Everybody Loves Chelsea

Galleries on the Move

Ameringer McEnery Yohe
George Billis Gallery
Blackston
Lori Bookstein Fine Art
Chambers Fine Art
Edlin Gallery
Gagosian Gallery (store)
Hasted Hunt Kraeutler
Horton & Liu
Steven Kasher Gallery
Lombard-Freid Projects
Sperone Westwater
Margaret Thatcher Projects
Van de Weghe Fine Art
Von Lintel Gallery
ZieherSmith
David Zwirner

Gallery Spaces Closed

Bellwether
Cynthia Broan Gallery
Buia Gallery
Cohan and Leslie
Charles Cowles Gallery Cristinerose Gallery
Feature
Fruit and Flower Deli
Caren Golden Fine Art
Moti Hasson Gallery
Kinz + Tillou Fine Art
Rare Gallery
Smith-Stewart (now a roving project)

Christina Hejtmanek

Send a letter to the Editor

Save to Del.icio.us Digg this

The recession may have derailed the best-laid business plans and seemingly solid projections of many New York galleries, but not all the news is bad. Although a number of spaces have closed, a host of dealers are following the advice of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel not to let "a serious crisis go to waste" and using this moment to relocate and restructure.

Some, like the gallerist Amy Smith-Stewart, are going the "pop-up shop" route to avoid long-term financial commitments. When Smith-Stewart’s lease was up this past May, she decided to close her two-year-old Lower East Side gallery on Stanton Street and become a nomad, producing "less static, more elastic and hopefully more artist-driven" shows in temporary spaces. Last month she inaugurated her series of roving projects with a group show at Kumukumu Gallery, on nearby Rivington Street.

Other dealers are taking the opposite tack, digging in and trying to solidify their businesses. Exhibit A is megadealer Larry Gagosian. He seems to be thumbing his nose at anyone who’d think a measly global economic downturn could get him to shutter any portion of his ever-growing empire by launching a storefront shop for Gagosian-published catalogues and limited-edition art objects just a few steps from his branch on pricey Madison Avenue. That on the heels of opening an eighth gallery, in Athens, with plans for a ninth, in Paris.

The gallery-world realignment may be most visible in West Chelsea. Not long ago, it seemed as though the neighborhood would fall into the hands of luxury-condo developers. But with construction stalled all over the city and commercial leases finding few takers, dealers are moving into street-level spaces that were previously out of their reach. In October storefronts in Chelsea that had once rented for as much as $120 per square foot were going for $65 to $75 per square foot; some spaces above 29th Street and west of 10th Avenue could be had for as little as $30. Art world veterans will recall a similar phenomenon in SoHo during the recession of the early 1990s, when a number of dealers, including Brent Sikkema and Blum Helman, took advantage of the slack rental market to nab better locations. Since landlords still have to pay taxes on empty properties, they are structuring deals to get galleries in fast and allowing some to take leases as short as a year, instead of the typical five years or more.

Vacancies plus lower rents have led to a gallery version of musical chairs: When a dealer closes in a prime storefront, another, often from an upstairs location or less ideal neighborhood, quickly snaps it up. In the case of West Chelsea, once ground zero for the blue-chip and the cutting-edge, the influx of staid galleries is resulting in what the New York Times art critic Roberta Smith has lamented as "the squaring" of the neighborhood.

Back in July, on the very day Bellwether announced it was closing, a number of other galleries submitted proposals to lease its choice storefront on 10th Avenue and 18th Street, according to real estate agent Anne-Brigitte Sirois. The winner was Andrew Edlin, who has moved his contemporary- and outsider-art gallery into the space from its former nook on the sixth floor of 529 West 20th Street. Next door to Bellwether, the space formerly occupied by the Cohan and Leslie gallery is being taken over by the American modernism dealer Lori Bookstein, who is relocating from a smaller 57th Street location, where rent was doubling. "A lot of galleries are looking [at West Chelsea] because they are aware that there are opportunities," says Bookstein’s director, Lauren Bakoian. "We got in at a good time."

Another midtown gallery that has decamped is Ameringer McEnery Yohe. The 15-year 57th Street veteran seized ground-floor space on West 22nd Street made available when the longtime tenant, 303 Gallery, decided to consolidate its operations in a new, larger 21st Street space, also at street level. "I had to make a decision on the spot, because many other people were interested," says Will Ameringer, who adds that he had been waiting for a vacancy on particularly desirable blocks in the neighborhood for more than two years. "There is no critical mass of galleries on 57th Street anymore. If you want to be viable, you need to be amongst your colleagues, and the artists and critics."