In 2016, Los Angeles-based multimedia artist Kim SchoeNstadt launched her “Now Be Here” project in Los Angeles where 733 contemporary women artists gathered for a group photo at Hauser & Wirth.

Tell me about how you started the project, Now Be Here.

Hauser Wirth & Schimmel just opened in LA and their first show was called “Revolution in the Making: Abstract Sculpture by Women, 1947 to 2016.”

It was a great show.

It was a fantastic show, but it was very familiar. We were seeing the same artists over and over again. I want to point out the timing of all of this—the primaries for the 2016 election had just happened, so we knew that it was going to be Trump versus Hillary. The other thing for me was that I had had a child, and I hadn’t been very active in my community.
Now she was in school, and I could re-emerge.

Over the decades we’ve gotten used to seeing group portraits of men, the top 10 this or the top 10 that. I remember seeing a New York Times Magazine cover many years ago of what was called the “top” contemporary American artists, I think it was all men. So you saw the show at Hauser Wirth & Schimmel.

I saw the show and I saw the space—the courtyard and the roof where we could put photographers. I met with Aandrea Stang, their director of education, afterwards [with my idea], and she said, “Yeah, let’s do it.”

It was such a good choice—the place was centrally located, and you could take public transportation. Well-organized, too. You had two photographers [Isabel Avila, Carrie Yury], you had a sign-on desk. I’m assuming all of it was voluntary?

Yes, totally voluntary. One of my strengths is organizing. That’s what I did at John Baldessari’s studio, I was studio manager.

How did you get the word around?

First I made a list of artists, and sent it around. It was a shared list, and people added to it. The second list went to galleries, the third list went to curators. The idea was to be inclusive.

What did you do with the photo afterwards?

It was posted online, it was free to download. It would be nice to do a book.

After that was New York and Miami, both at museums (Brooklyn Museum, Pérez Art Museum). And then the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C., contacted you. Six hundred artists RSVP’d, and 465 attended.

It included artists from D.C., Virginia and Maryland. The museum went all out. We had our own cocktail. In addition to the programming [in the two weeks prior], we also had an artist resource fair right after the photo. Upstairs there were like 15 nonprofits that support artists. It was pretty amazing. Linn Meyers was my local collaborator, and Linn has actually gone on to found a residency program.

I understand you’re going to the Bahamas for a residency.

Last spring my gallery E.C. Lina, formerly Chimento Contemporary, took me to VOLTA NY, and I received the Baha Mar Art Prize. Baha Mar is a resort in the Bahamas, and they have an art program, gallery and studios called the Current. The Current gave out this art prize, and with it comes a residency, a commission in February.