“The next lucky number is 12. Twelve. Lucky Number 12.”
No, it’s not bingo night. That’s an announcement at an art gallery in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Their large windows display a painted sign that reads, in all caps: THE THUNDERDOME OF ARTS FUNDRAISERS.
Luckily, there are no steel cages or fight-to-death matches. Just lucky numbers.
The announcer at the microphone is Mike Hart, one of the founders of Ipso Gallery, started in 2009 by Hart, Liz Heeren, and Ted Heeren.
Ipso Gallery’s biennial-ish arts fundraiser, Lucky Number, is a lottery style, one-night-only event, where art from local artists is divvied up among participants—by chance.
“It’s an arts fundraiser where everyone wins,” says Liz Heeren, Ipso’s director and curator. All artists get paid the same amount, sponsors buy in to win three artworks, and a local project or nonprofit receives funding.
Doing it this way was important to Liz, an artist and art educator. Over the years, she noticed that artists often lose at events like these—“their work doesn’t sell or get bid on.”
At the event, Liz advises attendees on artists and artworks hanging on the walls, while “Ladder Boy” Ted hands the art out. Collectors holding numbered tokens eagerly wait for their lucky number to be called. If it is, they walk up to the gallery wall, pick their art, and then take it home that evening!
It’s exhilarating, nerve wracking, and sometimes tense, says the curator. There’s been some shouting.
Sponsors come with a strategy, says Liz. “People are invested … They’ve got their top 10 listed. They’re taking notes.”
It’s a gamble—either you get first pick, wait your turn, or get called last.
“Maybe in the end if they don’t get their number one choice, they’re getting an artist they don’t know as well, and might fall in love with that work and become a collector of that artist over time.” she says.
Lucky Number raises money to support local arts and culture. The 2025 proceeds will fund a site-specific public art installation. Over the last decade, the fundraiser has benefitted small arts organizations and artist-run creative projects.
Just as importantly, it connects the Sioux Falls community to art and artists.
“We’ve had some really strange shows over the years and really explored art in different ways. And that’s what gets us excited,” she says. “It’s getting people to do things that are uncomfortable, the transformation of the space, and the celebration of really weird ideas.”
For those who enter Ipso, it’s a moment of “delight in creativity.”
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This story was originally published by Arts Midwest, a non-profit amplifying Midwestern creativity with Creative Commons License
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