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Tell me about the project.

 

The in-house art program is called Landscape. A portion of every ticket sale goes into the art fund, so music-goers become patrons of the arts. The program supports both temporary and permanent exhibitions, or “interventions.” Murals, for example, are the more permanent works, and then other works change seasonally. The video residency, for example, in the dancefloor is a seasonal project. So, each season, a different artist takes over the video residency and, again, becomes totally embedded in the experience of dancing in a nightclub. The project space is a kind of gallery-like space that changes every season. Our summer season opens June 11th. The project space will be a tiny movie theater which showcases a wide range of video artists. I’m working with the associate director of Cristin Tierney Gallery, and she created a series of films for a Zaha Hadid building that opened in Chelsea that will be—a version of that will play for the opening of our summer exhibition. And the thing about the openings for the artist, which is June 11th, is it’s actually the only time people can come and explore the building exclusively to see art. There’s no gallery hours. In other words, outside of that time, you would just come to see music and then experience art. There’s only one night a season where you come deliberately and intentionally to experience all of the new installations for the building.

 

Yeah, it’s like a sneaky art attack.

 

Absolutely. It’s really meant to kind of transform the building, beautify and enliven the building, and give people, in this case music-goers, an opportunity to interact with art in a very spontaneous and musical way that ruptures the social contract of seeing art in a formal gallery where you kind of pass through and leave. Again, we just walked into the bathroom and saw Madeline Manning’s work, which is the toilet seats. I went to Japan, and I got really inspired, because there is an option every time you use the bathroom to turn on sound for politeness.

Above: 'My Neon Fortune Teller' by Dani B, and 'Eel Sewer' by Zoe Burke.

 

Wow, I love that.

 

Right? And then I got really inspired by it and thought like, why not do sound pieces in the bathroom? Why not do, you know, interventions? The bathroom is a great site, because it does also take you out of the regular space for a moment. It’s a private time, so.

 

Well, and I feel like people are always doing that in bathrooms anyways by like writing on the wall.

 

Precisely.

 

Or, like maybe, yeah, people want it to be more fun.

 

Exactly. Are you familiar with Bread Face?

Above: Bread Face with her piece, 'Water Closet', and '179. Café Standard Breads,' by Bread Face (Install View).

 

Yeah.

 

So she’s doing our next video piece. We’re doing a commissioned video. She’ll be essentially on the dancefloor with people. And then, she’s also—I’ll take you—she’s doing an installation in one of the bathroom stalls. So, it’s gonna be quite something.

 

This is quite the bathroom.

 

Yeah, so this is the main bathroom. At the very end, you will see these lights, these aquatic lights that can kind of beckon you over there in one of the stalls. She’s gonna kind of take over the stall. There’ll be sound. There’ll be mirrors, and one piece, one bathroom stall essentially will be a Bread Face takeover.

 

Really? How funny. You could almost commission each stall. It’s kind of like like that Broad City sort of thing where she’s like, ‘I have art on display at the sandwich shop’ or whatever. This is similar because it’s not a gallery.

 

Yeah, exactly. Right, but the difference is this isn’t commercial—there is no commercial exchange, you know? We’re not selling artwork. It’s not like, ‘Here, call this number or contact this person if you wanna buy.’ These are just, again, ways to experience the building. And I think the architecture just plays such a key role here as you see as we’re moving through. I mean, it’s such a dynamic space.

Above: 'Disco Moss' by gloflo, and 'All Paths Lead Down the Toilet' by Madeline Manning.

 

It’s fun. If I were here, my first thing would be to familiarize myself with where everything is, and then, in that, you’d be stumbling upon these artworks, so you’d be like, ‘Oh well look at that!’

 

I think you just said the perfect phrase, which is ‘stumbling upon,’ and that is really how I envision this. I mean, I think of the building as like an exquisite corpse, where each corner, each wall, each section, artists can kind of build upon each other. I mean, we started with this mural and then this work works with digital glitches that we pasted onto this, you know. And then, we just completed this 36-foot mural by ARTBABYGIRL for the opening. She’s one of our artists for the opening. In other words, gloflo is gonna be doing this. All the of art is in conversation with each other and with the building. It allows you to highlight things you may not have even like—’Oh wow, this structure is something that I didn’t notice, and now it’s highlighted.’

 

Yeah, it seems like it’s also in conversation with Bushwick and Brooklyn. It just seems like the spirit of, you know, that sort of mural-ly just art-everywhere-all-time.

 

Completely, I mean, and you know, for example, Glori, AKA gloflo. I mean her studio is down the street. She’s from New York. It really is also kind of supporting local artists, and that’s the entire initiative too: emerging artists and really taking a look at and highlighting them. 

 

And what kind of events do they do, musically?

 

I mean, every single thing that you can possibly imagine.There is just a really playful and kind of performative element to these works, because they exist in a place that’s crowded every night, that’s rambunctious, that’s spirited.

There is just a really playful and kind of performative element to these works, because they exist in a place that’s crowded every night, that’s rambunctious, that’s spirited.

Elsewhere is located in Bushwick, Brooklyn. All images courtesy Elsewhere, photos by Louis Nieto Dickens. Lead image: Film still from '180. Mission Chinese Naan,' by Bread Face.

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