Etherton Gallery, one of Tucson’s most prominent photography galleries, is moving from its Barrio Viejo location at the end of this year and might end up in the Mercado District. 

“We’re 80% of the way there to sign the lease,” said Terry Etherton, founder and owner of the Etherton Gallery. “So if we move — and we’re not just going to close — if we move, that’s where we’re going.”

Etherton Gallery is a Tucson institution. In 1981, Terry Etherton moved to the Old Pueblo from San Francisco after visiting some friends and falling in love with the UA center for Creative Photography. That year, he opened his first gallery on 6th Street and 4th Avenue. Rent was $235 a month.

“I basically opened this gallery on a complete impulse,” Etherton said. “A lot of people would ask me, ‘What was your business plan?’ And I said, ‘I don’t even know what a business plan looks like.’ And even if I did, if I had a business plan, I wouldn’t have done it.

Because on paper, it just didn’t make any sense at all. So I just thought, I don’t need a plan, I’ll just figure it out as I go along.”

The Etherton Gallery then occupied a roomy, second-story space in Odd Fellows Hall for 33 years, until 2021, when it moved to its current, Barrio Viejo location.

The transition went swimmingly. The historic building is owned by Bacon Industries, a longtime Tucson property-leasing business whose preservation and renewal efforts have restored and saved neglected Barrio Viejo properties since the early 1970s.

“In the ’70s, when they built the convention center here, they tore down a lot… and the Rollings family drew a line in the sand and said, ‘it’s not happening.’ They got the community to rally against them. They basically saved everything south of Cushing Street.”

Etherton got along well with Don Rollings, the property manager, who Etherton said immediate supported the gallery, as it brought visitors and new businesses to the neighborhood. 

“He was really proud of what we had done,” Etherton said. “He always said, ‘Terry was the first guy here, and that’s why all these other people are here.”

When Don Rollings retired last summer, Anne Schiff and Betsy Rollings, two of Don Rollings’ sisters, took over management of the property. 

The gallery’s lease excluded any option to renew, but Etherton said that due to the gallery’s impact on the neighborhood and his working relationship with Don Rollings, he assumed the company would renew his lease when he approached them earlier this year.

“Based on who we rented it from and the whole vibe about what’s going on in this block, I thought if I called my landlords and said I want to extend the lease, they’d be really happy about it.”

The request was denied. Bacon Industries President Anne Schiff told the Tucson Sentinel that the decision was beyond her control, and that, when Etherton approached the company in May for an extension, Bacon Industries had already decided to sell the property. 

But Etherton said he was told a different story.

“They told us that the family was going to divide up the properties…. So we don’t know what they’re doing or why they’re doing it, but one thing we do know is that they’re telling everybody different stories.”

New Beginnings

As of Monday, Oct. 12, the Etherton Gallery is likely to relocate to the Mercado District, west of downtown.

The gallery had sought to reopen in another Barrio Viejo property, but after searching around, Etherton could not find a location large enough to accommodate its collections. Kira Dixon-Weinstein, cofounder of the Mercado District, floated the idea by the gallery owner to move into the prominent mixed-use neighborhood. 

If the lease is signed, the gallery will be on the ground level of the Bautista, a soon-to-open complex of 250 rental units and a slew of commercial spaces. 

“It’s going to be a different type of audience because here, this is kind of a destination…. There’s going to be a lot more walk-in traffic and people who are just over there.”

“We’re going to have to think about that, figure out how to address that kind of an audience and have stuff that’s less expensive, so people can come in and just impulsively buy something.”

The prospective space is smaller than the current, Convent Avenue location. Etherton is working with an architect to figure out how to divide the space, so that the layout makes sense as a gallery while also providing independent workspaces to Etherton and employees Shannon Smith, (gallery manager and head registrar) and Daphne Srinivasan, (publicity, marketing and advertising). 

If it moves, the Gallery’s goal is to present its first show in the new space by Jan. 15. 

It may not be possible, but that’s what we’re shooting for right now,” Etherton said.

“Part of what I’m trying to do now is, I’m not going to let them determine when I end it. I’ve had this long career, and people know who we are internationally, and it doesn’t feel right for somebody to say ‘we’re going to decide when it ends.’”

Last Hurrah

Etherton Gallery’s final show at its Convent Ave. location is currently underway, and will remain on view until the gallery’s closing in late November. 

The show is titled “Lou Peralta: Expanded Portraiture, The Matter of the Invisible, with Elizabeth Z. Pineda: Maíz.” 

Lou Peralta is a Mexico City photographer and artist whose work exists at the intersection of “pre-Hispanic influences” and “contemporary culture,” per her bio. 

Etherton had not heard of Peralta until gallery manager Shannon Smith pitched her and Pinedas’ work for the final exhibition. 

“I’m really kind of glad that this is our last show, because I don’t know if we’ve dealt with an artist that’s more professional, more reliable, and just incredibly great to work with,” Etherton said. 

The exhibition brings together pieces from five or six distinct projects spanning Peralta’s work from the late 2010s until now.

This is kind of like a mini retrospective, is what it is,” Etherton said. “We didn’t want to show just one body of work because the bodies of work are really distinct, even though they are kind of related.”

Many of Peralta’s pieces involve the physical deconstruction and reassembling of her photographs, which creates striking textural and three-dimensional elements. Some are shredded, folded, balled up, pixelated, and adorned with various materials. 

One of Etherton’s favorite Peralta works is Disassemble No. 41 (Virgen de Guadalupe), Peralta’s own depiction of the Virgin Mary apparition said to have appeared in Mexico City in 1531. The photo is adorned with resin-sealed corn husks, bread clay corn kernels, and wooden clothespins.

Etherton is proud of his own work designing the exhibition, which is one of the owners’ primary creative roles at the gallery. 

“I feel the responsibility. This is your work, and by me hanging this next to this, I’m kind of reinterpreting in a way, and setting up a kind of hierarchy. And Lou could not have been happier.”

But the owner credits his team entirely for this final show, and says that, in the future, Smith and Srinivasan will take on greater roles in the gallery’s programming.

“I’ve done this for 45 years. I don’t really need to have all the control, I want to sort of let them introduce things and see what happens.” 

“This is kind of a good example of the direction I think this gallery is going, in terms of how we select the artists. You know, it’s going to be much more of a collaboration going forward.”

As for Etherton himself, he has no plans to retire. 

“A lot of my friends are like, ‘Wait a minute, you’re 75 years old. You’re going to sign a new lease?’ And I say, ‘of course, what else am I going to do? Go home and watch Netflix all day?’”

“I love what I do. Every day I come in here, I’m grateful that I get to work here, I work with these people, and you know, it’s an interesting job because no two days or anything like here.”