He’s Opened a Museum of Modem Art

This art gallery cost about a billion dollars less to build than the new Getty. But for all of the Getty’s sleek modernism, Jon Peterson’s site for viewing art is even more cutting-edge. And to visit Peterson’s gallery, there’s no need to battle crowds, book reservations or board a tram. All one needs to view the work at this virtual gallery is a computer and a modem.

“Every artist should have a chance to show their work,” says Peterson, an abstract painter and creator of https://www.w3art.com. Put off by the elitism in the art world and its fixation on a handful of best-selling artists, Peterson has dedicated himself to finding ways to expose the work of lesser-known but gifted artists.

He’s spent 25 years in art-making and activism. In addition to his Web site, Peterson has literally created a home for scores of Los Angeles artists by developing loft spaces downtown and renting them to painters, sculptors and photographers. A former president and co-founder of DADA, the Downtown Arts Development Assn., he has organized art exhibits and bus tours of artists’ studios to draw attention to the work of Los Angeles artists.

Just five years ago, the Internet couldn’t display pictures. Now Peterson sees the Web as a compass that can point the public toward art that may never show in the Getty or at a swank Westside gallery.

“Seeing art online isn’t a substitute for viewing it at a gallery or museum,” he says. “But the Internet is a great tool to entice the public to come see an artist’s work.”

Log on to https://www.w3art.com (preferably with at least a 28.8-speed modem) and you’ll discover high-quality color and black-and-white images of the works of about 60 mostly Los Angeles-based artists.

To exhibit their work online, artists pay Peterson as little as $80 to scan and display four of their pieces for a year. Thus far, he says, the site has not earned him any money. But Jill D’Agenica, a conceptual artist who creates large installations, says that showing her work online has brought her numerous rewards.

“I’m not interested in doing art that nobody sees,” says D’Agenica, who once placed 4,687 plaster angels throughout Los Angeles. “Art is about communication.”

D’Agenica, whose smallest work is 20 by 40 feet, says she lists the site’s address on her business cards. “In the first part of 1997, I didn’t have any exhibits,” she says. “The only way you could see my work was to view it on the Web or at my studio.”

Gronk, a figurative painter whose work has shown at several national museums and at private U.S. and European galleries, says showing online has sparked a dialogue between him and a number of art students interested in his work.

Peterson is now seeking advertisers--possibly gallery owners--and investors. So far, his biggest cost has been his time, as well as rent for a Web server and phone lines. His tools are Adobe Photoshop and Adobe PageMill, which he uses to display the artists’ works and design his Web site.

To demonstrate how simple it is to exhibit new artists, Peterson added several of this reporter’s travel photographs to his gallery.

Did I mention that there are works of art on display at https://www.w3art.com that cannot be seen at the Getty?