| Art in General | |
|---|---|
| Established | 1981 [1] |
| Location |
79 Walker Street (Tribeca/Lower Manhattan) |
| Type | Art [1] |
| Director | Anne J. Barlow [2] |
| Website | Art in General |
Art in General is a non-profit contemporary art exhibition space in New York, New York. Founded in 1981 in by artists Martin Weinstein and Teresa Liszka, Art in General is a nonprofit organization that assists artists with the production and presentation of new work. It changes in response to the needs of artists and informs and engages the public about their work.
Since its beginnings, Art in General has worked toward providing a space for artists to display unconventional work and exchange ideas with their peers. The first exhibition took place in 1982, and since then the institution has developed several programs that aid it in fulfilling its mission. Art in General organizes and presents exhibitions, commissions new art projects, hosts a national and international artist residency program, and facilitates regular free public programs.
Each year Art in General supports 5-7 artists through new commissions; 2-4 artist residencies; and 4-6 sound installations accompanied by publications and public programs to complement the works: artist talks, literary readings, video screenings, and panel discussions with renowned critics and curators. Currently, more than 3,000 artists have exhibited their work at Art in General in a wide range of disciplines—painting, sculpture, drawing, photography, installation art, audio, video art, performance art and new media art.
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The New Commissions Program, now the central focus of Art in General, has flourished since its launch in 2005. The program was created in response to New York City artists’ need of support during the initiation and early stages of their projects. Art in General commissions new works from six to eight artists each year, either through an open call, which allows artists to submit proposals that are reviewed by a panel of artists and curators, or through invitation, which occurs after careful research on local artists. Art in General provides commissioned artists with both space and a budget for developing their project, as well as an honorarium.
While Art in General strives to assist artists in the New York City area, it also collaborates regularly with national and international artists. The Artist Residency Program, established in the mid 1990s, was initiated to alleviate the implications of the decline in public funding to artists. The program is designed to encourage public participation in artistic practices, and enables artists to interact with the surrounding community during their creative process. Art in General also provides artists in residence with an honorarium to cover living expenses for their stay in New York City, and for materials to create a new work, travel expenses and living accommodations. A brochure is published in conjunction with each project, and throughout the residency period, Art in General organizes and hosts a series of private and public programs to introduce the artist to New York City’s community, such as receptions, artist’s talks, and meetings with arts professionals.
Through the Artist Residency Program, Art in General established the Eastern European Residency Exchange (EERE) in 2001, a two-way exchange program which enables selected artists to create work in a new environment, and to meet and interact with art communities in Eastern Europe and New York City. Artists are nominated by Art in General’s partnering institutions, Pavilion Unicredit in Bucharest, Romania and Croatian Association of Artists (HDLU) in Zagreb, Croatia. As part of the EERE, these museums and galleries also host New York-based artists for a two-month residency in their institutions.
Art in General regularly organizes other programs and exhibitions. The Audio in the Elevator program began in 1990 in response to the slow-moving elevator that takes 38 seconds to reach the 6th floor gallery from street level. Art in General saw this unfavorable circumstance as an opportunity to create a new exhibition space in the elevator, where one to five audio or video art projects are displayed each year.
As Art in General presented mostly group exhibitions for the first 20 years of operation the full list of artists who have exhibited is quite extensive and numbers in the thousands. Just a few are: Polly Apfelbaum, Orsolya Drozdik, Darrel Ellis, Carlos Garaicoa, Gabriel Orozco, Byron Kim, Glenn Ligon, Josiah McElheny, Paul Pfeiffer, Dorothea Rockburne, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Cecilia Vicuña, Marina Abramovic, Sharon Hayes, Andrea Geyer, Klara Lidén and many more.