DC Artomatic is a big arts exhibition: but not oriented to building the arts and culture ecosystem long term

 -- "Artomatic is back, if not quite bigger than ever Inbox Richard Layman <rlaymandc@gmail.com> 2:25 AM (1 hour ago) to me Artomatic is back, if not quite bigger than ever," Washington Post

From the article:

Artomatic was born in 1999 at 14th and Florida in the former Manhattan Laundry, conceived as a massive, un-curated, open-entry art exhibition — open to all comers — with a twofold mission, according to Koch: “to build community among artists and build an audience for art.” Since then, there have been 10 more shows... 

The work is not curated. Is it any good? 

Despite Artomatic playing host to — and in some cases advancing the careers of — many amazing, well-respected artists, there’s a long history of the event being trashed by the art-reviewing press, often unfairly, because it has no bar to entry. Koch acknowledges as much, but makes an excellent point about what hard-looking can ultimately teach the viewer. “You go into Artomatic and you say, ‘Oh, I like this, I like this, I don’t like that, I don’t like that, I don’t like that.’ What’s really happening to the visitor is they’re starting to develop their own curatorial skills,” he says. “If I go to a gallery or museum, somebody has selected everything for me. When I go to Artomatic, I’m making my own decisions.” In other words, stiffen your spine and take the plunge.

My problem with it is that they focus on the temporary, while to build an arts as production ecosystem, you need sustained efforts.  And while it's very important to focus on building the community of artists, at the sa.me time that becomes internally focused rather than outward

-- "What would be a "Transformational Projects Action Plan" for DC's cultural ecosystem," 2019
-- "Building the arts and culture ecosystem in DC: Part One, sustained efforts vs. one-off or short term initiatives," 2015
-- "Reprinting with a slight update, 'Arts, culture districts and revitalization'," 2009/2019
-- "Events and programming in a systematic manner," 2018

I still think it's cool.  But it doesn't have the kind of impact it could, were it to have a different organizational focus.