Storefront for Art and Architecture NYC

10 Apr 2012

Storefront for Art and Architecture Event held in 2012

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture Presents Archizines + Arch-Art! Books

Apr 18 – Jun 9
May 5 – Jun 9

Curated by Elias Redstone Curated by Adam O’Reilly for Printed Matter, Inc.

A double exhibition with 80 magazines, 80 feet of books and other printed matters. Designed by / | < | | (Giancarlo Valle, Isaiah King and Ryan Neiheiser) with graphic work by Benjamin Critton.

photograph : Sue Barr
Archizines – link to previous exhibition at AA School, London

NEW YORK. Archizines + Arch-Art! Books is a double exhibition consisting of Archizines curated by Elias Redstone (April 18 – June 9, 2012) and Arch-Art! Books, curated by Adam O’Reilly for Printed Matter, Inc. (May 5 – June 9, 2012) that will be presented at Storefront for Art and Architecture to bring to the table a hypothesis: printed matter matters.

Consisting of an eclectic selection of new independent and alternative magazines, fanzines and journals from around the world (that can be read as a contemporary response to the Clip Stamp Fold exhibition curated by Beatriz Colomina at Storefront in 2007, which explored the little magazines phenomenon in the 60’s and 70’s), together with a selection of contemporary artist books with architecture at the center, the exhibition will be a temporary library for contemporary approaches to architecture from different disciplinary origins and degrees of expertise. An opening reception will take place on April 17th at 7 PM.

photographs : Elias Redstone

Archizines was recently launched by Elias Redstone as a research project to celebrate and promote the resurgence of independent and alternative publishing (www.archizines.com) and an exhibition was initiated in collaboration with the Architectural Association School of Architecture in November 2011. Following presentations in London, Milan and Barcelona, Archizines makes its American debut at Storefront with a bespoke design by / | < | | (Giancarlo Valle, Isaiah King, Ryan Neiheiser) that draws inspiration from the quintessential New York model of publication display – the newstand – and turns it on its side. Instead of a vertical, 2-dimensional billboard, the show will offer a horizontal, 3-dimensional field of objects: 80 architecture publications displayed on delicate metal rods, which sprout from the floor. The exhibition will evacuate all other content from the space, creating an information vacuum that focuses the visitor’s attention on the objects themselves: 80 architecture magazines, fanzines and journals from over 20 countries that provide new platforms for commentary, criticism and research into the spaces we inhabit and the practice of architecture.

Arch-Art! Books will present a selection of artists’ books culled from Printed Matter, Inc.’s current catalog and present them as a medium through which architecture might be photographically explored. Each book is an flâneur’s response to the urban environment, documenting the social patina and environmental decay left on architectural space. The / | < | | design will present the books on linear displays, which will cut through and displace the field of existing Archizines publications.

Together, the complementary shows will form an exhibition of exchange and dialog; mining the overlap and friction found in the recent resurgence of alternative and independent architecture and art publishing from around the world. The exhibition will also include additional printed material (a graphic façade, newsprint, and catalogue) designed by Benjamin Critton that bring together ideas presented in each exhibition.

ARCHIZINES LIVE: Symposium on Publishing Practices
6 Manifesto Series on: MEDIUM / SPEED / HISTORY / CRISIS / DESIRE
In conjunction with the presentation of Archizines, Storefront will host a 2-day symposium on publishing practices as part of its Manifesto Series. Throughout its exhibition tour, Archizines has provided platforms for architectural research and debate, and demonstrated the residual love of the printed word and paper page – providing an antidote to digital publishing. Made by architects, artists and students, the publications included in the exhibition add an important, and often radical, addition to architectural discourse that will be furthered explored through the Manifesto Series, which will take place on Friday, April 20th and Saturday, April 21st.

The Manifesto Series consist on a series of presentations by the editors of the publications on display in the exhibition together with editors of some of the most established publishing magazines. The themes of the Manifesto series will be:

Friday April 20, 7-9 PM: Medium and Speed
7.00-8.00 Medium
8.00-9.00 Speed
Saturday, April 21, History/Crisis and Desire
2-3.30 / HISTORY
4.00-5.30 / CRISIS
6.00-7.30 DESIRE

Storefront for Art and Architecture : main page with current events

14 Mar 2012

Storefront for Art and Architecture New York City Event

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

2012 Spring Benefit Red/Read Honoring Barbara Kruger and Bernard Tschumi
at The Woolworth Building
Mar 29, 2012 6:30 – 9:00 PM The Woolworth Building 233 Broadway, New York City
Cocktails, Hors d’oeuvers A Building Performance and An “Almost” Silent Auction
Tickets start at $250; limited availability contact liz(at)livetreichard.com

Auction featuring works by artists and architects including: Vito Acconci, Dennis Adams, Erieta Attali, Daniel Arsham, Iwan Baan, John Baldessari, Gabriele Basilico, Phong Bui, Beth Campbell, James Casebere, Matilde Cassani, Peter Eisenman, Tony Feher, Haas & Hahn, Anthony Hamboussi, Steven Holl, Patrick Jackson, Louis I. Kahn, Rem Koolhaas, OMA, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, An Te Liu, Antonio Muntadas, Shirin Neshat, Mikael Olsson, Roxy Paine, Lucy Ravin, Pedro Reyes, François Roche, Cordy Ryman, Fanny Sanín, Tomas Saraceno, Gedi Sibony, Xaviera Simmons, Mikhael Subotzky, Stephen Talasnik, Marjan Teeuwen, Bernard Tschumi, Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown, Lawrence Weiner and James Welling. list in formation.

*All proceeds will support Storefront’s exhibitions, talks, competitions, publications and special projects.

3 Feb 2012

Storefront for Art and Architecture Event in 2012

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture Present Ingredients of Reality by Lan Tuazon in New York

Ingredients of Reality:
the dismantling of New York City
by Lan Tuazon
Exhibition: Feb 29 – Apr 7, 2012, 11am – 6pm

photo from Storefront for Art and Architecture

Ingredients of Reality: the Dismantling of New York City by Lan Tuazon presents sculptures, drawings and prints that discuss how history, the law and class structures are written on the physical environment. Surrealist in concept, Tuazon takes real/existing parts of the built environment — including buildings, lots, and monuments – and creates a new reality against the repressive logic of property. The exhibition includes the presentation of two new works: Architectures of Defense and New York City Bar Graph, which paired with Tuazon’s Army Park and Parking Lot Landscape, present the city disassembled into parts and functions unveiling taxonomies of power reordered into new composite figures that render visible what reality has ceased to distinguish.

About the Artist
Lan Tuazon, b. 1976 in the Philippine Islands, lives and works in New York whether she likes it or not. She is Lan Tuazon twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

3 Feb 2012

Storefront for Art and Architecture Manhattan Event

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture and 21c Museum Present DOUBLE, a Manifesto Series Event Marking the Arrival of Artist Serkan Ozkaya’s David (inspired by Michelangelo) in New York

Mar 6 6.30 – 9.30pm

NEW YORK, NY. February 3, 2012 – Storefront for Art and Architecture and 21c Museum are pleased to announce the presentation of DOUBLE, a Manifesto Series event marking the arrival of Serkan Ozkaya’s David (inspired by Michelangelo) in New York on Tuesday, March 6, 2012 from 6:30 to 9:00 p.m.

Golden replica of Michelangelo’s David:

photo from Storefront for Art and Architecture

Conceptual artist Serkan Ozkaya made David (inspired by Michelangelo), a double-size, golden replica of Michelangelo’s David, for the 9th International Istanbul Biennial in 2005. Days prior to the opening of the Biennial, the sculpture collapsed shortly after installation. After the collapse, the artist restored the damaged replica and cast two additional copies, one of which was acquired by 21c Museum in Louisville, Kentucky. The museum will travel the sculpture throughout the city for its New York debut on the morning of March 6, and it will arrive at the Storefront Gallery via a lowboy trailer in the afternoon for the Manifesto Series event. The work will be on view outside Storefront for Art and Architecture during the Manifesto Series panel discussion, which will take place from 6:30 to 9:00 pm.

The event at Storefront will include a live staging of manifestos, on the topic of Double by a group of distinguished panelists consisting of artists, architects, critics, historians and theorists, discussing the effects, desires and implications in the act of doubling, replicating or copying. The presentation of the manifestos will be followed by a discussion between the presenters moderated by Ozkaya.

The event will conclude at 9:00 p.m. with the launch of David (inspired by Michelangelo) on its journey home to 21c Museum. 21c Museum acquired the work by Ozkayain 2010, and in 2011 commissioned the 30-foot-tall sculpture’s journey from Istanbul to New York and on to the museum’s home in Louisville, Kentucky.

About David (inspired by Michelangelo)
David (inspired by Michelangelo) is a double-size, golden replica of Michelangelo’s David. Based on Stanford University professor Marc Levoy’s computer model, Ozkaya’s sculpture was constructed by six people over the course of six months. Originally created for presentation at the 9th International Istanbul Biennial in 2005, the sculpture collapsed days prior to the opening of the Biennial and the artist later restored the damaged replica and cast two additional copies, one that remains in Turkey and one of which has been recently acquired by 21c Museum in Louisville, Kentucky.

Ozkaya notes, “I wanted to use the potential of the 3D model to recreate the most precious man-made object; one which I had never seen for myself. I took the liberty to imagine it twice as tall and in gold. The realization of David (inspired by Michelangelo) has been a multi-step process: first it was executed and erected, and it then collapsed in Istanbul. After being rebuilt in Turkey, 21c Museum arranged its recent transfer to New York. Soon it will emerge on the streets of the city and head towards its home at 21c in Louisville.”

David (inspired by Michelangelo) and its collapse are featured in Danila Cahen’s film, Friendly Enemies (2010). The process is also documented in the 340-page Rise and Fall and Rise of David (inspired by Michelangelo), published by 21c Museum and Yapi Kredi (2011). The book will be available for sale at the event.

About the artist
Serkan Ozkaya (b. 1973, Istanbul, Turkey) is a contemporary conceptual artist whose work deals with topics of appropriation and reproduction, and typically operates outside of traditional art spaces. Ozkaya lives in New York City. He holds a Ph. D in German Language and Literature from Istanbul University and an M.F.A. from Bard College, New York.

Ozkaya’s latest works include Spaghetti Chair, made from fifteen sticks of spaghetti; David (inspired by Michelangelo), made from a 3D rendering program at two-times the size of the original; a site-specific sculpture called A Sudden Gust of Wind, simulating the sudden and unexpected scattering of papers; the hand-rendering of newspapers including the Turkish daily Radikal, and the front page of the Louisville Courier-Journal; and a contribution to a walking museum, Atlas, wherein Ozkaya constructed a rock to be strapped to the curator’s back and promenaded daily throughout the streets of New York. Ozkaya is the author of nine books, including Genius and Creativity in the Arts: Schoenberg, Adorno and Thomas Mann (Pan Publications, Istanbul, 2000), It’s Not What it Looks Like! I Can Explain (Baglam Publications, Istanbul, 2003), Today Could Be a Day of Historical Importance (artwithoutwalls, Louisville, 2010), and The Rise and Fall and Rise of David (inspired by Michelangelo) (21c Museum and Yapi Kredi, Louisville, 2011).

About 21c Museum
21c Museum is North America’s first museum dedicated to solely collecting and exhibiting the art of the 21st century. The 9,000-square foot Museum is part of the 21c Museum Hotel, located in downtown Louisville’s art and theater district. Opened in 2006, 21c was founded by Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson, arts patrons who are committed to bringing works of art to the public through innovative exhibitions and programs that integrate contemporary art into daily life. 21c Museum features permanent installations and special exhibitions by both emerging and established artists. Currently on view is Alter Ego: A Decade of Work by Anthony Goicolea, organized by the North Carolina Museum of Art and Telfair Museums, Savannah, in collaboration with 21c Museum. Over 35 exhibitions have been featured at 21c since its opening, including Cuba Now, Simen Johan: Until the Kingdom Comes, Creating Identity: Portraits Today, All’s Fair in Art and War: Envisioning Conflict, and Hybridity: The Evolution of Species and Spaces in 21st-Century Art.

More information at www.21cMuseum.org 21c Museum, 700 West Main Street, Louisville, KY 40202
Tel. (502) 217-6346 Fax (502) 217-6347

27 Jan 2012

Storefront for Art and Architecture Discussion

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture Presents ? Scale Big Change

with Barry Bergdoll and Leonardo Diaz-Borioli
1 Feb, 2012, 7:00 pm
Are you a member? Reserve your seat by sending an email to km@storefrontnews.org

? Scale Big Change is a Productive Disagreement Series event with MoMa Curator Barry Bergdoll and architect Leonardo Diaz-Borioli about the role of the social architect. The event will discuss the idea of socially responsible architecture highlighted in the 2010 MoMA exhibition, Small Scale Big Change: New Architectures of Social Engagement and the role of designers, funders, governments, and citizens in the creation of buildings, spaces and infrastructure designed for undeserved populations. The event will include the presentation of maps and projects that reflect an alternative viewpoint to what is considered “small scale.”

10 Jan 2012

Storefront for Art and Architecture NYC Event

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture Presents 007_Urban_Songline by Allard van Hoorn, sound design by Ryan Holsopple

A site-specific experiment and performance that transforms the Acconci/Holl façade into a musical instrument

Exhibition: 18 Jan – 18 Feb, 2012, 11:00 am – 6:00 pm
Opening Reception: 17 Jan, 2012, 7:00 pm
Performance Recordings: Daily, 5:00 pm

The origin of Songlines [or Dreaming Tracks] can be traced to Australian indigenous systems for navigation and caretaking of land achieved by mapping space through the creation of music based on the topography of land. For 007_Urban_Songline, the artist creates a series of Dreaming Tracks utilizing the changing morphology of Storefront’s façade and the sounds that emerge from the urban sonic context of the gallery.

The installation consists of an interwoven network of strings throughout the façade and the gallery space that transform the gallery into an interactive, responsive musical instrument. When a panel of the façade moves, the strings physically activate the totality of the façade and acoustically transform the space of the gallery making the different spatial transformations audible for visitors. Visitors become performers and are encouraged to manipulate the installation as they transcend the space by moving the panels of the façade and stretching and playing the fields of strings with their hands and bodies, thus constructing and transforming the acoustic and visual topography of Storefront.

For the opening night of the exhibition, van Hoorn will perform a concert of 7 Urban Songlines recorded in the space throughout the pre-opening days.

4 Jan 2012

Storefront for Art and Architecture Design Charrette

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture Presents design charrette at Queens Museum

SUPERFRONT’s Lab for Urban Futures invites you to
– a design charrette at Queens Museum 14 Jan
– SUPERFRONT publications panel and launch event at Van Alen Books 16 Feb

SUPERFRONT presents “Design with Detroit: Urban Futures” rapid charrette January 14th 3pm-6pm at the Queens Museum

On January 14th 3pm-6pm SUPERFRONT presents “Design with Detroit: Urban Futures,” a rapid design charrette for students and young designers at the Queens Museum of Art. Designers will have 30 minutes to review a brief and 2 hours to respond with design drawings in real time. Design problems to be addressed range from the rehabilitation of historic buildings in commercial districts to design-build strategies for multi-generational education centers and productive use of collective open space. The program brief for the design includes a screening of the 12-minute music video/documentary “Locusts,” a work of Detroit-based EMERGENCE media. This is the 3rd event in SUPERFRONT’s Lab for Urban Futures series at the Queens Museum of Art, which culminates with a publication release in February.

More info here. The rapid charrette format is geared toward leveling the field for designers who have limited time to devote to non-paying endeavors. Select projects will be published in the Lab for Urban Futures publication. To participate in the charrette please include your full name in rsvp with subject “DDUF” to info@superfront.org by Jan 12.

Upcoming at SUPERFRONT:
January 15. 3pm – 10pm Friends of SUPERFRONT present Detroit Deluxxe at the Queens Museum.
February 16. 7pm SUPERFRONT panel and publications launch at Van Alen Books.

Institute for Urban Design is reviewing submissions for the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale, to take place from August through November 2012 with the theme “Spontaneous Interventions: Design Actions for the Common Good.”

9 Dec 2011

Storefront for Art and Architecture Event

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture Presents Stammtisch / Tertulias / Salon : On Architecture and Publishing with Pablo Twose from Engawa and Benjamin Prosky

NEW YORK. Storefront for Art and Architecture will present Stammtisch / Tertulias / Salon: On Architecture and Publishing on Tuesday, December 13, 2011 at 7 PM at Storefront for Art and Architecture. The evening is curated by Ana Maria Torres and will showcase Pablow Twose from Engawa and Benjamin Prosky, who will discuss publishing practices, the internet, scalability and the open exchange of ideas.

“Thirty-five years after he published Toward an Architecture, Le Corbusier observed that it was the book’s layout – a bold mixture of text and image – as much as its content that contributed to its impact: “The layouts of my articles sparked astonishment and indignation among the printers,” he wrote in 1957. In 1922, he’d described his work as a “new conception of a book,” and he saw this new approach to book-making as intimately bound up in what he hoped would prove a new approach to architecture.

We find ourselves at an exciting and challenging juncture for architecture. New media have created opportunities for pushing the envelope and self-reinvention, even as publishers large and small have explored new forms of printing and distribution. Some still believe in the importance of a hard copy. Some books have become even more thing-ly: products to display on a coffee table. Others have become more ephemeral: self-published zines and journals, are, if anything, making a resurgence. Other books have been freed from print altogether. Each new direction suggests different possibilities in the world of architecture.”
–Ana Maria Torres

About the Participants

The Engawa project launched in January 2010 as a result of the need to discuss architecture by people located in different cities: Tenerife, Barcelona, Toledo, Granada, Giron, etc. Because of the distances, Engawa provides a meeting place and an open forum. The magazine takes its name and much of the meaning from the Japanese word “engawa”, which means the space between the interior and the exterior of classic Japanese architecture. It is a transitional space which suggests things like invitation or welcome, but also the contrary, that is to say projection and opening. The topic of each issue comes from one image chosen by a member of Engawa. This random image prevents repeating the usual topics, and allows randomness of conversation. From that premise a little spy game starts, where the images become text, or vice versa.

Benjamin Prosky is currently the Assistant Dean for Communications at Harvard Graduate School of Design, where he oversees the departments of events, exhibitions, web content, publications, and Harvard Design Magazine. He has worked as a freelance communications consultant for architects and designers, advising firms on branding, written and verbal communications materials, outreach to press, publications, clients, and cultural institutions. He co-founded Architizer in 2009.

5 Dec 2011

Storefront for Art and Architecture Exhibition

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Storefront for Art and Architecture Presents Strategies for Public Occupation, an Exhibition of Ideas in Response to the Occupy Wall Street Movement Dec 17-22, 2011

Zuccotti Park, October 26, 2011:

photo from Storefront for Art and Architecture

NEW YORK. Storefront for Art and Architecture will present Strategies for Public Occupation from December 17 – 22, 2011, an exhibition of ideas that will include seven days of discussions. Storefront will host an opening reception on December 16, 2011 from 7 PM to 9 PM. The exhibition, discussions and opening reception are free and open to the public.

On October 7, 2011, in response to the Occupy Wall Street movement, Storefront launched a Call for Ideas entitled “Strategies for Public Occupation” which invited submissions from architects, artists and citizens at large to offer their ideas for enabling acts of communication and action between the civil society and the structures of economic and political power. Gathering expertise from the various acts of civil occupation throughout the world during the last months and constrained to one image and one text of maximum 200 words, submissions ranged from the technical to the oneiric. With a prize equivalent to a New World Order, Storefront received more than 100 submissions.

The exhibition will present to the public the submissions delivered to the Call for Ideas and Storefront will host a 7-day marathon of talks, workshops and events that intend to bring together a creative force of experts, artists, architects and citizens at large to discuss the current state of affairs in relation to the Occupy movement around the world. While the exhibition will display proposals for spatial occupations for public demonstrations and actions in cities throughout the world, the events aim to identify the limitations and possibilities of tools of production [as artists, architects, anthropologist, lawyers, etc] and rethink new ways of cohabitation. All projects submitted will be available for browsing, consultation and distribution as part of the exhibition and through Storefront’s website and archive (www.storefrontnews.org).

Workshops and forums will take place December 16-22 from 7PM – 9 PM on December 16, 2011 and from 12 PM to 6 PM from December 17-22, 2011. Workshops will be led by members of the art, architecture and design community, by lawyers and experts in different fields including engineering and social sciences and members of the community interested in offering different degrees of expertise. While Storefront has invited several experts to participate in the discussions, in synchrony with the Occupy movement, Storefront welcomes anyone willing to participate in the discussions in an active manner and interested persons should contact Storefront by sending an e-mail with the subject “participation” and brief description of their interest and expertise to info@storefrontnews.org. Themes for discussion include the following:

16 Dec. Opening. 7pm. Manifesto Series 08. Occupy
Exhibition opening with the presentation of 10 manifestos towards Strategies for Public Occupation.

17 Dec. Urban Action. 12pm-6pm
Six hours of presentations and performances engaging with historical material and current practices in relation to urban interventions that defy established modes of engagement.

18 Dec. Food for thought. Paella Series 3.0 Alternatives/ 12pm-6pm
Taking food as a space for sharing and community building the Paella Series 03 will be an open event performance at Storefront where people will be able to converse and discuss ideas in a state of distraction enabled by food consumption and sharing.

19 Dec. Representation: Laws & Maps. 12pm-6pm
To understand the possibility of action one needs to be able to delimit the margins of the possible. Laws and maps are two of the most relevant documents that guide and constrain the possibilities of action. This session will unveil and produce new laws that allow citizens to empower actions beyond inherited parameters.

20 Dec: Mediums: Images, Newspapers, Blogs,… 12pm-6pm
From projections to posters to protester signs, different mediums and design strategies have been used as mediums and as messages to communicate different strategies of protest. This workshop will allow the public to develop visual material, from video projections to posters that will be included within the exhibition and on display throughout the day.

21 Dec: Architecture. 12pm-6pm
From the camps and structures created in the various cities’ occupy sites to the very architectures on Wall Street that symbolically embody the existing societal structures that have inspired the movements, architecture is an enabling and constitutive force. This day will be dedicated to discussing what is the role of architecture and urban design when envisioning a world order that differs from existing canonical forms of inhabitation.

22 Dec: Occupy Presents.12pm-6pm
As the last day of the exhibition, Storefront will house a series of real scale prototypes that function as strategies for urban occupation. From shelters, to posters, to chairs for urbanity, to occupy holiday postcards, to do it yourself manuals, visitors to the gallery will be able to take these presented objects as presents.

The exhibition will include ideas from: Abasolo, Andia, Barrios, Castillo von Bennewitz; Marin Abell; Laure Adamo; Andreas Alig; Marian Alvarez; Elena Amafutskay; Alfredo Andia; Percem Aydin Greta Babarskaite, Maria Juliana Bautista, Elizaveta Grigoriadi; Siarhej Babareka; Wolfgang Bankstah; Ethel Baraona and César Reyes; Jon Barni; Tiago Barros; Basurama; Nick Bates; Peter Behrbohm; Andrew Blackley; Lev Bratishenko; Janet Braun-Reinitz; Adam Brunton; Daniel Camacho; Casanova + Hernandez Architecten; Sofia Castelo; Deger Cengiz; Chenchuan Chen, Jae Shin and Ona Winet; Collectif YA+K; Javier Corzan Serrano; Jillian Crandall; Nick Crutcher; Rebecca De Marchi; Geoff DeOld; Desayuno Con Viandantes; Gil Doron; El Campo de Cebada; Esterni; William Evertson; Richard Farrelly; Zeglar Fergus; Caroline Filice Smith; Jorge Fontan; Virginia Gomes; Grávalos & Di Monte Arquitectos; H H; Heiko Haberle; Habitar; Menno Harder; Gonzalo Herrero Delicado; Kadel Herresthal; Rachel Hines; Omar Hussein; Peter Hutter; Inteligencias colectivas.org; Nova Jiang; Karl Johan; Christopher M. Johnson; Brandon Johnson; Herby G Joseph; Mattias Gabrielk Kalfoglou Schmidt; Brian Kim; Cortney Kirk; Chere Krakovsky; JaeWook Lee; Michael Lewarne; Isaac Linder; Radim Louda; Xiaojing Lu; Alisdair MacRae; Enrique Martínez Jiméne; Matthias Matschewski; Mitch McEwen; Fitim Miftari; Marina Migneco; Marcos Miguélez; Nuria Molina Lopez; MOOV; Jerome Morley Larson; NDNY – Kohilam Chandrahasan & Ananth Sampathkumar; Brian Nigus; Hannah Oellinger; Erin Ota & Caroline Smith; Jorge Orozco Gonzalez; Mike Osterhout; OWS-Sheltering Project; Jesus Palomino; Melissa Pearson; Javier Peña; Delphine Piault; PKMN Architectures; Jeannette Plaut; Marisa Prefer; William C. Reichard; Chloé Roubert; Luis M. Santalla Blanco; Aniket Shahane; Beto Shwafaty; João Silva Inácio; Matthew Slaats; SLAPP + mild + leise; Solidarity NYC; Ivan Stojakovic; Cheng-Zhong Su; Matthew J. Thomas; Cassie Thornton; José Ramón Tramoyeres; Chat Travieso; URBZ; José Luis Vallejo; Alexandros Vasmoulakis; Ana Vidal; Miljena Vuckovic; Lee Wells; Alan Williams; Ceri Williams; Loren Yu; Nianlai Zhong; Marcos Zotes, among others.

For more information on Strategies for Public Occupation, please contact Kara Meyer, Director of External Relations at km@storefrontnews.org.

About Storefront
Founded in 1982, Storefront for Art and Architecture is a nonprofit organization committed to the advancement of innovative positions in architecture, art and design. Our program of exhibitions, artists talks, film screenings, conferences and publications is intended to generate dialogue and collaboration across geographic, ideological and disciplinary boundaries. As a public forum for emerging voices, Storefront explores vital issues in art and architecture with the intent of increasing awareness of and interest in contemporary design.

More information at www.storefrontnews.org

Storefront for Art and Architecture
97 Kenmare Street
10012 New York, NY
Tel. 212.431.5795 Fax 212.431.5755

9 Nov 2011

Storefront for Art and Architecture Manhattan

Venue: The Storefront for Art and Architecture, 97 Kenmare Street, NYC, USA

Dates: 25 – 30 Nov 2011

HARRISON ATELIER PRESENTS PHARMACOPHORE: ARCHITECTURAL PLACEBO NOVEMBER 25-30

AT THE STOREFRONT FOR ART & ARCHITECTURE CONCEIVED, DRAMATURGED AND DIRECTED BY SETH HARRISON, DESIGNED BY ARIANE LOURIE HARRISON, CHOREOGRAPHED BY SILAS RIENER

Installation-performance hybrid features
Merce Cunningham Dance Company members Riener, Rashaun Mitchell, Jamie Scott and Melissa Toogood; lighting design by Aaron Copp and Nick Houfek; and an original score by Loren Dempster

Pharmacaphore HAt and Silas Riener 2010:

photos © Harrison Atelier

The innovative design firm Harrison Atelier (HAt) is collaborating with choreographer Silas Riener to create Pharmacophore: Architectural Placebo, the latest in a growing body of HAt collaborations bridging design with performance. The new dance-installation work, to be presented at New York’s Storefront for Art & Architecture, is conceived, dramaturged and directed by HAt founder Seth Harrison, designed by his partner, Ariane Lourie Harrison, and performed by Merce Cunningham Dance Company members Riener, Rashaun Mitchell, Jamie Scott and Melissa Toogood.

The installation will be on view November 22-December 3. The opening event, from 6:00 to 8:00 pm on November 22, will include a brief “teaser” performance. Full performances will take place nightly, November 25-30, at 7:00 pm and 8:30 pm. Tickets are free but reservations should be made in advance by emailing Ricky Lee at ricky@susangrantlewin.com. The Storefront for Art and Architecture is located at 97 Kenmare Street, NYC.

The very ideas underlying Pharmacophore: Architectural Placebo epitomize the unique intersection HAt occupies—where art meets science, technology and medicine, and the real and the imagined become a highly nuanced blend. Seth Harrison—who is, tellingly, the rare individual who has earned an MD, and MBA and an MFA—derived the new work’s title and theme from two medical terms. Pharmacophore is used by doctors and drug researchers to describe any family of similarly-shaped molecular structures that interact predictably with a particular biological target. Placebo effect is a beneficial change in a biochemical state, temporary and unreliable, produced in anticipation of therapy. The interaction of the two assumes a beguiling complexity. Placebo effects are augmented by marketing campaigns, social ambition, quests for scientific success as well as the institutional apparatus of white coats, prescription labels and medical instrumentation. Often the appearance of side effects can trigger the placebo effect of an otherwise inefficacious drug. Sometimes a placebo effect can be caused by a diagnosis. Where, then, is the line between pharmacophore and placebo? What are our cultural placebos, the conventions and assumptions on which we rely every day? Is medicine itself one such placebo-pharmacophore?

Pharmacophore: Architectural Placebo:

photo from SGLA

Taking these questions as conceptual touchstones, Pharmacophore: Architectural Placebo is HAt’s exploration of the cultural and philosophical economy that surrounds medicine, technology, and the human prospect in the 21st century. Seth Harrison commented, “Cultural placebos are familiar objects: the image of science, for example, or of hygiene, or social ideals. These cultural placebos act on the mechanisms of our wishes and desires, just as pharmacophores act by chemical mechanisms deduced by science.”

Ariane Lourie Harrison’s installation incorporates set and costumes, and transforms the entirety of the Storefront gallery into something like a pharmaceutical company façade cum radiological/DNA diagnostic suite of the future. The installation consists of 24 eight-foot-tall, tempered glass plates, supported by stainless steel framing and backlit blue. Contoured seats suggestive of medical apparatus are dotted with inflatable forms, and when unfurled these become cartoon versions of pharmacophores. The performers, following Riener’s choreography, use the inflatable set pieces as costumes and props; audience members use them as cushions. In the interaction of design objects and dancers, spectators and set, and spectators and other spectators, the performance highlights the shared desires that prompt our cultural placebos—even as the set pieces are contorted into placebo-effects as specific and numerous as the audience members themselves.

An original lighting design by Aaron Copp and Nick Houfek and an original score by Loren Dempster round out this genre-defying work. The piece is the third installment in HAt’s Pharmacophore series of design-dance hybrids. Catherine Miller choreographed the previous iterations, in 2010 and earlier year. Prior to Pharmacophore, HAt co-created Anchises with the choreographer Jonah Bokaer; The New York Times named that piece one of the Ten Best Dance Works of 2010.

Of the project, Executive Director Eva Franch i Gilabert said, “Pharmacophore: Architectural Placebo revolves around notions of collectivity and individuation, of function and desire, of original and fake, of expertise and play. The project dwells on the space left between culturally acquired norms and art performance; it allows visitors to exist between a collective imaginary space and a moment of individual creativity where the dancers take us from the waiting room of culture into a space of inner creativity. All of it a cultural placebo, all of it a cultural pharmacophore.”

ABOUT THE PHARMACOPHORE TEAM

Harrison Atelier (HAt) is a New York-based multi-disciplinary design firm founded in 2009. The practice operates along a broad spectrum defined by its two founding members’ respective training and backgrounds: Ariane Lourie Harrison, a critic at the Yale School of Architecture since 2006, holds a PhD in the History of Architecture from the Institute of Fine Arts, and an M.Arch from Columbia University; Seth Harrison is a designer and entrepreneur with MFA, MBA, and MD degrees from Columbia University. At the intersection of the Harrisons’ professional spheres, HAt mines a conceptual vein that runs through art, science, history and technology. At once avant-garde and pragmatic, the main thrust of the firm’s work involves an engagement with living systems. In their recent projects, such as new research facilities at the Fire Island National Seashore, HAt explores natural processes of growth, decay, and regeneration with intellectual rigor and visual flair. For more information about HAt, please visit www.harrisonatelier.com.

Silas Riener (choreographer and performer) grew up in Washington DC. He graduated from Princeton University with a degree in Comparative Literature and Creative Writing. He has worked with Chantal Yzermans, Takehiro Ueyama, Christopher Williams, Jonah Bokaer, and Rebecca Lazier’s TERRAIN. In 2010 he premiered NOX, a collaboration with poet Anne Carson and choreographer Rashaun Mitchell, with whom he continues to develop new projects. He joined the Merce Cunningham Dance Company in November 2007. While performing with MCDC, Riener completed his MFA in Dance at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts.

Rashaun Mitchell (performer) was born in Stamford, Connecticut, and raised in Atlanta, Georgia. He started dancing at Concord Academy in Massachusetts and graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 2000. He received the Viola Farber-Slayton Memorial Grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Performance Arts in 2000. Since then he has danced with Pam Tanowitz, Chantal Yzermans, Donna Uchizono, Risa Jaroslow, Sara Rudner, and Richard Colton. He joined the Merce Cunningham Dance Company in January 2004 and is currently on faculty at the Cunningham Studio. In 2007 he was the recipient of a Princess Grace Award: Dance Fellowship. His choreography has been presented at the Skirball Center (New York), La Mama (New York), Mount Tremper Arts (New York) and The Institute for Contemporary Art (Boston).

Jamie Scott (performer) studied dance in her hometown of Great Falls, Virginia. She continued training in the pre-professional division of the Washington School of Ballet and moved to New York in 2001 to attend Barnard College, graduating cum laude in 2005. She joined the Merce Cunningham Repertory Understudy Group in 2007 and the main company in 2009. Jamie is currently on faculty at the Merce Cunningham Dance Studio. She has danced with the Daniel Gwirtzman Dance Company.

Melissa Toogood (performer) is currently a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. She began working with Merce as a member of the CDF Repertory Understudy Group in 2005. A faculty member at the Merce Cunningham Studio since 2007, she has taught repertory workshops in her native city of Sydney, Australia, and at the Cunningham studio in New York. Melissa works with Pam Tanowitz, Miro Dance Theatre, was a founding member of Michael Uthoff Dance Theatre and performed with writer Anne Carson. Melissa earned a BFA in Dance Performance from New World School of the Arts, Miami, FL under Dean Danny Lewis.

Loren Kiyoshi Dempster (composer) uses a combination of computer, electronics, field recordings, cello, improvisation, notated scores and world music influences to create and perform music. He has performed with Dan Joseph Ensemble, Trio Tritticali, String Power, Spontaneous River and Left Hand Path, among many others. His compositions for music and movement have been presented at The Stone, Roulette, Issue Project Room, North River Music, Wesleyan College and at Chez Bushwick, a 2007 Bessie Award-winning performance arts space in Brooklyn of which he is a founding member. He has toured extensively with Merce Cunningham, and he played John Cage’s solo cello work “One8” for the dance “Interscape.” Ever interested in the relationships between movement, space and sound, Dempster creates or performs music for many choreographers including Chris Ferris, Jonah Bokaer, Project Limb and Stochastic Ensemble in 2010.

Aaron Copp’s (lighting designer) travels as a lighting designer have taken him to hundreds of theaters in more than 30 countries, from opera houses in European capitals to tents in the sand dunes of Rajasthan. His recent projects include lighting designs for Natalie Merchant, Yo-Yo Ma, Philip Glass and Laurie Anderson. Copp designed the critically acclaimed Kennedy Center revival of “The Glass Menagerie,” directed by Gregory Mosher and starring Sally Field. He has also designed frequently at the Old Globe Theater in San Diego and recently received a San Diego Theater Critics Award for Joe Hardy’s production of “Bus Stop.” He has worked extensively in the dance world, most recently receiving his second Bessie Award for Jonah Bokaer’s “The Invention Of Minus One.” Copp had a long association with Merce Cunningham, designing such pieces as “Ground Level Overlay,” “Windows” and “Biped,” for which he also won a Bessie. He holds an MFA from the Yale School of Drama and a BA from SUNY-Binghamton.

Nicholas Houfek (lighting designer) focuses his work in Dance and Theatre with a strong interest in new work development. Recent design work has been seen at the Lincoln Center Festival (SoPercussion and Matmos, Varése: (R)evolution Part 1,) Marvell Rep (Nora, In the Shadow of the Glen, Blood Wedding, The Dybbuk,) Ian Spencer Bell Dance, Olney Theatre Center (Farragut North, Call of the Wild,) Collaboration Town (The Play About My Dad, THE MOMENTUM,) Potomac Theatre Company (Therese Raquin,) Tours in US, France, Germany and China with dance companies Martha Graham, ARMITAGE GONE! Elisa Monte, Nai-Ni Chen and The Deborah Hay Dance Company as lighting supervisor; Lincoln Center Festival as Assistant Lighting Supervisor; Williamstown Theatre Festival, the Broadway transfer of Glory Days, and The New York City Ballet as Assistant Lighting Designer. He is a graduate of Boston University’s Theatre Design Program.