On The (W)hole

I started an art gallery at Dartmouth, as an undergraduate, called AREA. No one came to the openings; they were too busy with their frat basement parties. During my Junior year, I interned at the Whitney Museum and saw the 2002 Whitney Biennial that highlighted works by Forcefield and Chris Johanson. It was Chris Johanson’s work that really intrigued me and sparked an unyielding desire to meet him. After graduating, I sent a resume to a mysterious place called “Deitch Projects” where he was represented. They hired me as a receptionist.

The first show, at which I was stationed at the front desk, happened to be Chris’s show and I was able to meet him, and through him ALLLLLL the New York downtown artists. I connected with that community of people and curated my first show in 2003 at Brooklyn Fire Proof. The show was reviewed in the New York Times just above the New York Times Review of Jeffrey’s AVAF show and Jeffrey took notice. I was promoted to the director of Deitch Projects and because of that promotion was able to curate many, many shows both at Deitch and all over the world over the next eight years.

When Deitch closed, the community of artists I had been supporting needed a gallery to continue and fill the hole that Deitch left, so I became an art dealer. I curate those shows here, and still participate in curating shows on an international level, but I focus more on selling art. The Hole is unique from other galleries for a million reasons, not all of which are obvious to me because I am inside the thing itself. I show work that has spirit, heart, life to it. I like art that is based on artists living interesting lives and whose art is an extension of that lifestyle. I show works that are visceral, immediate, urgent, exciting, and accessible. I only relate to art that is sincere, not art about art, not art that requires an essay to appreciate, not art that is lazy or negative, but art that is sophisticated in a way that is visually apparent and that pulls you in to learn more. I can’t help but love art that has a certain skill, thoughtfulness and expert technique.

I wanted to open on the Bowery because my close friend, the late Dash Snow, lived at 138 Bowery and I spent my formative years lying on his floor, making art, talking about art, and generally goofing off. All my friends live down by the Bowery, I live by the Bowery, I love the “downtown” area and want to give back to it. A lot of people feel like the Golden Age of the Bowery crumbled decades ago, and while that may be true, it doesn’t mean that art on the Bowery is ultimately dead, and certainly does not mean that it isn’t possible to revive.

I work to curate art in a community-based way; artists themselves are the best curators, they naturally surround themselves and collaborate with the best artists. The best way to curate a show is to take a group of people that already exist and put the best of them forward with the best works that build to something larger than the sum of the individual parts. The worst way to curate a show, I think, is to pick some abstract idea and then choose artists who have no relationship to each other to illustrate that notion. Unfortunately, it seems to be the way some curators go about things. Instead of imposing a curator’s ideas upon their public, I think a good curator should organize and support the natural tendencies that come from the artist communities themselves. It’s more organic, nurturing; two elements that help a show have impact.