Jamée Lucas Loeffler might not look like your typical artist, sculptor or gallery owner, but he’s actually all three. The burly and bearded 51-year-old definitely looks the part of his other life, though.
“I build,” says the New Jersey native who has lived in Colorado most of his life. “If you want me to come out and dig a foundation and build you a house, I could do it from the ground up. Whatever you want. I’m a builder, but I was a mason first.”
Co-founder of the new Helios Public Art House on Main Street in downtown Longmont, Loeffler has lived in the Centennial State off and on since the age of four, and has been sculpting since he was five. He tried medical school and “didn’t like the bureaucratic aspect of it — or the fluorescent lights,” but it sparked an interest in anatomy, which turned a love of sculpting that began with a 16-inch clay King Kong into a lifetime of intricate sculptures, mostly bronze.
Some of Loeffler’s works are currently displayed at Helios along with the work of about 20 other artists, including fellow co-owner Ivan Kende. Born in communist Hungary, Kende and his family escaped to New York City in 1956, when he was 10, settling in the Astoria neighborhood of Queens. A multimedia artist who tends toward abstract drawings, Kende traces his love of art to a pencil and notebook he was given on that initial plane ride from Budapest to New York.
Kende says he tried this and that to support his family over the years, living everywhere from Ohio and Mexico to a famous hippie commune in Northern California called Wheeler’s Ranch, remaining a visual-art lifer through it all.
“I haven’t stopped yet,” he says.
‘An evolving thing’
Kende went to the High School of Music and Art in New York City but, like Loeffler, is almost completely self-taught. He moved to Colorado to be with his son, a drummer who lives in Denver, after the death of his wife. Loeffler and Kende met, first just by phone, because they were both showing their art at the Walnut Gallery, which eventually became Helios in their hands.
“Geoff [Whitmore], who had the gallery here, basically just said, ‘I’m done; I’m burnt out,’” according to Loeffler. “He said, ‘I’m going to close the gallery, unless you want it.’ He’d also talked to Ivan and had a very similar conversation, almost verbatim. Then somehow we connected.”
Whitmore acted as matchmaker, and in February of this year the unlikely duo of Kende and Loeffler opened Helios, filling the 2,800-square-foot space with their own creations along with the diverse work of over a dozen other local artists.
“The guy was looking to close the shop, and he was looking for the two most foolish people he could think of,” Loeffler jokes.
Both have run galleries before, but collaborating is a beast of its own.
“He tried it his way and I’ve tried it my way,” Loeffler says. “That’s an evolving thing, and a gallery is an evolving thing.”
‘Longmont’s for everybody’
In addition to visual art, Helios is designed to be a welcoming space for the growing Longmont community to appreciate local music. The gallery has already hosted a few weekend concerts featuring jazz and singer-songwriter performances on the stage Loeffler built. Helios even purchased a P.A. system and a drum kit to attract local musicians — like Boulder-based jazz artist Jeremy Mohney, who will play the space April 6, May 4 and June 1.
In addition to the new stage, Loeffler and Kende have added custom-built pedestals, sinks, shelves, counters and more. They plan to host a wide array of events in their newly transformed space.
“But not just music — we’re open to a lot of different things,” he says. “Some people want to use the space for birthday parties, stuff like that, and we were just talking to someone about doing a burlesque show. And we’ll do an open mic so anyone can play here.”
Loeffler’s vision for a multi-purpose art space in Longmont comes as the city’s population is set to surpass its county-seat cousin to the southwest. The duo understands their community is on the rise as more and more people are priced out of Boulder.
“It’s up-and-coming because Boulder is so expensive,” Loeffler says. “I think in a lot of ways, Longmont has got Boulder beat. The downtown is just way more approachable. Everything in Boulder is bougie and boutiquey and cliquey. It’s just not for everybody. Longmont’s for everybody.”
Loeffler and Kende believe their goals would be far different if they put all their efforts into raising enough money to run a gallery in Boulder.
“You’d end up selling greeting cards, because you’d be trying to sell as much as possible, and take consignment, charging artists and sellers to be there because you can’t afford the space on your own,” Loeffler says. “That’s a hard spot to be in.”
Both artists plan to use Helios partly as their studios, a place to create underneath the gallery’s skylight. The rest of the goal is just to survive by showcasing, supporting and selling the work of local artists, as well as their own.
But ultimately, Loeffler’s hope is that artists of all kinds will walk into Helios and feel like they’ve “stepped into home.”
ON VIEW: Helios Public Art House. 10:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m., Wednesday through Saturday, 364 Main St., Longmont. Free