THE INDOMITABLE BILLY HERTZ… And Louisville’s Oldest Independent Art Gallery

By Mckenna Graham • Photos By Matt Johnson 

“That’s how it started- being escorted across the tundra by two machine gun soldiers”, Billy Hertz says, “One of the best trips of my life.” The artist in question was then led across an expanse of frozen earth as large as a football field, the Siberian wind whipping unforgivingly around them, until the gun wielding soldiers reached a series of barracks. Inside, a small Russian woman in a floor length trench coat, presumably a general, was engaged in a shouting match with Valery, the Russian contact who had brought Hertz and fellow artist John Nation, to Perm, Russia to participate in the first ever International Art Show. 

“Valery is saying very terrible, terrible things to this woman,” commented an exquisite Slavic lady nonchalantly between puffs of her cigarette. She sat nearby, draped head to toe in an elegant fur sable, more beautiful than Isabel Rossellini at her peak. “Worse than mother f- - - - -?”, inquired Hertz. 

“Oh yes, much worse.” The beautiful stranger said, taking a casual draw of smoke. It turned out that the Russian mafia was in control of customs and Hertz and Nation were being accused of smuggling artwork. Though it would have behooved the two artists to mark their work far below its actual value to avoid the attention of the mafia, the situation was eventually handled. Hertz who had been arrested was released later that day and the artwork returned afterwards. All spy novel escapades aside, the cultural exchange marked a significant milestone that would open doors for later creative endeavors to blossom. 

The drama, in a way, seems typical of Billy Hertz’s life and career as an artist. This pillar of the Louisville art community, whom some call a legend, is always pushing forward obstinately and against all odds. He has an easy way of laughing off troubles and carrying on, thriving in environments and situations that seem to oppose him- opening an art gallery in a dilapidated neighborhood (not once but multiple times), changing gallery locations repeatedly (highly advised against), continuing to produce artwork while battling a brain tumor (switching from using his right hand to left as his physical capacities changed dramatically), using financial challenges as an impetus to create even more prolifically (his goal to sell 100 paintings in 90 days when faced with losing the gallery). 

“The artist, the gallerist, the community leader. All three are intermixed which makes [Billy] the force that he is in this city,” says John Begley, local artist, consultant and former Director of the Hite Art Institute, “The joyful thing about all of this is Billy. His unique personality, his cooperative but insistent nature, through health issues and losses his always positive, can- do attitude, he is a treasure that has shaped this city, its artists and art milieu.” 

Hertz knew he wanted to work as a painter since the moment he graduated from Florida Atlantic University with, amusingly enough, a BFA in ceramics. He came to the University of Louisville for his Post Graduate painting studies and has called this city home ever since. He has blessed the art community here not only through his prolific production of semi-abstract landscapes, but also through his work as a gallerist and art community activist. After serving as the first director of the Zephyr Gallery from 1987 to 1991, Hertz was determined to open his own gallery. To this day Galerie Hertz is the longest running independent art gallery in the city. 

Opened in 1991, it has operated continuously for the last 35 years, with the exception of a nine month period in 2006 during the worst of Hertz’s health troubles. The gallery has been in five different locations, bouncing between the 600 and 300 blocks of Market Street long before revitalized NuLu was even a glimmer in the eye of the city. It next made its home in the Weissinger-Gaulbert building before finally landing in its current location at 1253 S. Preston Street. The gallery’s original locations were so rough and tumble that East Enders coming downtown to attend exhibition openings were scared to walk the short distance from their cars to the gallery entrance. But the crime riddled neighborhood didn’t bother Hertz, he even welcomed the environment, complimenting the friendliness of his neighbors, allowing (within reason) the unhoused population a bit of cheese and cup of wine at openings before kindly escorting them out once conversation turned away from art. It was actually gallery-goers’ fearfulness to walk between exhibition openings along Market that eventually gave birth to the long celebrated trolley hop. 

The trolley was sponsored by six galleries, including Hertz, before receiving partial financial support from the city. It drove substantial foot traffic to the area, an economic boon to surrounding restaurants and businesses. “Billy was a trailblazer and a catalyst for change. What was once the Market Business district is now NuLu- it’s art that changed that district to what it is.” says Keith Waits, curator and operations manager for LVA, “He was an innovator who represented a great many artists over the years and fostered many great careers, which is what a good gallerist should do.” 

Hertz also had a hand in cultivating the arts community through raising awareness of galleries and current exhibitions via a publication called LOOK which was put together through a consortium of galleries. 

The current exhibition of Hertz’s paintings at the Moremen Gallery, 710 W Main Street, runs through the end of January 2026 and features work ranging from 2012 to 2025, all united by their use of three dimensional elements.

“I always liked Cheryl Chapman’s collages, Teri Dryden, and Caroline Waite. I just went crazy over them. And every time I tried it with newspaper and stuff, it looked like a pimple on prom night.” 

Hertz says. Robert Rauschenberg’s work inspired him to try using cardboard instead, but with no cardboard on hand he decided to use what was available to him-foam core. It worked like a charm. The current body of work employs Hertz’s signature use of semi-abstracted landscapes viewed from an aerial perspective but uses recessed and raised surfaces alongside a bold color palette to create dimensionality that tricks the eye. 

The move towards layering flat surfaces to create relief-like effects plays nicely with the existing tension between representation and abstraction. Encouraging viewers to fill in the visual narrative themselves, the paintings evoke fertile tilled earth, the bold red geometric shapes of barns and livestock buildings, a patchwork of crop-filled fields alongside empty linear highways, and sprawling train tracks. There is a whimsical intoxication that makes the viewer feel they have temporarily projected into the sky and unburdened by the shackles of their physical bodies may be afforded the freedom and perspective of a bird. 

In December of 2025, Hertz came to the difficult decision to close his long running gallery and focus solely on his work as a studio artist, represented by the Moremen Gallery. The time needed for regular medical appointments critical to his health has detracted from his ability to give the gallery his full effort. 

The gallery’s last day will be January 31st, 2026 and prior to its closure Hertz plans to hold a sale of current artwork on January 16th and 17th. “Billy has always made his life as an artist and not very many people are able to do that,” says Susan Moremen , owner of the Moremen Gallery, “And his example became a draw for other creative people.” This draw has led to the cross-pollination of creativity to and from Louisville over the years, between Hertz’s travels abroad to show his own work and efforts to bring other notable artists in to exhibit in his gallery. 

He credits much of his success to the ongoing support of his husband of nearly forty-four years, Tom Schnepf, who has been there through it all. When asked what he wants his legacy to be, Hertz said that he used to want to be one of the top ten painters, the kind with coffee table books and great fame. 

“Now,” he says, “I just want to be known as a good painter who really loved Louisville and didn’t accept ‘no’ for an answer.”