For an entity that began as little more than an idea – no address, no physical presence, no collection, no home – the Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art has become a concrete fixture in the local cultural landscape.

The museum was born 10 years ago as a vision and eventually took shape as a specific mission: To be a vanguard organization for contemporary art, graphics, design, architecture, film and performance.

In the past five years – after enduring early growing pains – iMOCA has hosted shows by an array of artists who have later found critical acclaim, both nationally and internationally. Even after losing its heftiest financial backer, the museum continues to make strides.

We examine the past, present and future of iMOCA’s thread in the world of contemporary art, and how its ascent can be traced simultaneously with the rise of contemporary art in Indianapolis.

Stuck in Indy

Stephen Schaf wanted out of Indiana. The Shelbyville native had lived on the West Coast before, but after his brother died and his mother suffered a series of strokes in the late 1990s, Schaf found himself stuck here, “bitching about being an outcast and totally playing the drama queen victim,” he said. “I was slowly becoming more and more bitter about being stuck in Indianapolis.”

It wasn’t until a trip to San Francisco that Schaf realized his happiness might be within his own reach. The creative director and owner of Indy design firm Hotbed Creative, Schaf found himself in a modern art museum staring at an exhibition of tennis shoes.

“I stood there and I was like, ’Oh my God. This is exactly what people in Indianapolis need — to understand that art is all around them,” he said. “It’s not just about going to the IMA and seeing oil on canvas or a sculpture by Rodin.”

Schaf started recruiting friends to help establish a 501©3, chief among them Jeremy Efroymson of the Efroymson Fund, which provides grants to arts groups and other organizations. After coming up with bylaws and working plans, Schaf ultimately became the founder of the Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art. He’s a current board member, former president and basically the dreamer-in-chief.

“I literally thought that iMOCA would be this pipe dream and that two years later it would be gone, given the nature of the environment at that time,” he said. “All of this public art that we have, there was none of that.”

But iMOCA had the support of Efroymson, a big believer in Richard Florida’s “creative class.”

“I love creativity, and I think contemporary art is the cutting edge of creativity. It’s a place for risk-taking,” said Efroymson. “And I think when you have a contemporary art presence in a city, it pushes the bounds and leads everyone, even in the way we think about our city.”

Efroymson doesn’t like to say how much money was involved in his backing, “but it was substantial,” he said. “The museum needed a boost and someone to invest in it. If you look at contemporary art museums around the country, it’s usually one person or a small group of people who get behind them. I felt like iMOCA needed a shot in the arm, and our city needed a shot in the arm.”

A little buzz

Shortly after the start of the new millennium, contemporary art was just starting to generate a buzz in Indianapolis.

Curator Christopher West joined iMOCA. Lisa Freiman became curator of contemporary art at the Indianapolis Museum of Art. And Mindy Taylor Ross was appointed to the Arts Council of Indianapolis, which helps bring contemporary public art exhibits to the city.

“The atmosphere started to change here,” Ross said. “But it needed those three different kinds of offerings in order to give the community different portals of entry and different ways to engage in contemporary art; iMOCA helped create a real density.”

The Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art held its first show in April 2002 in conjunction with the Stutz. “It ended up having a line out the door,” Schaf said.

Next, Michael Hile, a partner in the law firm Katz & Korin, donated space within the Emelie Building on Senate Avenue to iMOCA, based on a belief in contemporary art and as a way of positioning the firm. Hile is now president of the museum’s board of directors.

Then the work really began.

“It was just a matter of sweat equity — sweeping, installing lighting,” Schaf said. “Forty-five minutes before the opening of the first show there, I was literally down on my hands and knees scrubbing the floor. It really has taught me to be careful what you dream for, because it takes a whole hell of a lot of work to make things happen.”

West, who had traveled extensively to major galleries around the world and spent time working in San Francisco, curated the 2004 show “Out of Place,” which included an installation of vacuum cleaners, accompanied by photos of vacuum cleaners in odd situations.

“So it was out of place in that sense, and it also still felt like maybe a contemporary art museum in Indianapolis might be out of place, too,” West said, laughing. “But it was so gratifying. It seemed like every time we kind of pushed the boundaries, the community opened up to us even more.”

More successes followed.

Guy Richards Smit’s pornographic rock opera, “Nausea II,” subsequently went to the Museum of Modern Art in New York, said West, “which was one of our goals, to be a kind of steppingstone and help artists realize projects here that they haven’t been able to do elsewhere.”

A show of chairs by Israeli architect and designer Ron Arad was held the same year. Arad is now building the Jewish museum in Israel. This year, Arad will have a huge retrospective at MoMA, and the IMA will feature some of his pieces at its new design center in the spring. But iMOCA was the first U.S. institution to do a solo show for Arad.

The tradition continued in 2008 with exhibitions like “Is You Is, Is You Ain’t,” which West curated and then sent to Baltimore and New York.

“Christopher knows the pulse, but he’s not one to just go with the fad,” said Kathy Nagler, iMOCA’s executive director. “He is just fantastic at finding and identifying these young emerging artists who almost always go on to something bigger and better after being at iMOCA.”

“Rising tide”

When considering the impact of the Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art on the local arts community, IMA spokeswoman Katie Zarich invoked a famous analogy: “The rising tide lifts all boats.”

Schaf, who always wanted iMOCA to be “the antithesis of the IMA,” prefers to mix his metaphors.

“I hope that iMOCA was a bit of a driving force to, you know, put a shiv in their side,” he said. “I think they needed to have a fire lit under them.”

Zarich acknowledged that the atmosphere at the IMA has changed, and that iMOCA deserves some credit for the shift. “I think iMOCA pushed the IMA at certain points in time to be a little more daring, and to reach some of those new audiences that iMOCA has so successfully engaged,” she said. “One of their great strengths is that they can respond to situations that the IMA may not.”

One of those situations Zarich is referring to was an iMOCA tribute show after the death of former Indianapolis Star photographer Mpozi Mshale Tolbert in 2006.

“That was wonderful, and to me, that’s an example of how they could fill a need immediately,” said Zarich.

The Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art plans exhibitions sometimes less than a year in advance, as opposed to the multiyear schedules of other museums.

These days, iMOCA relies on two full-time staff members, West and Nagler. Efroymson parted ways with the museum about two years ago.

“I’m a starter,” said Efroymson. “I have about a two-year attention span. I’m not really interested in staying on. I knew eventually I was going to leave. And I think it’s grown beyond me.”

Nagler, who came on board at a crossroads after occupying positions at the Arts Council and IMA, is responsible for managing and nurturing that growth.

“We had to get a silly old strategic plan,” she said. “They’re expensive, and they say exactly what you think they’re going to say, but you’ve got to have them to get grants.”

Nagler is cautious about moving too quickly. Many museums built in the 1990s and early 2000s, she says, often did not build in enough fundraising to operate successfully — most notably the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.

“They got so excited about the bricks and mortar, a lot of them are really hurting,” Nagler said.

Before iMOCA can think about buildings, however, it must endure the current financial storm.

Building dreams

Ultimately, Schaf would like to see iMOCA in a permanent, gleaming home Downtown.

“I dream of something with a certain international stature,” said Schaf, “where it’s a prominent piece of architecture that becomes the shell for the art on the inside.”

But before a future home can find its way onto the board’s agenda, the current home has deficiencies to correct, including bringing the current facility up to museum standards. To get significant loans from other collections, the museum will have to follow the guidelines of the American Association of Museums on everything from humidity and temperature control to correct lighting.

“It’s always hard trying to get money,” Schaf said. “Bottom line, if the community does not rally around it, it’s not going to be here for the community. The money has to come from them.”

The museum has no endowment and no revenue stream. It exists on grants, donations and memberships. And over the past six months, the membership renewal rate has fallen by 25 percent.

But 250 members is still a dramatic increase compared to 2007’s count of 120. Visitor numbers are three times what they were in 2007, an increase Nagler attributes to partnerships with other organizations

“The Chakaia Booker show was a partnership with Public Art Indianapolis and the Indianapolis Arts Center,” said Nagler. “There was also cross-marketing going on between the Indianapolis Opera and Marion County Public Library for the ‘Hansel & Gretel’ show.”

The museum also has a new shop front area — 48 Cubed — in which artists create small exhibitions, with the works for sale. It wants to expand its educational component beyond the popular iMOCA 101 lectures and the “coffee talk” series, all of which contribute to Nagler’s vision for the museum as an artistic gathering place.

“Almost every contemporary arts museum in the country has started in some dinky little place like where we are,” Nagler said, citing MoMA in New York and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago.

“They’ve all started for almost the same reason. All of them started a long time ago. All have had a hard journey. So we’re fitting the model.”

Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art

Where: 340 N. Senate Ave.

Hours: 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

Admission: Free.

Contact: (317) 634-6622 or www.indymoca.org.

Upcoming exhibitions at iMOCA:

“Das my i$H” opens Friday, with a reception from 6 to 9 p.m. The exhibition will feature paintings and sculptures by Ish (Ismael Muhammed Nieves), who has been working as an abstract graffiti artist for 25 years.