Interior of The Patrick Moore Gallery

Just off I-80, with off-street parking bordering a quiet, residential neighborhood, you’ll find Patrick Moore’s new art gallery. A far cry from his former west-side location behind the Rio Grande Depot — a hip, edgy part of town with parking challenges — the new gallery at 2233 S. 700 East, near Sugarhouse, is a comfortable destination, especially for those who live in mid- or south-valley areas or Park City.

Location is important but that’s not the only attraction in Moore’s new space. Formerly a furniture store on the ground floor of Susan Gallacher’s King’s Cottage Gallery and Art School, Moore’s gallery is nearly 4,000 square feet of interesting rooms that seem to go on forever. Each discrete room may potentially showcase a different artist, enabling Moore to offer more artists more opportunities and his customers a greater variety of art to choose from. The more intimate size of the rooms, some furnished with sofas or chairs, also help buyers envision how a piece might fit on their wall back home.

The Patrick Moore Gallery opened in August with the annual show of the Art Glass Guild of Utah, along with some artists Moore has represented for some time, including Holly Mae Pendergast, Darryl Erdmann, Susan Gallacher, and Kim Reasor, a California artist who renders cityscapes in oil. Just as in his former space, Moore also sells jewelry and other small art pieces in his gift gallery.

After closing his west-side gallery at the end of December, Moore says he began looking for another space in the downtown area, “but nothing caught my eye.” Meanwhile, artist, teacher and gallery owner Susan Gallacher was dreaming of having someone develop a gallery in the ground floor space of her building. When she heard Moore was looking, she contacted him and the two began dreaming together of what could be.

The very nature of the new gallery suggests a different vision for Moore. “I’d like to bring more out-of-state artists into this market,” he says. “Right now, there’s a perception around the country that the Salt Lake art market is strong.” Because of the way the space is arranged, in five discrete rooms, he can feature three or four artists at the same time.

In addition to featuring new works of art, the new gallery enables Moore to provide another service for his clients: reselling works of art the client no longer wants or needs after downsizing or simply running out of wall space in the home.

Moore is also planning to offer his space for special events and parties — from book groups to small theatrical productions, to charity fundraisers. Though there’s no formal collaboration with Susan Gallacher or the six other artists who occupy studios in the building, there’s always the possibility of an open studio tour, art lectures, or similar art-related events that would help put this unassuming, art-filled building on everyone’s art-destination map, so to speak.

“The more traffic we can generate together,” says Gallacher, “the better it is for all of us.”

You wouldn’t realize it at first glance, but the building has even more space that could be put to synergistic art purposes. There’s an empty studio upstairs, and a larger space downstairs that could be another small gallery and/or art studio.

The gallery will be participating in the Salt Lake Gallery Stroll, and for the September show will feature a group show of landscape paintings.

Exterior of The Patrick Moore Gallery

The Patrick Moore Gallery, located at 2233 South 700 East in SLC is open 11-6 Tuesday — Saturday and can be contacted at 801-484-6641.

Sue Martin

Sue Martin holds an M.A. in Theatre and has worked in public relations. As an artist, she works in watercolor, oil, and acrylic to capture Utah landscapes or the beauty of everyday objects in still life.