Published: September 30, 2011
Theodora Richards, the daughter of Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, shimmied around the room in a second skin of stretchy black lace, while the billionaire Stephen A. Schwarzman grazed past Alexa Chung and Karolina Kurkova. Around 9:20 p.m., Mr. Hambleton, the famously reclusive graffiti artist who descended into obscurity after the 1980s art gold rush went bust, arrived with a bandage on his nose, seemingly dazed by the crowd.
It was a different scene two evenings earlier on the Lower East Side, where art dealers were opening their galleries for the beginning of the fall art season. Young 20-somethings, not recognizably rich or famous, wandered past the small storefronts in fedoras and jeans. At the Rachel Uffner Gallery on Orchard Street, about 150 people packed into a space the size of a large one-bedroom apartment and drank from cans of Tsingtao beer. The artist Sara Greenberger Rafferty’s opening show included work made using photographs, Plexiglas and acetate. And she hugged well-wishers that night despite a faulty air-conditioner that left most sticky.
But Ms. Uffner, 33, has more in common with her uptown peers than appearances suggest. Though one gallery owner may show an artist whose work now sells for $25,000 or more and another may show unknown artists whose work still goes largely unnoticed by big-name collectors or established critics, both are part of a new generation of New York gallerists who are slowly transforming the city’s art scene.
“There are new galleries popping up all over,” Ms. Uffner said, taking a break from the evening’s festivities. “People are beginning to recognize we have legitimate places to show.”
When the stock market collapsed in fall 2008, many people feared the art market would be dragged down with it. But art auction houses, including Christie’s and Sotheby’s, are currently reporting healthy business. Individual prices are often strong: At Phillips de Pury in May, one of Warhol’s famous images of Elizabeth Taylor sold for $26.9 million: about $3 million more than a similar work at the height of the market at Christie’s in 2007. And while Larry Gagosian and other blue-chip dealers continue to dominate sales for the wealthiest collectors, gallery owners who have opened their doors in the past few years seem to be thriving despite the persistent recession.
The New Art Dealers Alliance, a national organization of art professionals or gallery owners in business less than 10 years, said that nearly one-third of its 300 members are based in New York City.
Choosing which up-and-coming gallerists to profile for this article involved considering art dealers who either opened New York galleries or began working together within the last three years. Then art critics, gallery owners and art collectors were interviewed to narrow the field of gallerists who represented promising artists or had an interesting take on contemporary art.
The final cut included Mr. Restoin Roitfeld, with that famous last name and the prized connections that come with it; two dealers positioning themselves as the angry young men of the art world; and a scrappy out-of-towner hoping to make it big in New York.
Despite their differences, all share the need to actually make a living at this. Owning an art gallery is an expensive proposition. That is why many new galleries are on the Lower East Side, where rent can range from $2,000 to $10,000 a month, compared with $25,000 or more for a gallery in Chelsea. (Ms. Uffner says she pays less than $4,000.) Many new gallerists, like Laurel Gitlen, find their art spaces after walking around the neighborhood. Some, like Mr. Valmorbida and Mr. Restoin Roitfeld, have forsaken the traditional gallery space, choosing instead to hold exhibitions when and where they choose. (Artists generally earn 50 percent of the sale price of their work at galleries, while the gallery owner might earn 30 percent to 50 percent of a sale, depending on discounts, or whether an art adviser of another dealer is involved.)
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/02/fashion/young-gallerists-are-transforming-new-yorks-art-scene.html
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