by Sara Christoph for Norte Maar

One century ago this year, the floodgates of modern art were opened by three artists: Arthur B. Davies, Walter Pach and Walt Kuhn. One year before, they had formed an artist-run coalition—the Association of American Painters—and in February of 1913, the organization mounted its first show, The International Exhibition of Modern Art. Today we know the event largely by the nickname it garnered from the show’s location: The Armory Show. And the rest, it seems, is modern art history.

Yet if Davies, Pach and Kuhn were paling around today and happened to stumble into next week’s Armory Fair, the highly publicized centennial show opening March 7^th, they would likely feel frightfully lost. The name may be the same, but the original spirit of spontaneity is largely gone.

Click image above to download the official Bushwick Armory Night map.

Art fairs have in recent years become the focus of the art world. Some, like the critic James Panero, have suggested that the big fairs lack the experimentation that was born in the first 1913 exposition. “Today the big art fairs of ‘Armory Week’ borrow the name of the 1913 show but share nothing of its independent spirit,” Panero recently suggested, “They are the trade shows of a contemporary salon aesthetic. So what’s the best gift you could make in honor of the centenary? Skip the big fairs, travel to the most out-of-the-way gallery you can find, look for the most unexpected work of art in the place, and buy it.”

And so the question is posed: Where might the trio go today, to find something that echoes their vision? An event that, rather than promoting celebrity artists whose work already fetches garish prices, showcases the artists whose names are not yet “marketable?”

The answer may lie in an extension of Armory Week across the East River, somewhere between Broadway and Flushing in Brooklyn. These are the galleries of Bushwick, the neighborhood that has continually been cited as the frontier of the New York art world in both location and talent. To celebrate Armory Week this Saturday, March 9, at least 35 spaces—ranging from alternative and apartment spaces to legitimate galleries—plan on staying open late from 6-10pm. Many local bars are chipping in too, hosting after parties with secret specials for Armory attendees.

In keeping with the neighborhood’s temperament, each gallery will be celebrating Armory Week in their own style, the sole uniform factor being the late-night openings. Yet this reason alone is enough to attract attention, as many Bushwick galleries, with miniscule budgets and staffs of two or three, open their doors at varying hours.

“Bushwick is the frontier in so many ways,” explained Stephanie Theodore of Theodore Art, who has been one of the key players in organizing the neighborhood’s involvement in this year’s Armory Week (last year’s Bushwick night was organized by Jason Andrew of Norte Maar in conjunction with his 7th edition of Beat Nite). After running a gallery in SoHo in the early 90s, Theodore moved her space to Bushwick, a location she cites as one of both sustainability and community.  “There is a strong DIY ethic here that permits anyone with the will and means to break the divide between creator and audience.”

It is true that boundaries feel much less stable here in Bushwick—between curator, artist and audience, between gallery owner and gallery-goer. This is an attitude that the Bushwick side of Armory Week promises to capture in full (as opposed to the oft intimidating, blue-chip commercialism to be found at Piers 92 and 94). In Bushwick, many of the gallery owners are not only artists themselves, but residents of the neighborhood.

Take Centotto, a gallery artist/writer Paul D’Agostino runs of out his apartment on Moore Street. The show up this weekend features the surrealist-leaning paintings of Adam Thompson and Larry Greenberg—Greenberg being the owner of Studio 10, another Bushwick gallery housed at 56 Bogart Street. Theodore Art, Stephanie Theodore’s gallery that shares an address with Studio 10, will show the paintings of Phillipe Richard. A French artist well known in Paris but rather undiscovered here in the States, the show harks back to the original Armory’s cross-Atlantic journey.

This kind of cooperative artistic multi-tasking and DIY attitude is nothing new. It was alive and well at the time of the original 1913 Armory Show. Let’s not forget Alfred Steiglitz ran 291 with fellow photographer Edward Steichen; Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray established the Société Anonyme with American patron Katherine Dryer (also an artist herself) in 1920. In short if we are to learn from the past, contemporary historians may want to pay a little more attention to the fringes of the art world… Bushwick it is baby!

All participating Bushwick spaces will stay open late on Saturday, March 9, from 6-10pm.
Download a map of the participating neighborhood spaces

Related Posts:
Cool NEW galleries not to miss during Bushwick Armory Night, by Katarina Hybenova, Bushwick Daily, Mar 7

Event Tip: The following local bars -Tutu’s, Mama Joys, Miles, Alaska, Brooklyn Fireproof Cafe, Bodega Wine Bar, Cafe Ghia, and Dear Bushwick -  will offer drink specials with a secret password: “Bushwick Galleries Late Night.”