Donation, collaboration lead to new Tiny Garden Gallery Installation at Price Center

The Price Center’s outdoor permanent art gallery is expanding with the addition of a new Tiny Garden Gallery (TGG) being installed just inside the main archway entrance of the front garden. This new gallery space will feature tiny art submitted from the San Marcos community. The TGG, a former Little Free Library, was donated by local artist Karen Cross, and repurposed by Texas State University interns, Rachel Trout and Hannah Comstock. The new art exhibition space is slated to officially open in the garden next month.

The Tiny Garden Gallery was imagined for the purpose of bringing in more art to the garden as well as encouraging more of the San Marcos community to publicly display art. This newest collaboration between the Price Center and Texas State University will also allow a new range of ever- changing artwork to be submitted and displayed within the center’s garden alongside 11 other current permanent works of public art.

“My passion is art,” said Cross, a community artist, educator, and founding member of the former 218 Co-Op Gallery downtown. “I thought it would be wonderful to have a public art gallery at a community center on a small scale with art rotating frequently.”

The Price Center Garden, it turns out, was the perfect fit for Cross who hopes the gallery helps build a strong sense of belonging to the community through art.

As Arts Education majors, Trout and Comstock wanted the new gallery to be approachable to all. Its petite size offers a unique and intimate experience, allowing the viewer to move closer to the artwork enclosed in the box. The lower height also makes it very kid-and-wheelchair friendly, and a QRcode driven submission process makes it easy to participate.

“As we worked on transforming the library into the gallery, it was amazing how many opportunities we had to talk with visitors passing by,” Trout said. “The ‘community’ began with this project just through working on it outside. Hannah and I can’t wait to see how the Tiny Gallery brings in a whole new community.”

The Tiny Garden Gallery represents the second successful collaboration between TXST University’s School of Arts & Design and the Price Center. The pair were part of a five-gallery collaborative show featuring late San Marcos artist Bill Huston earlier this year.

Find more information and the application to submit artwork for the Tiny Garden Gallery by using the QR Code located on the gallery itself or by visiting price-center. org and click on Tiny Garden Gallery.

For more information about our other gallery displays and more, please call 512-3922900 or stop by the Center at 222 W. San Antonio St, downtown San Marcos.