Theresa Pollak in her painting class studio at Richmond Professional Institute, later VCU (Photo courtesy VCU James Branch Cabell Library, Special Collections & Archives)
Back in the misty early 1990s, I composed a roundup of makers and creators for the pages of Richmond magazine. Trying to sound cool by using a pop reference, I titled the September 1994 feature story “They Might Be Giants.”
The assortment included The Useless Playboys, with upright bass player Jonny Cecka, who died this past May of diabetes; Steve’s House Dance Collective, with members including Lea Marshall and Rob Petres, who went on to form Dogtown Dance; Bio Ritmo, still making their Latin rhythms after personnel changes; Katharine Gates, author of “Deviant Desires” (1989); and Wesley Gibson, teacher and author of “Shelter” (1992) and “Personal Saviors” (2011), who died in late 2016.
After the 1994 publication, there came no fuss, no event, and we got on with the next thing. Fall arts and entertainment issues breathed in and out.
I remained intrigued by the idea of a cross-disciplinary honoring of makers and creators, but I didn’t know what to name such a thing. My wife, the artist Amie Oliver, didn’t hesitate when I wondered aloud about my problem: “You should name it after Theresa Pollak.”
As is the usual case, Amie was right.
Without Pollak, what is known today as the Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts would not exist, nor would the arts program at the University of Richmond. Pollak, who lived from 1899 to 2002, made art for most of the 20th century. Born here, she traveled and lived for a time in New York City, and throughout her long life, she kept learning and experimenting in her work.
Pollak (center) speaks at the Second Annual Pollak Prizes for Excellence in the Arts in 1999. (Photo by Joan Tupponce)
Editorial Director Susan Winiecki liked the idea of naming these honors for Pollak. With the help of John Bryan, then in development at the VCU School of the Arts, we floated the idea by Pollak, and she gave her blessing, later appearing at the actual ceremony in its second year. Thus, on a warm September evening in 1998, we gathered in the upper space of the Anderson Gallery with folding chairs and coolers filled with drinks to hand out the first awards.
The “Prize” part I never really liked because in the art world prizes often come with a check attached. In the long run, though, the Pollak seems to have felt like a gift to its recipients — that of recognition by their community and peers.
The selection process involved a panel of former honorees and community members, with a roster of names that at first were accumulated by forms left at galleries and venues, and that later were collected online. We seated the selectors, I left the room, and then we tabulated the results.
Mandy Moore with then-Event Coordinator Portia Zwicker at the 2007 Pollak Prizes (File photo)
For the past 20 years, I have written most of the artist profiles, and these have been among the most wonderful and painful pieces of my career. I derived great insight and enjoyment from learning about what went into making these various artists. Then distilling their life experiences into 800 words or less caused me to want to rip out what’s left of my graying and retreating hair. The categories grew, divided, shrank and then repeated every two years. The receptions expanded into a kind of art prom and are today anticipated events. We’ve had one celebrity sign-in. Singer and actor Mandy Moore attended because she knew Daniel Clarke, one of the musicians being honored, and she complimented my hosting. I didn’t get a selfie because we didn’t have them then.
That I was able this time out to interview Vince Gilligan, 1985 graduate of Lloyd C. Bird High School — I was class of ’80 — and talk about his early “X-Files” days was, I admit, a bit of a fanboy thrill. And his appearance on the cover is the first time since their premiere that the Pollaks have taken all the real estate below the masthead. Thanks, Vince.
That we’ve been able to recognize artists of all stripes and devotions for this long is to Richmond’s credit. We have some incredible people here accomplishing amazing things, many of them quietly undertaking their visions after what is not their first or even second job. They haul their kits to gigs, stare down half-completed canvases, bring character and life to naked pages through words powered by imagination, assess a block of wood or stone, or even a pile of junk wired with video monitors, and tell themselves there’s something in there waiting to get out.
For their effort, they may get an exhibition, or eventually a fellowship, but there’s no telling. So much of what an artist does comes by the driving force to make something happen in a world that is a perpetual motion machine of distraction. Whether or not somebody somewhere will notice or care about the artist’s configuration is the massive unknown.
If I know anything about art, it is that if it doesn’t get written about, then it didn’t happen. When I say that, I mean on paper, in a magazine or a book that endures as a physical object in time and space. The Internet is fine until the power goes out or the website goes down, and online commentary is like writing in water. If you can pull it off the shelf and read it, the corners may yellow, but it’s yours because you did the work that put you there. And if you get a Pollak, there’s even a little something for the wall.
And, of course, the party.
