Kyle Timothy Fine Arts celebrated its grand opening on July 23 at its location at 53 South Main St. in the Nugget Arcade, a retail space. Owned and operated by Kyle Timothy Blood ‘90, KTFA is the first commercial art gallery to open in Hanover in twelve years.
Featured artist Henry Isaacs, a resident of Sharon, Vt., said he thinks the gallery is “going to be a great success” and hopes that a commercial high-end arts gallery can “encourage” residents of the Upper Valley to engage with the arts more deeply.
“After all, that’s what it is about — trying to place art in people’s lives and homes,” Isaacs said. “It’s terrific to see Kyle’s gallery take that place.”
After spending twenty years running his interior design firm Kyle Timothy Home, first based in East Hampton, N.Y., Blood moved to Canada in 2016. In 2024, he unexpectedly became the owner of a longstanding arts gallery in Charlottetown, Canada, called Details Fine Art Gallery, after a friend asked if he would take it over. Ten days later, he was in business.
“I’ve never worked harder,” Blood said. “The Dartmouth education is not one where you think, ‘Oh, can I do this?’ It’s one where you think, ‘How can I do this?’ I’m proud to say that three years later, it [Details Fine Art Gallery] is breaking all sales records to date.”
After a decade of living in Canada, Blood shifted his attention back across the border and told his husband that he wanted “a footprint back in the States.” His husband agreed, with the condition that they needed to “find community” that was stronger than that on Prince Edward Island.
While scrubbing the baseboards of his home during spring cleaning last year, Blood happened to join a Zoom call with a group of other Dartmouth alumni and had an “aha moment” that Hanover was where he wanted to go.
While visiting Hanover for Arts Weekend following the opening of the revamped Hopkins Center for the Arts October 2025, Blood was struck by the wealth of alumni in the performing arts, like Mindy Kaling ’01 and Shonda Rhimes ’91, but saw a gap that needed to be filled.
“I asked, ‘Where are the visual artists? Where’s their home?’” he reflected.
Following his realization and a conversation with Hood Museum director John Stomberg, Blood began writing a business plan in February. He picked up the keys to the space in the Nugget Arcade on May 15 and opened the gallery a month later on June 18.
Blood said his fellow alumni have been “amazing” in helping work out the gallery’s business plan and prepare the space for opening, calling their support “overwhelming and humbling.”
“I don't know where else in the world anybody could pick up on those relationships that [were] made 40 years prior,” Blood said. “We’re not trying to relive our past as Dartmouth alumni, but we’re looking towards the next thing”
Current Dartmouth students have also found an “outlet” in KTFA, gallery assistant Ryder Cuch ’28 said. Before the grand opening of the gallery, Cuch got a chance to work with featured artist Ruth Douzinas ’98 in the wood studio at the Hop. Interacting with alumni artists has been a highlight of the job, he said.
“Building a relationship and understanding how some of their craft works is really cool,” Cuch said. [Douzinas and I] “both have interests in energy, and she’s still being an artist while leading another path” as an environmental engineer.
In the studio, Douzinas creates three-dimensional pieces out of clay and fiber. She first learned how to sculpt in the clay studio at the Hop as an undergraduate, which “planted the seeds” that inspired her to “fully” commit to her passion, she said. She described the arts community in the Upper Valley, including at the nonprofit AVA Gallery and Arts Center in Lebanon, as “an artist’s dream.”
“This area really inspires a lot of people to be creative,” she said. “That inspiration comes out in different mediums and different techniques. Kyle picked a lot of different perspectives for how New England can bring out people’s creativity.”
Kyle Timothy Blood ’90 pictured on July 30 with his dog, Tucker.
Blood said he hopes for the new space to be more than a place to buy artwork. He envisioned the gallery as a “visual vacation” for visitors, drawing from his time as a copy-editor for Martha Stewart Living Magazine in New York: When he needed a break from words on a page, he would often walk to a nearby Japanese department store to be “transported elsewhere” by their flower displays and “look at beauty to forget about whatever was going on that day.”
The gallery showcases work from Dartmouth alumni as well as regional and nationally recognized artists, with prices ranging from under $100 to $30,000, reflecting Blood’s commitment to making the “destination for everyone in the Upper Valley” that he envisions.
“People can come in, sit down, feel comfortable, take a load off,” he said. “I welcome you with open arms. There is something for you here.”
Max Hubbard '29 is a reporter from Boston, Mass., and is majoring in government and minoring in French. In his free time, he enjoys listening to music, running and watching movies.
