Today we’d like to introduce you to Milena Mortati.
Hi Milena, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I grew up in an Italian household in the German part of Switzerland and moved to Los Angeles where I have always felt creatively free to explore and express myself. I started out in the performing arts and organically moved into the world of visual art and enjoy painting, sculpting and photography.
In 2018, I started drawing up a business plan for an art gallery/cultural arts center called CRE8. A multimedia platform designed from artists for artists, offering creatives exciting new ways to share their unique talent to an international audience and providing collectors and art lovers ways to discover hidden gems. The mission is to facilitate and foster collaborations and support for independent artists from all walks of life across all mediums. Providing a space where events, projects and ideas can be brought to life through various avenues and share inspiring stories to help bring awareness and flood creativity back into our communities. The idea of CRE8 is meant to foster a global community, crossing borders in pursuit of bringing all sorts of artistic talent to the forefront. A true haven of inclusion, acceptance and freedom of expression.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
For the following years I spent time perfecting that plan, speaking to numerous people about my idea, looking for supporters, investors, scouted lots of locations and even found the perfect home but my frustration grew as I was not able to manifest it into the tangible business I had envisioned, due to lack of support and money.
In February 2020 I officially registered the business and had my first pop-up group art exhibit, where I organized a one-weekend-long art exhibit featuring a few dozen artists and performers, bringing actual life to my business idea for the first time in Los Angeles, CA.
When the pandemic shut everything down just a few weeks after my successful event, I knew I had been incredibly protected that my idea hadn’t yet taken off. The financial burden and uncertainty of the times to come would have made the life of my business almost impossible to survive with the burden of a lease, employees and the letdown of artists I meant to support in the first place.
Due to isolation during the last few years, I turned CRE8 to our online platform. I curated my first virtual art exhibit titled CENTURY OF HUMANITY featuring 21 international artists and 60 original works of art, which opened on May 3rd, 2020.
I released a second season of CRE8 podcast where I’d interview artists from all walks of life via zoom. Guest Artists were able to open up freely and share their struggles, dreams, hopes, vision and elaborate on their motivation to keep on fighting to fulfill their mission as an artist living in the 21st century. I also started reaching out to all friends and artists I had met along the way who wanted to collaborate at some point which prompted the birth of a new art series titled “TRIBAL RIGHTS” which I was able to exhibit in November 2020 with other incredible artists under the CRE8 umbrella at the Hungarian Cultural Arts Center in Downtown Los Angeles, CA, a more intimate in person experience, which seemed appropriate for the series itself.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
In December 2021 I met Diana Barillas, a young woman who had just moved to Los Angeles from San Francisco and just a few months later I met my current partner, Kalise Wallace. Turns out the three of us share the same aspirations of creating a safe space for artists and building creative bridges worldwide. And the three of us have been working on our shared dream to establish a home for artists ever since.
So far, we have already curated and organized a few successful Pop-Up shows around the Los Angeles area together and opened our third show this past May and packed the house. A group art exhibit titled PEEPSHOW featuring a curated selection of international artists, exploring body positivity and diverse sexuality with the intention of removing the stigma and shame surrounding different body types and lifestyles that should be celebrated.
Our show was so well received by the community it prompted us to take the leap and sign a one-year lease. And I am proud to announce, CRE8 opened its doors to our first official home at 1500 South Los Angeles Street, Los Angeles, CA 90015.
We’re always looking for the lessons that can be learned in any situation, including tragic ones like the Covid-19 crisis. Are there any lessons you’ve learned that you can share?
If we learned anything through these difficult times, I’d hope it is the awareness of one another, the importance of community, coming together and collectively working on a better, more inclusive future!
As we plan out our year with exciting exhibits, events, artist panels, art classes, tackling social issues, promote beauty found in diversity, equality, inclusion and more, our goal is, despite another serge of the Covid Virus, many uncertainties, inflation and the onset of a possible recession, to become a beacon of hope and use art to keep society inspired. We have been actively trying to get the mayor and city council involved to draw more attention to the possibility of creating real change and instill hope by actively using our artist community in various ways.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.CRE8.art
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/cre8__art
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CRE8.art.org
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPuLPHLplji8IPSoF0yRwJQ
Image Credits
Tess Burns
