Rhode Island Gallerists Discuss Artists Sunday

November 30 is designated to encourage shopping local for art

Posted Friday, October 31, 2025 9:00 am

By Emily Olson

One afternoon, a family of five wandered into Plumb Gallery in Bristol. Their intent wasn’t to buy, but they spent nearly an hour looking at, talking about, and appreciating the art that hung on the gallery walls. Jen Charleson, who owns the space with her husband, Larry Sample, welcomes that kind of attention. “There’s nothing sadder than an empty gallery,” she says. “Watching that family explore the gallery and spend time with the art really made my whole day.”

But not every gallery or artist can rely on foot traffic to raise awareness of their work. That’s why Artists Sunday, like Small Business Saturday that immediately precedes it, matters. Much like the small stores that benefit from a day devoted to local shopping, Artists Sunday, which follows on the Sunday after Thanksgiving, was created in 2020 to shine a spotlight on creative work that might otherwise go unnoticed. It gives community members a reason to explore, support, and celebrate the artists in their own state and encourages holiday shoppers to purchase meaningful gifts from their artisan neighbors.

For Charleson, the concept of Artists Sunday is new. “I don’t know who invented it,” she says. “But I’d like to thank them.” In addition to representing artists at her gallery, Charleson is a mixed-media artist inspired by sacred geometry. “I create this moody background scene and paint over it using India ink and metallics. It gives a human feeling to mathematical sequences.” Earlier in her career, she sold her art in an artist cooperative, a retail space jointly owned and operated by members. “The co-ops I was involved in did wonderful things for me as an artist,” says Charleson, “but they were like gift shops, and I realized I was creating bite-sized art I knew would sell. I didn’t like the feeling that I was making art for customers instead of simply making art.”

Those early lessons in navigating both creativity and commerce shaped the gallery’s mission. Charleson wanted to create a space that honored artists’ visions without compromising their integrity. In developing Plumb Gallery, Charleson took the best parts of the co-op model and adapted it for high-end artists. “Our setup is geared toward artists who make serious, large-scale work rather than product lines,” she said. “I think it’s evident when you walk in our gallery that we’ve created a space that feels luxurious and shows how meaningful art can transform an environment.”

Charleson recognizes the tension that exists in an artist’s soul between the need to create and the need to pay the bills. “There’s a lot at stake, particularly at a large scale,” she says. “If you took months to create a piece and spent thousands to frame it, it’s important that it sells.” And although Plumb Gallery has been in business for less than a year, it’s already showing promise. “People aren’t used to seeing a retail gallery that’s full of interesting things,” she says. “The artists Plumb attracts are taking risks.”

Liz Kelley is a muralist and painter, and curator of The Dryden Gallery in North Providence. She recognizes the importance of any tool that helps artists sell their work and applauds a supportive movement like Artists Sunday. Like Charleson, Kelley is aware of the push-and-pull between creativity and commerce.

“Artists today are different from a Michelangelo or a Da Vinci,” Kelley says. “Art was a lifestyle for them, but for today’s artists, monetizing art is a necessity. That puts a spin on the way creative juices flow and puts a veil of pressure on everyone.” That pressure can sometimes leave artists feeling uninspired, though a holiday deadline can be motivating. “An event like Artists Sunday can give people a reason to create,” she says. “But it can also hinder artists.”

Kelley worries that when a flood of art appears during the holidays, it can breed comparison. “When everyone is in a big visual pool, artists might feel they aren’t good enough. Or they might put in a lot of effort and their work flops,” she says. “Preparing for one big annual event is like preparing for the Olympics. And what happens if you break your ankle in the first hour?”

The solution? For Kelley, it’s recognizing the importance of buying art year-round. “If spring is in the air and you see a painting that makes you feel good, buy it,” she says. “It will help you preserve that feeling.”

Katrina Mominee, founder of Field of Artisans artist market, agrees that artists should be visible year-round to build relationships so that when the holidays arrive, their work is foremost in a holiday shopper’s mind. “It’s playing the long game,” she says, explaining that for many artists, the months of November and December can represent half of their annual sales. “It’s a short time period, but the artists tend to go all out in their preparations,” she explains. Mominee considers the artists in her network microbusinesses that have benefited from an awareness campaign like Small Business Saturday and is excited about the idea of giving artists their own day. “That concentrated type of awareness is so special,” she says. Field of Artisans is hosting its own holiday events to help connect artists and art lovers throughout December.

Mominee helps the artists she works with navigate the space between creativity and commerce by showing them how to use the market to build relationships. “Artists want to sell what they love creating, but that’s not always what people want to buy,” she says. “I always tell the fine artists I work with to use the market to build a clientele. If they sell prints or stickers, they’re slowly building an awareness of their work that could result in that large sale.”

Beyond guiding artists, there’s the question of how the broader community experiences and supports local art. Charleson says generally about the arts scene in Rhode Island that the people who want to invest in it are already involved, and the people who don’t know about it don’t know what they’re missing. “I love giving people an excuse to do something new,” she says. “If everyone picks a day to go to an art space, they might immediately commit to coming back and say to themselves, ‘I should have been doing this all along.’”