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62 DEALER'S HAND: A PILGRIMAGE TO MEMPHIS STREET ACQUIRING A BUILDING IN THE HEART OF THE DALLAS DESIGN DISTRICT, LILIANA BLOCH EMBARKS UPON NEW TERRAIN AS A TEXAS GALLERIST. INTERVIEWED BY CATHERINE D. ANSPON. PORTRAIT MIRRORLESS MIND STUDIO. E l Salvador-raised art dealer — and former gymnast — Liliana Bloch is known for her unerring eye, activist stance, and nimble ability to take chances. Both the Dallas Art Fair Foundation and mega-collector Marguerite Hoffman shop her gallery, where you'll find everything from a space capsule sprouting plants (Simón Vega) and a palm slathered in peanut butter (Vince Jones) to quilts celebrating African-American nuns (Letitia Huckaby) and poly-sexual erotica photography (Tim Best). Herein, our conversation. As you embark on your third space, take us back to the beginning: Deep Ellum, 2013, a modest storefront. Sharing a space with Brian [Gibb, The Public Trust] was wonderful, because he was generous and supportive. The biggest challenge was introducing my roster to Texas without the validation or connections I needed. I didn't grow up in Texas, and my professional art experience was with a nonprofit art institution. Therefore, I didn't have a client list, or the social connections I needed to have the support of collectors that were oriented towards museum aesthetics. Developing relationships of transparency and trust needed time. And I had to operate under a very strict budget. Biggest break. Being the first Dallas gallery to sell a piece to the Dallas Museum of Art in our inaugural year participating in the Dallas Art Fair. That gave my gallery local validation. The second break was to have Simón Vega, a fellow Salvadoran artist participating in "Cosmopolis 2" at Centre Pompidou in Paris last October. We were the gallery to give Vega his first solo exhibition in the U.S. Bragging rights. Letitia Huckaby is currently on view at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Pedro Vélez was part of "Net Art Anthology," one of the 25 most important exhibitions in the last decade, and Alicia Henry's exhibit at The Power Plant in Toronto "Witnessing," will come to [the DMA] this winter. Alicia Eggert is gaining rapid international recognition. Henry and Huckaby have been working with me since our Liliana Bloch with works by Simón Vega, Alecia Henry, Letitia Huckaby, and Kathy Lovas. (continued on page 64)