Steven Vail has been in the business of Fine Art for twenty years; his first Des Moines gallery was located at Southwest 5th. Then, he dealt out of the 18th floor of the Financial Center until he and Kirk Von Blunck, FAIA developed a gallery space in the Historic Teachout Building. There was that one time in Iowa City, too. 

Vail’s latest iteration is Steven Vail Fine Arts–Project Room, located in downtown Des Moines’ Fitch Building. In October of 2019, following five years of development and construction, the Project Room opened its inaugural exhibition, "The Show Must Go On,” at its bespoke gallery space in the Fitch building. In hindsight, the title reads as a foreboding: opening only months prior to the end of life as we knew it, this debut show would go on, and on, and on. 

Now, SVFA returns to regularly scheduled programming. Kate Wiley makes her curatorial debut by reinstalling “The Show Must Go On” and augmenting the progenitor with a wide variety of artwork. The product is a hybrid show, affectionately dubbed ON AND ON AND ON. 

This aptly-titled perennial exhibition is a celebration of galleries’ essential transience. Eschewing traditional group shows or , our radical approach welcomes organic change to the salon walls. As artwork is placed on new walls across the city, state and country, the holes left behind provide an opportunity to hang previously unshown artwork from the collection. The show will metamorphosize as it goes on, and on, and, oh, you get it.