ranchers your life.

We live in such a fast society to what we spend most of time at work or at school or home.

People do need to go out and see art.

And, there is something about looking at a beautiful piece of art that lifts your soul.

Well, an effective gallery is one.

It's its, reputation is important, and people know that when they get an invitation from a reputable gallery, there's something of substance worth viewing.

You are at one northeast third Street.

The untitled gallery, the untitled art space.

Actually, it goes beyond being a gallery.

While we were working on the building, everybody kept saying, what is the name of the building?

Well, this particular building had no name.

And, so I, we kept trying to come up with a name and because we're only seven feet from the railroad track, we would come up with.

Tracks, sidetrack or off track or, all of these names that sounded more like betting parlors rather than art galleries.

So finally, one day, I just got tired of everybody saying, you have to name it, you have to name it, you have to name it.

And I just said, okay, it's untitled.

It's it will be the Untitled Gallery.

Two three.

Go!

Okay.

One, two.

Three.

Go!

Oh, wait, wait.

Well, actually, I wanted to have just a studio.

But the space was so huge that I thought, you know, this is really terrible.

I mean, that I would have all of this space.

I should be able to, use it, you know, for multiple uses.

So I, I'd always kind of been critical of the way a lot of, this one up and galleries that I dealt with, were run.

And I always thought if I had a gallery, I would run it a certain way and I would show a certain kind of thing.

And so we started having exhibitions, and I enjoyed, going out and looking at artists work and finding artists to bring people that you otherwise would not be able to see in their work in Oklahoma City.

Well, that was easy.

That was very easy.

It was very grueling.

Yeah, I know.

The Untitled Gallery is more than just a gallery.

It, although it's a wonderful exhibition space, her vision has brought it into the realm of, education, and collaboration and discussion.

I like it this way.

And then we will go ahead and sit this one back behind.

It's become a real mission of Lori's to have a space to help, not only exhibit art for the people of central Oklahoma and beyond, but also to, provide some educational opportunities.

How was how was this work created and why?

I'm John Seward, and this is my daughter Melanie.

And, we've been photographing together for several years now.

Let's go ahead and, bring this hot box.

in Melanie.

When I'm shooting on my projects, Melanie acts as my assistant.

And, when she's shooting, I act as her assistant, though, so she reminds me every now and then that she's a much better assistant than I am.

Melanie, this is Mel, Hi, Mel.

Hi.

Nice to meet you.

Our latest project is, we're, documenting our patients that are in hospice care.

Nice to meet you for the, good Shepherd hospice program.

Yeah, you.

You're looking great.

Ready to have your picture made?

Yes.

Good, good.

Having been in a lot of galleries for many years, and I think my children would say, and wife would say the same thing many, many times you can go into, and there she comes, Miss America.

Where did the camera now.

Say you could spend an, couple of days looking in galleries in Chelsea in New York City.

And you may see 10 or 12 galleries a day.

And for me personally, if I see one gallery or two galleries that has a really dynamic work that touches me, then I think it's been a pretty good day.

Yeah, it's well known and Candid Camera pretty cute.

That is cute.. We're really fortunate to have the untitled gallery in Oklahoma, for not only Laura's vision of art, but as an educational tool as well.

The opening is from five to.

Was it 9 or 8?

I did change it, but then that was before the Friday night faction.

So, I think that you should be here whenever you want to be here, but the opening is at five.

Okay?

Okay.

Well, I know I'll be here right at five, maybe a few minutes before.

Well, it's, running around crazy the day of the opening, trying to get, make sure that all of the kind of woke up and everything's perfect, I, I happen to be a little, sort of a perfectionist in that I. I want everything to be perfect.

Oh.

What does it say?

I have an appointment at 3:00.

At 4:00.

Opening night usually is just a reception for the artist to introduce the public to the artist.

So they can ask questions or interact with the artist and find out, you know, either meet him or her.

So.

And, to have some sort of dialog.

How do you like the negative from that?

No, the negative was was the glass.

We do it all by hand.

And I think that's one of the draws of people when they hear about it.

How do you decide which ones you wanted to show?

Did you kind of have an idea of what.

Yeah, I ended up kind of like my pieces that were my favorite photographs.

And it's here are yours.

These are mine.

What kind of lens Did you use?

These are traditional lenses.

I really I try to find artists that somehow, are sensitive, their work sort of relates to another person's work, or would be so opposite that they would balance each other and, so I, try to find those kinds of situations and bring those artists together for exhibitions When you have a wonderful exhibition up, it's, it's a great thing.

I mean, sometimes I have a hard time taking them down because they're so beautiful, or there's something about them that's so wonderful.

And, and I think that it enriches your life to be in a atmosphere of.

Where creative minds meet and things go on.

And that's what we want to happen in this building.

Well everybody thought I'd lost my mind.

The roof was caved in, the floors upstairs were all rotted out.

It had been actually abandoned for around 37 years.

I remember walking in the front door and, looking at this total, disaster and not taking more than four steps and just saying that I had to save this building.

It has to be.

I have to save it.

Because if I don't save it in three months, it'll be another parking lot.

And there was just something wonderful about it.

I set out for the next five years, with the help of my husband and many friends, and relatives, to renovate the building and turn it into an art space where, different, art events could happen, where it would be a place that people would want to come and, have a dialog about creativity and about the arts.

The upstairs is, has a living space where we can house, artists from other areas in the country to come and do printmaking.

We have a darkroom.

To, a painting studio.

Leadership.

Oklahoma City was here, the other day, and we had, I believe, seven artists who were upstairs making prints.

Well, what we have today is we have four different level, five different locations here of people printing.

And so what we're going to be showing today are different techniques of printmaking.

When, people start seeing, on top and learning about printmaking, let's say, you know, printmaking or painting or sculpture or anything, they educate themselves.

Soon they find themselves, buying art, and it helps to educate and raise the level of awareness of how important art is in one's life.

I don't know how this started, but, I decided that I wanted to stay open late one evening.

Welcome to the, again.

Another Friday night faction.

We're glad that you came for our film.

Farrago for people who are kind of interested in the arts.

And then I guess what you'd call the feature is, an episode from the collection that, Laura has been storing.

And it's an episode of The Outer Limits.

The original Outer Limits, from 1963 to 65.

It gives them a place to come.

They always know that if they don't have something else going on Friday night, we can go down to the untitled gallery, and there will be something down there that we would be interested in.

These films are still out there, but as we move into the digital world where, you know, everything's going to to DVDs and so forth, these films live on and it's places like this that we get to see them.

The one thing is that you never know what's going to happen here.

Well, I think what makes, this, space different than most galleries is that we are more than just a gallery.

Let's get that wall out and let's move it where that that bench is.

Laura's Untitled Gallery is almost an installation in itself.

You could strip all the all the artwork off the walls, walk in there and have a great conversation about the facility itself.

It is a piece of art.

You go back when it's the old craftsman.

It's where laying the bricks or doing those wonderful wooden beams in the gallery.

And that's a conversation space itself.

And so that added, with the the art that chooses to place in the galleries is an open dialog.

People come in, they're ready to talk about the building, about the art.

It's an open communication with Laura.

It's a it makes for an easier well, it's all about job of communicate with the public.

One coming down and one going up.

Whether it's to sell a piece of art, you know that that interpersonal reaction already there.

This other gallery is important because of the size and the ambiance to have the acoustics, you know, with, you know, nobody's afraid to talk once I you're in the gallery and just a wonderful place to to have a beginning.

For any artist to do some of the work there is because he has halos and shadowing on several.

Well, and this is all allowed.

This is all for this is, this is all my print.

This is not a separate print from this one.

So I think that supporting the arts is a is a vital importance to a community.

Well, you have to have a great cultural community in a city.

In the stronger that it gets, the more industry can that comes in.

It brings in tourism.

I mean, it's just very vital to a community to have a good arts and cultural community.

And the more that that is going on in the more, cultural events and the more galleries that we have here, the more things, the larger numbers will be supportive of the.

them.