IMAC Warehouse Transforms Into an Immersive Art Hub Ahead of Demolition

Over the past few weeks, the abandoned IMAC warehouse in RiNo has been a hub of activity. Inside, five artists have been hard at work, pulling multiple twelve-hour days to turn the building into an immersive piece of art before its demolition.

It's all part of the sophomore No Vacancy artist residency program hosted by the RiNo Art District in partnership with the IMAC property owners, EDENS. EDENS plans to level the building in late 2023 or early 2024 and construct a complex with ground-floor retail with residential housing on the upper floors. "EDENS is grateful to have RiNo Art District as partners and will continue working with No Vacancy and/or other artist activations until the building is no longer available," says Tom Kiler, managing director at EDENS.

Nearly 100 artists applied for the residency this year, with the final five selected by previous No Vacancy participants as well as RiNo Art District boardmembers and staff. The residency and corresponding exhibition provide artists with a stipend (this year it was $8,500) to transform abandoned buildings into pop-up exhibits.

"Beyond showcasing some of the incredible artistic talent we have in the community, No Vacancy is a great example of the kind of creative collaboration that happens when we give artists the space and opportunity to create freely and push their practice," says RiNo Art District deputy director Alye Sharp. "As Denver continues to grow and change, we hope that more developers and businesses will follow suit and find unique opportunities to partner with the many artists who are creating here in the district."

This year's resident artists are Taylor Madgett, Mackenzie Urban, Jonathan Saiz, Isaac Jordan Lee and Phillip David Stearns.

For Stearns, who moved to Denver from New York in 2021, the residency is an opportunity to get his foot in the door of Denver's lush art scene. His corner of the warehouse includes its cooler, a bleak, bunker-like box that he's transforming into a cyberpunk street market installation titled Open Vault - The Market.

Stearns says his art is inspired by watching "way too much sci-fi" as well as the terrifying, technology-fueled aspects of real life. In 2017, he dove into a rabbit hole researching cyber warfare and designed a range of software boxes that he presented at Ethereal Summit.

This year's No Vacancy exhibit is a continuation of that oeuvre, and he's translated different pieces of cyber-weapon software into textile designs, using them to create plush FAB-250 air-to-surface bombs. "There's a war going on currently. It's a pretty brutal one that just escalated to a very alarming point. As you're aware, Russia and Belarus have signed an agreement where Russia is now deploying technical nuclear weapons," Stearns explains. He hopes his art will make his viewers acknowledge this sinister reality.
Meanwhile, Urban is taking her portion of the warehouse in a different direction. Instead of presenting one large installation, she's treating the project as a studio exhibition, creating several different pieces of art that are related only by their thought-provoking tendencies.

Urban majored in molecular biology and has a career in transplant services for human tissue, and her scientific expertise is clearly visible in her art. "I ask a lot of questions about things I see, things that I come across, things that might not even exist but I think would be interesting, and then use my art to document my process of trying to answer those questions," she explains.

Some of her work plays on the IMAC building's past as a cheese-culture factory, and she created a Petri dish with realistic splotches of the bacteria and fungi used to grow bleu cheese. She also brought in a couch that's positioned around the Petri dish, and calls it her "cheesy space for growth and conversation, like the incubator space in my cheesy Petri dish. I've gotten many eye rolls from the other artists," Urban says with a laugh.

She's also creating a mural of mitochondria on the warehouse wall, painted in the bubble gum-pink hue of her childhood bedroom. "Mitochondria are inherited entirely from your mother," she explains. "I've used mitochondria a lot in my work to discuss my relationship with my own mother, and [I'm] reflecting here on what it was like growing up with my mom."

One of her larger works is a wall covered in the pinkie fingers of strangers. Urban sat outside the warehouse collecting pinkie casts of unsuspecting but agreeable passersby. She explains that when viewers come for First Friday, they'll be able to use the installation to link their pinkies with those of strangers, creating sacred promises that only the viewer will be able to keep.

"A lot of people in Denver are really familiar with [IMAC] but don't know what's inside. I think people are really curious now that they've seen us going in and out and know that art is happening in here," Urban says. "It'll be fun to give it that last hurrah before demolition."

No Vacancy 2023, IMAC Warehouse, 2550 Larimer Street, opens Friday, June 2, 6-9 p.m. Pop-up openings will occur through July. Follow @novacancyrino for more details.