Lower East Side Galleries
The location of a gallery is
not that important but I feel it has a power on the work of art. After visiting
the galleries from Chelsea, I had the opportunity to visit the Lower East Side
galleries as well. The difference is not that big, both being related with
great works of art, but is noticeable.
The
galleries from Lower East Side seem to show a different kind of work than those
in Chelsea and most of them are different in their own way. For example the
first gallery I visited was “Joe Sheftel” and I saw some nonconformist
paintings made of some ripped material and put nicely together and also just
some canvases without a frame hanged on the walls of the gallery. This was a
pretty unique way of creating art. The next gallery I visited was also a bookstore.
The name of the gallery is “The Strange Loop” and is a bookstore combined with
a gallery creating all this new idea about viewing art. This creative idea I couldn’t
find in Chelsea. The most interesting way of presenting art I founded in a
basement. I know it sounds weird but when I visited “Stephan Stoyanov Gallery” I
was surprised to discover this basement. Beside the unique way, the gallery had
different rooms in the basement, surrounded by pipes and bricks projecting all
these designs and moving images. Again, these kind of art I couldn’t find in
Chelsea, even though the first floor of this gallery has regular canvas
paintings. I can go on and on because every single gallery I visited has a
unique way of presenting art. On the other hand, in Chelsea, most of the
galleries present paintings.
Talking about collectors, I find
it hard to see people actual buying these works of art from Lower East Side
galleries. I mean some of them are actually hard to see presented in a
different environment. You can find art that you can buy but is equally found
with the one you can’t buy. And when I say you can’t buy I am saying that the
work of art it’s a little bit weird and maybe the buyer needs to buy the same.
For a change in Chelsea I found that only people with money buy those works of
art, maybe because of the price or maybe because of the sophistication. I think
also the surrounding area has something to do with the type of art because you
can compare the two neighborhoods and see the differences. You can see that
Lower East Side is dirty and more crowded than Chelsea and also what type of
institutions or buildings are around. In Chelsea you have elite private schools
and offices of multi billionaire corporations, institutions that you can’t find
in Lower East Side. And because of surroundings you can look down on a piece of
art or up, but not all the time because your aesthetic viewing of a work of art
can kick in and can change your perspective.
To sum up, a work of art if is good, doesn’t
matter where it is shown. But in some cases the surrounding area can help. The
variety of art is so big and people have their own and different opinion that
they can like a kind of art that others they can’t and vice versa. Lower East
Side was one example of diversity of art and I recommend to everybody to visit
the galleries at least a few times because there are so many.
