I’m going to warn you, I can be quite pedantic. I like refer to my Free Little Art Gallery as a “Free Little Art Gallery”. (There’s even a site for them at freelittleartgalleries.art.)
And yet, I have one friend who will not use the shortened name FLAG because I guess they were involved with some other thing called “FLAG” and had a bad experience or something… so they call it an Art Library.
Another friend does a little better, and calls it a Little Art Library. So close! It’s Free Little Art Gallery… You know, it’s Free, it’s Little (and the art is Little) and it’s a Gallery.
I guess if you are used to talking about a Little Free Library you might get tripped up saying Free Little Art Gallery.
When I was describing it to my daughter months ago I said “It’s a Little Free Art Gallery… an LFAG!” before I realized I switched the letters, and quickly figured out that it was FLAG not LFAG. (For obvious reasons!)
So here’s the thing… I really don’t care what you call it, as long as you come and see it and take some art! Yes, you know… take some art. Some people see something and say “Oh, I love that thing, but I don’t want to take it, because someone else might want it.”
Please. Take the art. That’s why it’s there. I made something and put it there, or a friend of mine (or someone I don’t even know) put art there because they want to share it with the world!
So if you want something grab it. If you see something that someone you know might like, grab it. If a friend has a birthday coming up, grab it, give it to them and say “I thought of you when I saw this, and thought you might like it!” You don’t even have to tell them it was free, or where you got it from. I mean, isn’t it awesome you’re sharing someone’s art with someone you know?
I was thinking about someone calling it an Art Library, and remembered that one of my neighbors mentioned he used to check out art from the local library. What? Yes! You can check out art from the public library, hang it in your house for a while, then return it when it’s due. The Free Little Art Library can work the same way. If you see something you like, grab it, take it home, and keep it for a while. You can always return it.
I rotate things out if they’ve been in the gallery too long and no one takes it. If it goes through a few rotations I may drop it off at one of the other FLAGs in the area. (Either 65th & Clarke in Wauwatosa or 87th & Locust in Milwaukee)
It’s a Free Little Art Gallery. The Gallery is Little. The Art is Little. The Art is Free. Come and get it!