Finally.

Finally. You can track down susceptibletoimages.wordpress.com/

Kat Murrell, former co-owner (with Deb Brehmer) of the Portrait Gallery, is flying solo, and if her initial outing is any indication, this is the place to go for well-written info on what’s going on in art. Move over Art City and make room for a smartly designed win-win. Brehmer soldiers on with her Portrait Gallery, and zounds! has added another space (directly across from the PG). It currently features the works of Rudy Rotter. Apparently, Murrell & Brehmer had an amiable parting, as Brehmer says “we’re still art history chick buddies.”

Dean Jensen has been attending the Outsider Art Fair in NY for 16 years. And it ain’t cheap. His booth fee alone is over $10,000, and he emailed me that “I don’t think we did enough business to cover even half of the expenses. “Only three have been disappointing,” he says. One after the dot.com bubble burst in the late 90s, one after 9/11, and this recent one. All in all, we’ve mostly had good years there, and a few of the fairs have been gang busters.”

The Milwaukee Art Museum isn’t the only venue cutting costs. The prestigious Nelson-Atkins in Kansas City has turned back their thermostats and cut their hours. Their splendid Steven Holl Bloch Building addition (contemporary American art primarily) opened a few months ago and I was privileged to visit it in December. It’s everything and more with plenty of room for exhibitions. You can catch the Southwest Chief out of Chicago and be in K.C. in seven hours. You owe it to yourself, if only to see the Isamu Noguchi Sculpture Court. Trust me.

After a stay in my old hometown, I journeyed on the Chief to Arizona and visited the Phoenix Art Museum which also has a sparkling new addition. It was here I saw the best Franz Kline ever, a great Richard Misrach photo and what has to be the best ever Gregory Crewsdon.