Postmasters Gallery
Postmasters Gallery is a contemporary art gallery located in Manhattan's Tribeca neighborhood, owned and directed by Magda Sawon and Tamas Banovich. The work it presents is "content oriented, conceptually based, and reflective of our time."[1] Its shows and represented artists have been written about in publications such as the New York Times, Artforum, Artnet, and Art In America, among others. Postmasters is considered to be among the "leading experimental galleries" in New York City.[2] It is the primary gallery for all the artists they represent.[3]
In December 1984, Sawon and Banovich opened Postmasters in the East Village. The name of the gallery references the idea of being "post" the European masters, alludes to Postmodernism, and is partially inspired by the owners' early interest in mail art and its distribution by the postal service.[4] Five years later, in 1989, the gallery moved to SoHo, and then relocated to Chelsea in September 1998. In June 2013 Postmasters moved to its current location at 54 Franklin Street in Tribeca, taking over a 4,500-square-foot (420 m2) ground-floor space complete with large functional basement. Upon their move, Postmasters released a statement titled "Postmasters 4.0 Tribeca: 'Grow AND Go.'" They wrote, "We want to afford ourselves the opportunity to show art that the market is not yet swallowing whole. We want to continue championing work with challenging but relevant content that may take the time to be loved, appreciated and acquired. We want to look for art by artists - old and young - that confounds us that we don't know or understand. We don't want to anticipate the market and try to deliver on its demands. We want to challenge the market and perhaps teach it. We have, after all, sold some impossible things in the past. We want to search deep and wide for collectors who share this vision."
The gallery has a history of exhibiting work in media that is challenging for a commercial art gallery, including the work of several Net.artists and political activists. For example, Maciej Wisniewski's media-rich e-mail software Netomat was exhibited as an artwork at the gallery in 1999 before being exhibited at the Whitney Museum of Art in 2000. The gallery's decision to exhibit software as an art form engages the Marshall McLuhan-coined concept "The medium is the message" by updating it with Wisnieski's belief that 'the artist's role is to challenge the existing notion of software development and distribution.'[5] And in May 2010, Chatroulette became both medium and subject for artists Eva and Franco Mattes AKA 0100101110101101.ORG.[6]
On September 6, 2001, German-born artist Wolfgang Staehle, installed three live-feed video projections in the gallery, one of which was a panoramic view of Lower Manhattan, which would remain on view for the rest of the month. In a strange coincidence, the feed captured the terrorist attacks of September 11th, transforming a fixed image of the city into what the art critic Roberta Smith of the New York Times called "a live history painting."[7] Following the terrorist attacks of September 11th, the name of the piece was changed from "To the People of New York" to "Untitled." [8]
In 2002, Sawon sold a work by artists Jennifer and Kevin McCoy from the gallery to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which she has described as a highlight of her career.[citation needed]
In 2007, Hong Kong-based artist and Internet activist Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung exhibited a video critical of the George W. Bush Administration entitled "Because Washington Is Hollywood for Ugly People".[9] The following year, "Because Washington Is Hollywood for Ugly People" was included in the Official Selection of Sundance Film Festival 2008, and has been shown in various other film festivals around the world.[10]
On occasion, Sawon has allowed artists to direct the public's attention to her own role as an art dealer. In 1992 the gallery hosted an exhibition of work by Silvia Kolbowski that featured posters of the gallery itself.[11] In an event called "Ask the Dealer," during the month-long hashtagclass series at Winkleman Gallery in 2010, Sawon promised to truthfully answer any question asked of her regarding her experience as a gallerist. [12]
In 2014, Postmasters was named "Best Art Gallery" in the Village Voice's "Best Of" series. Deeming it the best art gallery in New York City, the Voice declared that Postermasters was the "premier venue for art with brains" and "remains tops among NYC gallery-goers who like their art front-loaded with timely ideas."
In March 2017, Postmasters announced that they would be expanding to Rome, where they will be involved with pop-up exhibitions, special projects, and art fairs. As of April 2017, Paulina Bebecka is the director-at-large of Postmasters, overseeing Postmasters activities in Rome, and Kerry Doran is the director of Postmasters in New York.
Artists
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Artists currently represented by Postmasters include:[13]
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Artists previously exhibited by Postmasters include:[14]
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References
- ^ https://www.artsy.net/postmasters
- ^ Viveros-Faune, Christian (February 6, 2013). "How Uptown Money Kills Downtown Art". The Village Voice. Retrieved April 3, 2014.
- ^ Postmasters gallery website
- ^ Ann Fensterstock (September 17, 2013). Art on the Block: Tracking the New York Art World from SoHo to the Bowery, Bushwick and Beyond. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 271–. ISBN 978-1-137-27849-4.
- ^ Mirapaul, Matthew. "A Drawing Board for Multimedia E-mail". The New York Times. July 31, 2003.
- ^ Fisher, Cora. "EVA AND FRANCO MATTES AKA 0100101110101101.ORG Reality is Overrated". Brooklyn Rail. June 2010.
- ^ Smith, Roberta. "In New York's Galleries, a New Context Seems to Remake the Art". The New York Times. September 19, 2001.
- ^ [1]
- ^ Smith, Roberta. "Battle Rages on the Cultural Front". The New York Times. December 30, 2007.
- ^ [2]
- ^ Smith, Roberta. "The Gallery Is the Message". The New York Times. October 4, 1992.
- ^ [3]
- ^ http://www.postmastersart.com/
- ^ http://www.postmastersart.com/