Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Field Trip #5

                                  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.


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