Meet with the founder and director of the INhouse project.
Brook Smith is a businessman and philanthropist. A graduate of Clemson University, where he received a degree in financial management, he is president of Smith Manus, a leading provider of surety bonds on behalf of numerous industries throughout all 50 States and Canada. A native of Louisville, Kentucky, he has a longstanding relationship with the creative community in the city and has supported creative and artistic projects both locally and nationally. In July 2015 he founded INhouse.
Julien Robson studied fine art in London before becoming a curator at university galleries in the UK. During the 1990s he worked in the private gallery sector in Vienna, Austria, and, in 2000, arrived in the USA as the first Curator of Contemporary Art at the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Kentucky. In 2012, after serving four years as the Curator of Contemporary Art at PAFA in Philadelphia, he began working as an Independent Curator and Art Consultant. He has been Director of INhouse since its foundation in July 2015.
The mission of INhouse is to enrich our community by supporting creativity and imagination.
Creative expression touches us through each of our senses – sight, sound, touch, taste, smell – and enhances the quality of our lives with pleasure. Yet, each of these expressions has its genesis in the imagination of individuals, a person or people in a room inspired with an idea and a passion to realize it. Founded by contemporary art collector and philanthropist Brook Smith, INhouse is an entity conceived to provide space and support to creative individuals, groups, and organizations in order to foster new ideas. It is not simply a place, it is a catalyst, a nurturing framework with a vision to help imaginative talent grow.
INhouse is both a house, which can be used for organizational retreats and individual short term residencies, and a seed-fund, which supports individual projects.