Blue Star Contemporary Art Center, Contemporary art museum and gallery in Southtown, San Antonio, United States.
Blue Star Contemporary Art Center is an art museum and gallery housed in a former warehouse in the Southtown arts district. The space displays rotating exhibitions featuring paintings, sculptures, and multimedia installations created by regional and international artists.
Blue Star Contemporary was founded in 1986 by a group of artists after three local galleries closed and the San Antonio Museum of Art cancelled an exhibition of 25 local artists. Artists and businessmen raised $40,000, and the first show of 27 artists in the former Blue Star Ice and Cold Storage warehouse drew over three thousand visitors. The warehouses, bought by developers Hap Veltman and Bernard Lifshutz in 1985, were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1993.
The center serves as a gathering place for the local art community and attracts artists from across the region. Through its exhibitions and programs, it shapes how people in the area engage with and understand contemporary art.
The building sits in the Blue Star Arts Complex along the San Antonio River Walk in Southtown, with four galleries inside the former warehouse. The complex is busiest during the First Friday Art Walk, held on the first Friday of each month since 1994, so time a visit around it or choose another day for quieter viewing.
The center partners with Berlin's Künstlerhaus Bethanien to send Texas artists to international residency programs each year. It also collaborates with the San Antonio Botanical Garden to commission outdoor art installations that blend nature with contemporary works.
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