Meet Joseph Leroux | Artist/curator/gallerist

We had the good fortune of connecting with Joseph Leroux and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Joseph, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
For a few years around 2016 I was showing my work with an art gallery in Providence, RI called GRIN that I was really excited about and we were just beginning to do bigger art fairs with them in NY and Miami. The art fairs were exciting because you could get in front of so many people in such a short amount of time but they were also terrifying because of the amount of money that was involved in doing each fair. The owners of GRIN decided sometime around 2017 that they were going to pursue other opportunities and leave the gallery life behind. My Wife Stacey Lee Webber and I had several conversations about what our next steps might be. We went to Miami Basel in December of 2017 as visitors with several friends of ours and after several drinks had decided that we knew enough really great unrepresented artists and had the necessary ingredients to make something exciting happen on our own terms. We had our first Bertrand Productions exhibiton in April of 2018 and we are continuing to represent many of the same artists today as when we started.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
I have been an artist in gallerists clothing for a several years at this point. Bertrand Productions is our gallery that has existed in the Frankford neighborhood of Philadelphia since 2018. Since the gallery began Stacey and I have represented around 10 artists which includes ourselves. Stacey’s main body of work that she has spent around 15 years working on revolves around various ways of manipulating US currency which has always been very relatable to many different kinds of people due to our familiarity with the material….MONEY. This meant that I stepped into the gallery operations/artist role while Stacey would remain more focused on her studio practice. That sounds much less entangled than it actually is and just to give you an idea of the reality…We live and work and have our gallery in the same building and have convinced 2 of the other artists that we represent to relocate from the midwest to the same building where they also live and work in separate units in the building. In a nutshell we funded the gallery and most of its operations off of the sales of Stacey’s work and were betting hard that the other artists that we were attracted to would also become more desirable to a wider audience if they were given the right environment and resources to continue to produce work and get it in front of a bigger audience. We are constantly learning, adapting, questioning our own operations and how they can be better and learning to trust opinions outside of ourselves. We currently have 3 assistants who help produce artwork and manage most of the photography and our digital presence through various channels. We are a relatively small operation but we are relentless.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Philly is a thrilling place to be right now. There are lots of creative people doing exciting things all over the city and yet it still feels real and gritty. There isn’t a map to show you where all of these things are happening and sometimes there are opportunities going on in the neighborhood where you live that you have no idea about. It is a great place to succumb to the tunnel vision of your own aspirations and just grind. Of course there is lots of fun tourist stuff to visit like the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Eastern State Penitentiary, the Mutter Museum and Cheesesteak Vegas but I think it would be more intersting to come follow along with us in a normal week and see what kind of treasures you come away with.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
Stacey and I moved to Philadelphia in 2010 right after we finished graduate school in Madison, Wisconsin. We had a lot of great professors there including Jack Damer and Lisa Gralnick who I still consider my Grad school parents. They were tough, and they made sure by the time we left school that we were making strong work and we were able to defend it. When we reached Philadelphia we were in massive student debt in new gritty city and were scrambling for jobs to make ends meet. There were a lot of people that thought we were crazy (rightfully so.) We decided that we needed to set up a studio party in our new apartment which at the time was in the Port Richmond neighborhood of Philadelphia. Several of our new east coast acquaintances came to the event and through the grape vine a couple named Matt and Katie found out about our studio party and made the effort to come out and support us. They purchased several of Stacey’s works which allowed for a little financial breathing room and within a year we had moved to the Globe Dye Works building that Matt and Katie are part owners of. The Globe Dye Works building (and family) has been a perfect environment for a creative couple to grow. Matt Papajohn and Katie Recker have continued to support us in numerous ways over the last 10 or so years and we would not be where we are right now without their support and guidance.

Website: www.bertrandproductions.com

Instagram: bertrand_productions

Other: Artsy- Bertrand Productions

Image Credits
All photos courtesy of Bertrand Productions