Hangin Art hanging it up at end of summer

One of Arlee’s cornerstone businesses is enjoying serving its customers for one last summer.

Hangin Art Gallery and Coffee House, part of downtown Arlee since 2003, will be open until the end of August, says owner Donna Mollica. Then, she says, it’s time for someone or some group with new energy and new creativity to give it a new future.

Donna remembers when the doors first opened on July 3, 2003, when she and others involved had never run a coffee shop. “How hard can it be?” became a big laugh line when the answer became apparent.

Fortunately, 16-year-old Erin Snyder came in that day and said, basically, “I have the experience and I can do it.”

After a week, she ran the place with the man who started the whole idea, Denny Nault, the rest of that summer. Now a skilled musician and songwriter working on her first recording, she is still working as a barista in Boston.

“The story of the Hangin Art is very much the story of Denny Nault, and the story of this building,” Donna says.

The building had been a rather notorious establishment, the Log Cabin Bar, infamous for being a rough, and sometimes deadly, place. Denny had hung out there as younger man, and told Donna, “If you were hankerin’ for a fight, you’d go down to the Log Cabin Bar. Fight your way in, have a few beers, and fight your way out. You’d feel good when you left.”

The band played behind chicken wire to keep them safe from flying debris. Then, during the Firemen’s pancake breakfast on the Fourth of July 1987, it was gutted by fire.

Denny bought what little was left of the building in 1991, while working at Smurfit Stone pulp mill. There were just the outside walls, without even a roof. “You could see the ‘A’ on the hill from inside,” says Donna. From then until it opened in 2003, he worked behind boarded windows, building something for the community. “Nobody knew what he was doing in here all those years. Everything in here, every piece of trim, every outlet, he paid for and mostly installed. When he needed more money, for a roof or something, he’d work overtime. It was absolutely a labor of love for him.”

Donna met Denny when she moved in across the street in 2000. “He brought me in and he showed me. It was beautiful.” Donna explains that Denny had had to work since he was very young. This was his chance to renew his artistic side he had left in his youth, eventually taking up drawing, painting and poetry, and enjoying the music people brought in.

While Denny was a builder, and an artist, he was not a business operator by nature. He joined forces with Donna to help bring the concept to fruition. With her background in business and art, they made great partners, became best of friends, and eventually married in 2013.

“I did this with him because I was so taken with what he had created. It captured my imagination,” Donna said.

The Hangin Art became a comforting neighborhood gathering place, with coffee and treats in the morning, homemade soup for lunch, and live music and dancing on many an evening. The Killdeer Artisans Guild, a cooperative of western Montana artists, took over curating the art displays, and many young people got work experience serving food and coffee.

The business was featured in at least two magazines — Big Sky Journal and Three Rivers Lifestyle.

Donna continued to run it, with the help of Marie Kloberdanz, even after her beloved Denny died in 2015. But Marie has a growing family, and Donna now feels it is time to look into what she has all her life said, “someday I’d like to…”.

“There’s never a good time to close a part of your life that’s been really rich,” Donna admitted.

She points to photo albums that include people who now have children of their own, dancing to live music here when they were kids.

“Hopefully there will come a new sweep of creativity at some time. It’s time for others to bring a new life, new energy to the building.”

In the meantime, there are stories to tell, memories to share, and no doubt, a last musical bash or two.

For one more summer, Hangin Art still offers fabulous local art, great food and coffee, and a cozy place to meet.