In 2005, art curator Louky Keijsers Koning created LMAKprojects in New York City in order to give emerging international artists a space where they could develop professionally while building connections with new audiences. LMAK — an abbreviation of Louky’s full name, Louky Marie Antoinette Keijsers — consisted of a main gallery in Manhattan’s Chelsea District as well as a supplementary project space in Williamsburg. The dual-space setup allowed LMAKprojects to simultaneously create innovative and engaging art shows while building a solid reputation within New York’s mainstream art scene.
In 2009, Louky’s husband and fellow art curator Bart Keijsers Koning began focusing on LMAK full time. That same year, the couple decided to relocate its gallery and project space to Manhattan’s Lower East Side, an area that was receptive to its intent of engaging audiences with thought-provoking conceptual art.
“The nice thing that the Lower East Side is doing is drawing crowds that are very serious about art and what to engage, and [they] really look,” Bart says.
Louky, an independent art curator and art historian, has been known to take a DIY approach to showcasing art, including projects such as hosting guerrilla film screening from a truck. Her efforts with LMAK are guided by this same ideology of curating innovative contemporary art.
Both Louky and Bart have an interest in any medium of art that challenges the viewer in some way. They gravitate towards work that gives insight into the artist’s creative process and that captures a sense of progression in his or her methodologies and thought processes.
In March, LMAK will feature work by Elana Herzog, an artist who creates “sculptural drawings” from found textiles and staples. Her work blurs the lines between 2-D and 3-D spaces and high-brow and low-brow culture through the use of discarded fabrics.
LMAK also represents a number of international artists whose work is more conceptualized, so Louky and Bart have found inventive ways to forge connections between artists and potential collectors by building a solid online presence and marketing endeavors for their artists.
“We are constantly reviewing with the artist new goals and new ways to approach people,” Bart says. “It’s not just the show that you put up; that would be a quarter of the work.”
Aside from the exhibits, the Keijsers Konings curate LMAKseries, which showcases work by video and audio artists and allows the couple to continue delivering a broad perspective of innovative art.
“It keeps us aware and on the level of looking around, interested, fresh, and engaged,” Bart says. “It is personally what we do the gallery for; we are interested in art and the process of art, and we like to be a platform for that.”
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