(L to R) Andrew Jeffrey Wright and Shelley Spector in the gallery.

It's never too late to reinvest in old, neighborhood buildings and the old masters. It's also a ripe time to invest in the young masters.

The irrepressible sculptor and arts talent cultivator of Southwark, Shelley Spector, is once again furbishing the former bakery space on Bainbridge Street with paintings, drawings, photographs and sculpture faster than it takes Gesso to dry. Through December 19, two shows will run through the gallery, exhibiting the works of over forty Philadelphia artists, half of whose compositions will sell for the price of a good pair of sneakers-not the Paris Nike Dunks, but definitely the New Balance MX608AB.

During three days in December, with no apologies expected, dirty green pictures of Benjamin Franklin will be exchanged for panels and erections by Philly's nascent finest. The annual Red Dot, "Is where we pull a painting off the wall, wrap it up for you and send you home with art," Spector explains.

Wait there's more. And you won't have to liquidate junior's college account.

Running through December 10 at Spector, The Great (re) Masters is a copyist connoisseur's delight, an iconographic encyclopedia of fake Angelico (Fra) through Zurbarán (Francisco De) meditations. "This will be a high-spirited way of buying art," says Spector, "that people have a lot of fun with." The old masters will become flattered via the same aping enthusiam with which Cezanne copied El Greco, or Renoir created impressions of Watteau and Fragonard.

The participating exhibitors include artists who are new to the gallery as well as local talents whose careers the proprietor is renowned for helping.

"Shelley has created a vital place for emerging artists who weren't being seen otherwise," said Pew Foundation Arts Fellowship Director Melissa Franklin, who added, "She is a magnetic and fun person, who uses her great energy and generosity in representing a young and worthy aesthetic.

The curatorial work of Spector has stemmed from the sculptor's studio labors. Behind the gallery is a woodshop cum studio that Spector explains formed the seed of her grassroots agence populaire. Conceiving her new space, Spector was thinking over hanging works by Adam Wallacavage and Jim Houser. "I think that by the time we put up Jim's paintings as our first show in 1999, it became obvious that exhibiting was an amazing thing to do with this place." Wallacavage, whose photographs were enshrined in the new gallery's second show, is, like Houser, a denizen of the alternative art community, Space 1026. "We are very much about giving first shows to young artists," explains Spector, who adds, "It was one of the biggest reasons why I wanted to turn part of my studio into a gallery."

"Forget about it being unusual for a person to be an artist and a dealer simultaneously," said painter Randall Sellers, whose solo show was presented at Spector last October. "Shelley, let's just say, is what Philadelphia should be all about, being that she didn't feel she had to locate her gallery in Old City but instead chose a different environment, which reflects her true spirit of independence, which I much admire." Sellers, who is composing a "not-too-far-off-from-the-original" graphite-on-paper variation of Manet's Luncheon on the Grass for (re) Masters, met Spector when he worked TLA Video on Fourth Street. A showing of his drawings at Bean Café (located two blocks from Spector Gallery), became a source of future conversations and Spector's inspiration to include his pieces initially in several Spector group shows.

"There are a lot of artists being dumped into the city from the Philadelphia art schools," Spector says, adding, "Usually the bigger institutions here are not interested in them unless they've been established elsewhere."

Spector, 43, grew up in northeast Philadelphia. She was a sculpture major at the University of the Arts, graduating in 1994. Although she currently makes her living as an artist and gallery owner, Spector spent her poorer days toiling in sporting goods and clothing stores, as a caterer, painted houses, "and I was also a house cleaner."

"[Spector] understands what artists go through and a viewer can grasp her sensitivity and compassion by looking at her sculpture," Sellers added.

A September, 2005 solo show by Spector at Painted Bride, I am on your Shoulders, will feature a "wood and figurative" environment combining architectonic, sound and kinetic installations, through whose byways and notches spectators will be able to walk.

Interior of Spector Gallery.

"She's such a good artist, has great taste and has a really good eye," explained columnist Roberta Fallon, who met her "kindred spirit" when the writer started at Philadelphia Weekly in 1999. "Both of us," Fallon continues, "make Philadelphia artists our business. Fallon, the co-host of "ArtBlog" at www.fallonandrosof.com, continually includes passages about Spector on the website and in her newsprint column. "Shelley's talent is matched by her amazing shows, generosity and ceaseless willingness to promote, befriend, encourage, even cajole artists," added Fallon, who continued to laud Spector's wisdom in providing "rising stars" painter/silk screener Ben Woodward and painter Thom Lessner their first solo shows.

Woodward, whose gouache-on-board copy of Marcel DuChamp's Nude Descending a Staircase will be hung at (re) Masters, has chosen to imitate an artist whose found-object sensibility is paralleled in the urban mimetic of Spector. The Aristotelian Spector explains, "When I was a kid, there was this large sign at Korvette's Shopping Center at the intersection of Welsh Road and Roosevelt Boulevard. Each letter of the word, 'Northeast' was its own sign, set inside a square, somewhat like the Hollywood sign. This had an impact on my work." Photographer Zoe Strauss, who has been in several Spector shows, also grew up in northeast Philadelphia. "Don't put the northeast down," Spector says, laughing that gallery owner Rodger LaPelle has called the area "a good place to situate the witness relocation program." "But every place has its inspiring points, doesn't it." she adds.

Visualizing the yield potential of spaces characterizes how Spector intends to transform the gallery at Painted Bride into a fairground of figural compositions, wooden lattices and the empty spaces whose soulful presences her commissioners believe will be rivaled only in works by Alberto Giacometti. "Shelley is a great and very important artist in our city," said Painted Bride Associate Director Lisa Nelson-Haynes. Spector's staying power is evinced by the permanent sculpture collection she has had at Sloan Kettering Hospital in New York.

A mother of two, Spector lives four blocks from the gallery with her life partner, a writer. Raising children in an artistic environment demanded cleanliness and proximity to home. She used to live two blocks away, "then a massive distance of four blocks, which is really still okay." In 1998, Spector transformed the first floor of the dilapidated, old bakery via dry-walling, scrubbing and repainting into a studio that finally included a tidy, aesthetically pleasing exhibit space that was furbished by the time her second child was born in 1999.

"You can recognize [Spector's] importance whenever you think, for instance, that Randall Sellers has gone on to exhibit at New York's MOMA," said Franklin, who says she met Spector, "several years ago," when the artist was consulting with Franklin about designing a professional practices course for artists at the university level. Today, Spector's gallery, a private business, is not eligible for grants such as the Pew fellowship, because it is does not possess 501 3 C tax exempt status. "But as an individual artist," explained Franklin, "Shelley is definitely eligible."

While discussing (re) Masters, Spector is buoyant. She says that viewers will enjoy seeing Andrew Jeffrey Wright's graphite-on-paper Mona Lisa because the figure is actually partly based on the alien from the film, E.T.. Jim Houser will contribute a rendition of Fifty Days at Illium, an acrylic copy of the Cy Twombly oil that is hung at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Sarah McEneaney will impart an egg tempera-on-wood copy of Rain by Vincent Van Gogh. Thom Lessner will impersonate Edward Hicks via acrylic on wood in his copy of the The Peaceable Kingdom, whose original is also hanging in the City museum. Most of the works will be priced comfortably for the frugal bourgeoisie. Wright's Mona Lisa will be tagged at $200. "We are going to have a lot of fun with this one," says Spector.

Philadelphia's Red Dot is similar to the Red Dot Gallery in New York City because both galleries have a cap on the pricing of works. In the northern city, artwork sells no higher than $5,000. Spector's creation of the art world's first "hundred dollar store," is how she antes up--- or down, and is how she says buyers can "trade your cold hard cash for some cool-ass work." No credit cards or checks will be accepted. In addition to graphic art, latch hook rugs, fur masks, kitchen countertops, bracelets and other art "necessities" will be vended during the three-day event. Spector's yearly tagline for the event reads, "Art snobs are shaking in their boots." Her institution is several years older than the NYC venue.

The Great (re) Masters will close on December 10. Red Dot runs on Friday, December 17 (6pm to 10pm), Saturday, December 18 (12pm to 5pm) and Sunday, December 19 (12pm to 5pm). Visitation to Spector Gallery during January, February and March is by appointment only. The gallery is located at 510 Bainbridge Street. Additional information is available by calling the gallery at (215) 238-0840, via e-mail, info@spectorspector.com or at the gallery's website, www.spectorspector.com.

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