There's no place like home

FLORIDA WEEKLY FILE PHOTO The von Liebig Art Center in Naples has hosted a number of events including these Tibetan monks who created a sand mandala. Naples needed an art center.

So the Naples Art Association built one.

It's that simple. And that difficult.

"It took passion and tenacity," says Bette Young, former NAA president and building chairperson. "You have to have passion for what you're doing, and everybody that was involved had the passion.

"The Naples Art Association had been here since '54, and we felt the community's visual art services needs were not being met," she explains. "It was our job to do that, and we accepted the challenge."

And so The von Liebig Art Center was built.

The center, which houses four art galleries, six studios, an art library and offices, celebrates its 10th anniversary on Friday, Nov. 21. For years before the center opened, the NAA had bounced around in various locations: in a storefront in old Naples, on Fifth Avenue North, then Fifth Avenue South. But there simply wasn't enough space in any of those places for what the association — and the community — really needed.

When he was planning the redevelopment of Fifth Avenue South for the City of Naples, urban designer Andre Duany was interested in centering things on The Naples Players and the art association.

"He recognized the cultural needs in the community, and he convinced the city council," Ms. Young says. "He shook his finger at them and said, 'You have two great cultural organizations you're going to lose from this city if you do not find space for them.' So they closed off a street for the Players and gave us the corner of Cambier Park."

A community effort

Ms. Young, then-president of the NAA, had no idea how arduous the task would be. She thought they'd be in their new building in a few short years; it took six. "I attended 80 meetings," she recalls. "Eighty meetings with various people involved in the city to secure that lease."

She kept logs of each and every meeting.

"Then people were so generous to us," she says. "The community really wanted this to happen and made it happen. We went twice to the state, and received $500,000 each time from the Cultural Affairs Committee."

The association had to raise matching funds each time.

The von Liebig Association gave $1 million: $650,000 for the building, and $350,000 for an endowment. The Frederick Watson Foundation gave the second largest donation: $400,000. "And the rest came from the generous, generous community," Ms. Young says.

The center was built for $3.5 million. It was built on time, and on budget. "That's what happens when the community wants something to happen," Ms. Young declares.

In 1996, she became the building chairperson, and Elaine Vreenegoor became president of the association.

"It was a grand time, because we were all struggling toward the same thing, to get the center up and running," Ms. Vreenegoor says. "You feel a certain excitement, and you feel achievement when it's done: Wow, I really was a part of it. And it makes you feel pretty good — especially when a lot of people instrumental in this were already retired; we were going to play golf, bridge, sail.

"It was an opportunity. As far as I'm concerned, it is one of the better things I've done in life."

"I joke that I had some time between menopause and Medicare that I wanted to make a contribution to the community," says Ms. Young. "I really wanted to make a significant contribution somewhere, and this fell into my lap."

A dream come true

The City Council asked the association "not to turn our back on the park," Ms. Young says, adding, "They knew we wanted to face out toward 5th Avenue South."

So the architect, Alfred French, designed the front and rear entrances at an angle; the rear doors, which lead out to Bette Young Plaza, open onto Cambier Park.

The von Liebig Art Center opened on Nov. 22, 1998. The two-story, 16,000-square foot building is now a mainstay of the community. It's open seven days a week to the public, and approximately 100,000 visitors a year do so for lectures, workshops classes and exhibitions.

"The whole thing surprised me when it was done," says Ms. Vreenegoor. "It was like a dream… But when it was finally done, you say, 'Oh, that's what it was all about. This is the dream come true.'

"None of us had really any background in doing this sort of thing."

In August 2001, The von Liebig garnered national attention when City Councilman Fred Tarrant, although blind, deemed a satirical political painting obscene and demanded it be taken down. "Famous Tongue Mona, Al, Monica" by local artist Ted Lay showed the Mona Lisa, Albert Einstein and Monica Lewinsky, all sticking their tongues out. (The triptych was based on a famous photograph of Mr. Einstein.) Councilman Tarrant claimed Monica Lewinsky's tongue looked like a penis and threatened to cut off the association's lease.

Barbara Hill, then executive director of the art center, refused to remove the painting. The flap not only gave the center more attention, but drew visitors to the exhibition to see what all the fuss was about.

The von Liebig has held many outstanding exhibits, including, but not limited to: "Naples Collects: A Richard Segalman Retrospective," "Telling and Retelling: Seminole Stories of the Everglades," "Reservations: Native American Children's Art," "The Photographic Landscape: Clyde Butcher and T.K. Hill," "Art for Amusement's Sake: Original Comic Art Drawings from the Collection of Charles Woodruff" and "Awarding Pictures: the Art of Children's Book Illustration."

Last year, the art center hosted a group of Tibetan monks who, over a number of days, created a sand mandala in the main gallery and then destroyed it and released the sand into the Gulf of Mexico.

With Gators Galore, in which local artists decorated large alligator sculptures for auction, the center raised more than $800,000 for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Collier County.

I think the Naples Art Association and The von Liebig will grow very well over the next 10 years," says current executive director Joel Kessler. "The von Liebig, in many ways, needs to be the leader for the renaissance and what's going to happen with art in the downtown area."

"We've reached a marvelous plateau, and now it's time to reach the next plateau," says Ms. Vreenegoor. "It's like climbing the Grand Canyon. You reach the middle plateau, and you rest. Then you go up to the ridge of the canyon… you look around and say, "Which way does our direction lie?'"

"It's a beautiful building," says Ms. Young. "I don't know how it could have been designed better to fit the site and fit the needs. When you walk in, you have the feeling that good things happen here, and you want others to become involved.

"It's a building that just envelops you. It's a happy space."