“In our branding, we like to say we’re an artist-run space,” said Mr. Miller, calling their business “collaborative” in the spirit of musician-run record labels like Dischord Records or Lookout Records. They produce zines for many of their shows (doing designs, printing and binding in-house) and are known for their flexibility in scheduling.

He remembers a big fair two years ago when four out of five artists could not make their deadline for delivering artworks to be photographed. He supplied older artwork instead and rescheduled the shoot. “When those things happen, instead of hammering artists about deadlines, we are more likely to pivot and accommodate the creative process,” he said.

As a figurative painter, Emma Gray of Five Car Garage said she realizes “how long it can take for an artist’s vision to come in — I hold the torch for them.” Her old-fashioned training in portraiture at the Heatherley School of Fine Art in London (“no electric lighting was allowed”) also helps her “talk to painters about painting.”

She founded the gallery in 2013 after moving to a home in Santa Monica that had a large custom-built garage for a car collector. Now, the garage is the gallery, with a meditation studio on the property that she uses for community sound baths, breath work, and performances involving her artists, such as Alison Blickle (a practicing witch) and Lazaro (or “L,” an alchemist). In her own studio next door, Ms. Gray is currently working on a series of “fire” paintings based on her experience fire-walking in Santa Fe.

Eve Fowler, a co-founder of seminomadic Artist Curated Projects, says that giving artists agency was the goal of her program, started in 2008 out of her own apartment with a colleague, Lucas Michael. “We had so many friends who were good artists and didn’t have shows. We also felt like artists don’t have any power,” she added — so early on, they invited artists to share the decision-making and organize the shows.