1. culture watch culture watch
HIGH ON ART
Bill Lowe, passionate art lover and advocate, is moving his gallery to a high-
profile Midtown address
By Lisa Frank
ho else could say—all in
W bill?
the same sentence—that
he sold a multi-million
dollar Kandinsky painting
and started out as a waiter
hoping for a good shift to pay the light
Meet Bill Lowe, a self-described
“empire builder.” This Atlanta gallery
owner points out that most of his male
clients are empire builders too:
All Photos courtesy of the Lowe Gallery
developer Charlie Ackerman, music
impresario LA Reid of Def Jam
Recordings, the president of
DreamWorks in Los Angeles and many
others. “You attract people who are like
you,” he told us during a relaxed
conversation in his Atlanta office.
“We’re all about raising the stakes and Gallery owner Bill Lowe is moving his gallery to Two Peachtree Pointe in Midtown after 18 years at TULA.
paving the way.” He admits there’s a
down side. Empire builders are never “The new building articulates my aorta.” He’s thrilled to be across the
content. “We always want more.” vision of who we are today,” Lowe says. street from the hip new urban campus
Enter another empire builder—his “John and I have similar personalities; of SCAD—the Savannah College of Art
new landlord, John Dewberry, former we share a commitment to quality.” and Design—and just north of the High
Georgia Tech quarterback with major Lowe boldly adds, “I contemplate global Museum. He lives two blocks away in
real estate holdings in the heart of domination of the art world. So my Ansley Park.
Midtown. Thanks to Dewberry’s castle must reflect that. If I move, it Lowe recalls the early days when
incentives, designed to lure the has to have a huge WOW factor to another generous soul took a big risk
prestigious gallery to his new building, engage ‘our tribe’ [Lowe’s nickname for on him: Lily Friedlander. She still
Two Peachtree Pointe, The Lowe his family of artists and loyal owns TULA, a former electrical plant
Gallery moves uptown in March, collectors].” she converted into artist studios and
leaving behind two decades of history Lowe sees his new Midtown address galleries in 1983. “Lil has been a
at TULA, a secluded warehouse with as “the epicenter of Atlanta” and the guardian angel for me,” Lowe shares.
more than a dozen galleries in south stretch from Pershing Point to 10th “She was crazy to lease to me 20 years
Buckhead at the end of Bennett Street. Street—his new gallery site—as “the ago with my limited resources. Without
76 ATLANTA STYLE AND DESIGN | WINTER 08

2. 1. 2.
4. 3.
Photograph by Greg Mooney (left)
1. Steven Seinberg, Edge 2, oil and graphite on canvas. make the average person comfortable
2. Dusty Griffith, At Peace, wax, oil, acrylic on panel. with art,” Lowe believes. “I find the
3. Bill Lowe, Ted Turner, Rhett Turner and Eva Lowe. common ground and make art make
sense.” He wonders how clients and
4. Margarita Checa, The Beating of Life, olive wood
their children could have the sensual
and mahogany.
art experience he is going for if there
her, I would not be in business today,” gallery and sell privately.” Yet one of were no gallery. After all, Lowe readily
he acknowledges. his favorite gallery owners in San admits, “I do sexualize everything. I
And in a climate where many gallery Francisco understands what drives want people to leave here jazzed
owners around the country are finding Lowe when he says, “You have too because they’re thinking about how
“the brick and mortar thing is archaic,” much ego to do what you do without a that painting will change their world.
Bill Lowe admits. “Everyone says they public stage, don’t you?” Anything important we do in our lives
make more money once they close the “If I do have a gift, it is my ability to stems from a personal passion and
78 ATLANTA STYLE AND DESIGN | WINTER 08

3. strong desire. If someone loves a
painting enough, they find a way to
own it.”
Speaking of passion, over-the-top
drama and sexuality, opening
receptions at The Lowe Gallery are
legendary. A recent party celebrating
the gallery’s 18th anniversary was a
scene straight from Sex and the City.
Free cosmopolitans at multiple bars,
hundreds of young fashionistas,
spectacular catered food, loud techno-
music, and muscular dancers pumping
above the crowd on elevated pedestals.
Are we still in Atlanta? All the other
TULA galleries were open, yet the
energy was clearly at Lowe.
In fact, he is the only Atlanta art
dealer with a second location in
another city. He chose trendy Santa
Monica in West L.A., of course. And it’s
thriving. We asked if he finds client
tastes are different in Los Angeles and
Atlanta. The answer is, “Not really. We
attract people who share our highly
emotional taste in art,” Lowe says.
Interestingly, most of his west coast
clients have east coast origins.
“Growing up in Alabama, I’m painfully
southern,” he smiles, eager to promote
emerging southern artists whose work
often hangs right next to more
established artists, “to see if they can
hold their own.”
In the end, Lowe believes great art
can have a healing, nurturing effect.
He calls it “psychic surgery—literally.
I’m obsessed with harmonics and
unseen energies,” he explains. Art is
selected for its power to speak straight
to the heart, an aspect often ignored by
a purely intellectual approach. “A great
painting can open the viewer right up.
It can reconfigure their energies.
That’s the surgery part,” Lowe adds,
believing this unique approach gives
his gallery a distinctive point of view.
When the $145 million Cobb Energy
Performing Arts Centre opened in
September, their board unanimously
80 ATLANTA STYLE AND DESIGN | WINTER 08

4. selected The Lowe Gallery to oversee
the site-specific public art. “I have 80
artists who could have done a stunning
installation, yet Jimmy O’Neal’s work
stood out,” Lowe recalls. “I thought his
southern roots were meaningful.” The
result is a 28-foot-wide painting and
assemblage titled The Nine Muses
which draws on Greek mythology, yet
is very contemporary. The Lowe
Gallery recently lent their southern
sensibility to Blackberry Farm, a
luxury spa destination in Tennessee’s
Smoky Mountains, named among the
finest in the world. Nine huge
paintings were installed in an 18th-
century barn, converted to the finest,
most expensive organic restaurant in
the southeast.
This fall, richly colored, oversized
photographs by filmmaker Rhett
Turner filled the main gallery. “I’m
going to try to be more restrained at
this opening because of the nature of
the work,” Bill Lowe confides. Turner’s
powerful portraits introduce natives
from Yemen and Libya.
Remarks by the artist’s father—Ted
Turner—were uncharacteristically
brief. “This is a great gallery, and, son,
I am so proud of you,” is all he said. It
is a genuinely emotional moment. (Isn’t
that what everyone wants to hear from
a father—especially if that father is an
empire builder?) The crowd continues
to pour in. It’s just another day of
highly charged emotions and live
theater at The Lowe Gallery.
About that global domination, “I
don’t really want it,” Lowe concedes as
our conversation comes to a close. “It
would be way too much work.” Perhaps
his dream to dominate the art scene in
Atlanta and L.A. is enough for now.
Lisa Frank is an Atlanta writer and
public relations consultant with a
special interest in the arts and
environmental issues
www.frankrelations.com.
ATLANTA STYLE AND DESIGN | WINTER 08 81