Elevator ARI Flood Recovery

Situated in the cultural centre of the Lismore CBD, Elevator ARI is a not-for-profit artist run studio and gallery committed to provide a space of inclusivity and open dialogue.

We are a small independent artist collective run by artists that are striving to bring art and artists work to the Northern Rivers, committed to fostering the culture of our community. Most of the artists at Elevator supplement their wages through other part-time and casual work.

Our studio and gallery space have been ravaged by the floods, the water rising to above the 2nd floor to the roofline of the building. We have lost not only the space, uninsured due to the exorbitant premiums, but our creations, tools, supplies and collectively decades of thoughts and dreams. As hard as it is to fathom the loss we are all working out how to move forward with rebuilding our collective space and our artistic careers. We are greatly in need of financial support to contribute to cleaning, repairing, rebuilding and refilling our cherished space.

On Sunday we prepared our personal items to be 1m above the 2017 flood level, anticipating that this would be enough. We opened the doors on Tuesday morning to have found that we have lost everything.

Our gallery space below has also been inundated and will require major repairs to be a usable space once again. We are in great need of assistance to re-build the studio and purchase supplies to continue sharing art and artist’s work for our community.

We look forward to seeing you all when Elevator ARI is reopened