One of the more irreverent recent additions to the local art community, Christopher Lynn, is leaving the Gallery of Contemporary Art.

   After two years as curator of the gallery at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, the 33-year-old Lynn and his family are planning a move to Cleveland, where he'll become executive director of Spaces Gallery, a contemporary art space.

   Lack of a stable staff at the Gallery of Contemporary Art drove Lynn to search for another job, he said.

   "When I was hired, there was the understanding that there would be an assistant," he said. But a position for a regular assistant never materialized.

   Suzanne MacAuley, chairwoman of the college's visual and performing arts department, said the problem was entirely financial: "These are really difficult budgetary times at the public university level."

   The staffing issue became critical in December, when Lynn's son, Moses, was born with tracheoesophageal fistula - an abnormal connection between the esophagus and the trachea that required round-the-clock attention.

   "When Moses came along, I couldn't find the 60 or 70 hours a week it took to run the gallery," he said.

   Still, he said, he wasn't terribly serious about finding another position.

   "We shopped around for the sole purpose of getting some leverage with UCCS," he said.

   He and his wife, performance artist Maria Samuelson, only decided on the change because "Spaces was a really, really good job, and we knew UCCS wasn't going to budge."

   Spaces Gallery has a full-time staff of five, and is a major part of a thriving contemporary arts scene. Although Cleveland proper is only slightly larger the Colorado Springs, more than two million people live in its metropolitan area. The Cleveland Museum of Art recently hired a new curator of contemporary art. The city also has a dedicated contemporary art museum - MOCA Cleveland - that's raising money for a new building.

   But the gallery itself has been going through a relatively tumultuous period: Lynn will be the Spaces Gallery's third executive director in less than two years.

   "At least it's not Armenia," said Lynn, referring to former Fine Arts Center director Michael De Marsche, who left the center to take a position in Yerevan, Armenia.

   During his two years here, Lynn showed a commitment to contemporary art and a willingness to think outside the box with such events as April's "1440 Minutes," a 24-hour art happening co-sponsored by the Gallery of Contemporary Art and Colorado College's Inter-Disciplinary Experimental Arts (I.D.E.A.) program.

   "I'm proud of the strides the two of us made toward developing collaborative programs between our institutions," said I.D.E.A. program curator Jessica Hunter Larsen.

   He also brought a sense of fun and irreverence with events such as "Bad Art Night," at which people would get together to make cheesy knockoffs of art by Dale Chihuly and others.

   Hunter Larsen said she was sorry Lynn was leaving the community, describing him as "an innovative, agile thinker with great ideas and energy.

   "I hope he feels that he has a ‘cheering section' in Colorado Springs," said Hunter Larsen.

   One member will be MacAuley.

   "Chris has created a great forum for exhibits, stimulating exchanges, some ‘underground' art-making events (e.g., Bad Art Nights), film screenings," she said. "He has invigorated the mission of the gallery to be the best in regional contemporary art (with a great twist) and curated some truly thoughtengendering shows of national and global artists."