Soho Night and ecoartspace NYC project room opening March 5th and 7th

On Thursday March 5th ecoartspace will join with several other NYC non-profit art spaces for Soho Night. There will be special events, exhibitions and programs from 6 - 10 pm. (see list) For this event ecoartspace will stay open until 8pm so please visit us on the early side.

The public opening for the new ecoartspace NYC project room at 53 Mercer Street in Soho will be on Saturday March 7th from 12 -6pm.

The first ecoartspace project at Mercer St will be Simon Draper's work with the Habitat for Artists Collective which began in Summer 08 in Beacon, NY. In that original Habitat for Artists project Simon Draper supplied each artist with a basic shed (6 x 6' with doors, window and skylight). These collaborative works take the form of sheds, that literally functioned as temporary studio spaces and came outfitted with doors, windows and skylight. The materials used in the creation of the structures consists of reclaimed components and each artist in the collective creatively adapted their shed to suit their own needs. (read more details in the November 13th blog post on the HFA project).

For this new version of HFA, Draper's collaborators include artists Chris Albert, Richard Bruce, Sharon L. Butler, Ryan Cronin, Kathy Feighery, Marnie Hillsley, Matthew Kinney, Grace Knowlton, Michael Natiello, Sara Mussen, Steven Rossi, Todd Sargood, Matthew Slaats, Lynn Stein, Dar Williams, Grey Zeien, Donald Kimmel and Flying Swine live Theater.

ecoartspace has been operating bi-coastally, with Amy Lipton in New York and Patricia Watts in the San Francisco bay area. We are celebrating our 10th anniversary this year and due to a growing presence and increased demand for ecoartspace’s unique brand of environmentalism, the time has come to open an office in New York City.

ecoartspace is part of a growing community of artists, designers, scientists, curators, writers, nonprofits and businesses who are developing creative and innovative strategies to address our global environmental issues. The new Soho office space will promote a diverse range of artists whose works are participatory, collaborative, interdisciplinary and educational. Future programs and events will include exhibitions, discussions, screenings and workshops.

“Artists today are breaking out of traditional confines of what is considered art and engaging in real world issues. By implementing a participatory structure with the diverse people that make up communities––these artists are pointing the way towards a new paradigm of environmental consciousness and sensitivity”, Amy Lipton, Ecovention 2002

Habitat for Artists

This past summer ecoartspace sponsored artist Simon Draper and his Habitat for Artists Project at Spire Studios in Beacon, NY. Several artists living in the Hudson Valley were invited by Draper to participate in this site-specific, collaborative exhibition project. Draper, who has long been working with concepts regarding habitat/shelter in his own art provided each artist with a basic 6ft. by 6ft. shed, to be used as a workspace for the duration of the show, which closed in November.

Ecoartspace’s relationship with Draper evolved from summer 2006, when Amy curated an outdoor exhibition at Abington Art Center’s Sculpture Park in Philadelphia titled Habitat in which Draper participated with his shed “Private Reserve”. This work remains on view and acts as a shelter and contemplative space for the viewer. For Draper, the work also functions as a metaphor for his personal art making activity and provokes larger questions regarding marginal spaces, artists as pioneers in developing neighborhoods and communities and the ongoing migration of artists from these places they helped to nurture and create.

In this new project, Habitat for Artists, the sheds literally functioned as temporary studio spaces. The question becomes, in a time of escalating prices for artist’s workspace and as artists flee Manhattan and Brooklyn in search of more affordable workspace such as in the Hudson Valley region - how much space does an artist need to create their work?

Each artist involved in the project adapted their shed to suit their own needs. The sheds came outfitted with simple openings, doors, windows and skylight. As much as possible, the materials used in the creation of the structures consisted of reclaimed and re-used components. Artists included in the HFA project were Chris Albert, Richard Bruce, Sharon Butler, Kathy Feighery, Marnie Hillsley, Matthew Kinney, Sara Mussen, Steven Rossi, Dar Williams, Grace Knowlton, Matthew Slaats and Simon Draper.

Welsh-born artist Simon Draper has lived and worked in the US since attending Cooper Union in the 80’s. He moved to the Hudson Valley in 1996, where his work has become focused on the humble architecture of the lean-to shed. An endlessly adaptable form, Draper has applied his ingenuity in fashioning them out of surplus and discarded materials—at times, including his own previous work.

On Sept. 9, HFA artist Dar Williams' held a CD release party for her new recording, Promised Land at Spire Studios in Beacon as a fundraiser for several regional non-profits represented at the event including Ecoartspace, Scenic Hudson, The Beacon Institute, Hiddenbrooke, Clara Lou Gould Fund for the Arts, Hudson River Healthcare, Farmworkers Fund and Flying Swine Live Theater. The artwork in the new Promised Land CD booklet was on display for the event, which includes the HFA artists as well as Maureen Beck, Val Clark, Aidan Draper and Grey Zeien. Before singing a few new songs, Dar spoke about the collaborative effort that brought this project together. John Cronin of the Beacon Institute and Erin Riley of Scenic Hudson also spoke about the environmental work their organizations are doing in the Hudson Valley.

Andrew Revkin's recent NY Times blog post:
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/10/small-car-house-is-beautiful/