This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2017, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
An eclectic Salt Lake City art space is closing its doors this month.
CUAC, an art gallery at 175 E. 200 South in downtown Salt Lake City, will close April 22, ending a 25-year history marked with challenging shows and some controversy.
Adam Bateman, CUAC's executive director and curator, announced last week that he would be closing the gallery to focus on his art career. An exhibition of his work opens Friday, with a reception from 6 to 8 p.m., at Writ & Vision, 274 W. Center St., Provo.
In a statement, Utah arts patron Diane Stewart, a member of CUAC's board, said Bateman "has been monumental to the development, interest and investment in the growth and understanding of contemporary art within our communities."
Karen Horne, a painter and owner of the Horne Fine Art gallery, said Bateman "challenged his audiences. He was able to aim less at marketability than at experimentation in materials and format. Adam also engaged a younger, more hip demographic than the average SLC gallery."
Among the notable shows Bateman has curated at CUAC is last April's "444," which took artifacts from police-related shootings and presented them as art objects. In September, CUAC became the tourism office for the nation of Zaqistan, artist Zaq Landsburg's 2-acre country and land-art installation in northern Utah.
In 2015, Bateman walked across Wyoming to consider, in literal terms, the western migration and his 62 ancestors who walked the Mormon Trail.
CUAC — then the Central Utah Art Center — was founded in Ephraim in 1991, to highlight the works of Utah artists. Bateman, an Ephraim native, began running the center in 2005.
The center thrived in a rent-free space in Ephraim's Pioneer Square until 2012, when the city evicted CUAC. Bateman accused city officials of censorship over art photographs that featured a woman's nude breasts. CUAC sued Ephraim, and in 2014 the lawsuit was settled, with the city giving the art center $60,000. In the meantime, Bateman relocated CUAC to Salt Lake City.
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