New York Is More Alive Than Ever, NOW!
Photo credit: Camilo Fuentealba Brevis. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
A group exhibition curated by Saam Niami and Gabrielle Richardson recently christened 25 Allen Street, a new gallery in Chinatown. Featuring the work of 18 New York-based artists, New York…NOW! captures the present moment in this metropolis, proving that organic, community-centered spaces still exist and deserve to be prioritized.
As New York…NOW! unfolds on the opening night, people gather on the street, smoking cigarettes and running into old friends. Above us, artist Ekene Ijeoma’s piece flies—a black flag with white lettering that reads: “An Artist Survived Today.” Inside the gallery, viewers are cocooned by paintings from Taylor Simmons, Jade Thacker, and Tara Atefi, as well as two pieces from Gala Prudent. People spread themselves out, nesting in whatever space they can find as artworks cover the corners and hallway.
Christopher Al-Jumah, Untitled, 2024. Persian silkwood and Rubio Monocoat. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
Deeper inside, photographs, carved and embroidered pieces, and paintings transfer energy from wall to wall. Pieces speak to each other. Niami feels as if Christopher Al-Jumah’s Untitled (2023) and Nuvany Davis’s Boyd (2024) have become friends; they are placed diagonally across each other. Al-Jumah’s chair, made of Persian silkwood, complements Davis’s series of C-prints featuring her family, as both artists evoke a sense of care in their creation and perception.
Nuvany Davis, Boyd, 2024. Digital C-Type and C Type prints. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
There is a strong sense of kinship between the artworks, their admirers, and their makers. Noting their personal connection to nearly every featured artist, Niami and Richardson centered community as the driving ethos behind the curatorial process. “You could name any number of people who have had shows at Gagosian or Zwirner who are based in New York,” Niami says. “But the point of the show was to show a wider umbrella of people that are all loosely connected, and now they're all friends, which is really nice.”
Miles Greenberg, Respawn Body, 2024. Mixed Media. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
Down the hallway, performance artist and sculptor Miles Greenberg helms a mirror-covered room. Respawn Body (2024) features several clones of Greenberg lying on one another at the center of the room. Messages are inscribed on their chests as they reach for each other.
On the second floor, people cozily melt into leather couches and surround the long kitchen island that has been turned into a bar for the evening. The same area would eventually become a programming hub and stage for playwrights and filmmakers like Max Wolf Friedlich and Kit Zauhar to read new work.
Madeline Bach, Orchid Summit, 2024. Pen, pastel, mechanical pencil, marker, and gouache on paper mounted to panel. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
Artist and baker Madeline Bach (also known by her Instagram moniker @frostedhag) says the whole evening makes her feel like a freshman in college, encountering the NYC art world for the first time. “Coming from a background of running a gallery that was so, ‘Every show is done a certain way,’ most openings are pretty uniform,” Bach says. “[The show] is like an old New York way of ‘We did this. Come see it. It's going to be incredible.’” Bach wanted to use the group exhibition as a space to do something different after Richardson, her good friend, approached her about participating in the show.
Photo credit: Camilo Fuentealba Brevis. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
In the past, Bach separated her cake-making prowess from her drawing background, grappling with the seemingly monumental responsibility of representing someone in portraiture form. However, recently, Bach has been intent on combining the two practices, creating portraits for her cakes. Using accessible materials like BIC pens and mechanical pencils, Bach’s piece, Orchid Summit (2024), captures a difficult cake she made over the summer. With shapes as the focus, Bach’s intuitive mark-making projects a sense of ease as calming deep purple-blues and hints of yellow echo throughout the painting. A closer look reveals Bach’s expert hand and emotions associated with her cake, whose real-life counterpart was pieced back together after it was dropped accidentally. On the canvas, Bach processes her woes, translating her relationship with the cake into visual form.
Taylor Simmons’ exceptional piece, However Long I Stay (2024), was painted in anticipation of the group show. The pastel colors and textured strokes depict a group of men finding solace in each other on the sidewalk, juxtaposing the peace and chaos of merely existing in NYC.
Taylor Simmons, However Long I Stay, 2024. Oil and spray paint on canvas. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
Photographer Lula Hyers combed through her personal archive, which spans over a decade of work shot in NYC, to create a collage. The images, arranged in a puzzle-like form, feature a range of movements. Ballerinas dance across a photo strip while a subject floats on their back, nearly submerged in water. Friends hold each other while others rest in bed, allowing Hyers to capture distilled, authentic moments. Untitled (2024) contains photographs from the past and present, but time ceases in Hyers’s work as she continues to log scarce femininity and self-expression in the everyday.
Lula Hyers, Untitled, 2024. Hahnemuhle matte print. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
“I think that's what photography's essence is. It's almost like a time machine in some ways,” Hyers says. “There were so many emotions coming out as I looked at all of this work. My friends came over and looked at it with me, and we were all feeling really emotional looking back on over 10 years of images together and that was a pretty surreal experience.”
Artist and photographer Guarionex Rodriguez Jr. comes to support his friend, Bre Andy, who presents two delicate paintings that reflect scenes from her daily life. Andy’s mastery is clear as her studies appear to be photographs from farther away. Using oil on paper, Andy uses recreation as a vehicle to capture how we see ourselves. In Waiting takes viewers inside Andy’s eye, as she sits on her bed gazing down at her leg. Careful, light strokes depict her view of her tights with her tattoo peeking out.
Bre Andy, On My Way! (left), In Waiting (right); 2024. Oil on paper. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
“I personally know [Andy] and [have] seen her growth,” Rodriguez Jr. says. “The delicacy that she has in her brush strokes and intimate moments, I'm really attracted to that intimacy.” Rodriguez Jr. and his friend, Isabel Ling, express their appreciation for how many people New York…NOW! has been able to bring together, dispelling the myth that New York—and its arts scene—is dead.
“This is a good moment to showcase that these people have been doing things for a long time,” Rodriguez Jr. says. “New York's nostalgia is [often] at the forefront of how people want to showcase what New York is, and to me, that happened at that time and we are here right now. Start paying attention. We're all here.”
Ling agrees, noting how special 25 Allen St. is in its ability to hold so many artists and their communities. “It's important that we have space for artists. I don't think that anyone here is necessarily an emerging artist, but people have been around in New York and are really committed to the city,” Ling says. “I feel like the artists don't actually really come together that often.”
Photo credit: Camilo Fuentealba Brevis. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
Niami says he wanted everyone to “bring their A-game” after he and Richardson narrowed down a list of 40 potential artists for the group exhibition. “We had many moments like, ‘Is this seriously [going to] happen?’ but we never lowered the standard,” Niami says. “Gabby and I, we have the sorts of reputations where if we are doing something big, a lot of people are going to pay attention to it. We wanted to make sure that we gave it our best.”
After striking up a friendship with 25 Allen St.’s owner, Geoff Bartakovics, Niami pitched a show at the space centered around video art. Bartakovics quickly intervened, convincing Niami to make New York City the focal point of their first exhibition. Soon after, Niami brought Richardson, or “Miss New York” as he calls her, on the project. Niami recalls: “[Bartakovics said], ‘I want you to show me what New York means to you,’ I told [Richardson] about the show, and she asked me immediately if she could help me with it, and I was like, ‘Okay, here we go.’”
Painter Kate Awalt-Conley says the show reinvigorated her interest in the New York art scene with the whole evening feeling like a big party. “My work particularly has been shaped by the queer culture in New York and performance,” says Awalt-Conley. “Being at the opening really connected the show and the title to me because I feel like, ‘Everybody is here for a personal reason in a unique way, coming together.’”
Exhibition manager Sascha Lewit first connected with Niami last March when they discussed ways to connect different art communities in New York, as the chasm between the underground and the gallery world grows. “Seeing the people and who's coming in, so many different worlds are here,” Lewit says. “There are older collectors, emerging collectors, and then also on the artist side, you have a whole range of artists here as well.”
The show also stands apart from typical group exhibitions, as Lewit notes that 100 percent of the sales go directly back to the artist, instead of the gallery recouping half of the sale—a common industry standard. “[It’s] something that I love letting people know,” Lewit says. “For a lot of collectors, they buy because they want to support the artists, and you are really directly supporting the artists.”
Praise Fuller, Peripheral prayers for my wellbeing, 2024. Cyanotype on ceramic. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
Interdisciplinary artist researcher Zion Estrada makes one of the first purchases of the night, acquiring Peripheral prayers for my wellbeing by Praise Fuller. Using cyanotype on ceramic tiles, Fuller comes to life in a series of five self-portraits. Hung on the wall in a circular arrangement, the multi-component piece remains in infinite motion as Fuller smiles, moves her arms, and talks aloud. The blue and white contrast of the cyanotype perfectly replicates Fuller’s gestures, as she is projected onto the clay she brought back from Mexico. Estrada says she was honored to purchase Fuller’s work after taking a workshop with the artist through Field Meridians. “She placed herself on these pieces. I just felt really drawn to it,” Estrada says. “It's beautiful, it's abstract, but it's also long exposure work. I like when Black folks work with pieces that take a little bit more time and a little more technology.”
For Hyers, the show captures how artists in New York are feeling, providing a space for them to create community and engage with each other off-screen. “Born and raised in New York—this is my home. Pretty much every idea I've ever had has been birthed here,” Hyers says. “I think people feel like New York is dying, and in a lot of ways, I see things that affirm that for me from certain angles. In the grand scheme of things, New York is really only ever as alive as the people who live in it. A big part of this show is to tap into what artists are feeling right now, where they are going, and how they engage with each other as a community.”
Hyers, Niami, and featured photographer Dean Majd agree the show is romantic, hoping people would fall in love here. “I encouraged everybody to be romantic,” Niami says. “I just love New York. I love New York art. I want this to be a little reminiscent of the '70s. I want people to see the work that goes into it, the faith that everybody has in us, and take away that you can still make something amazing happen in this city if you work very hard, and meet the right people, and have faith in an idea.”
Curators Gabrielle Richardson and Saam Niami. Photo credit: Anthony Hilliard. Courtesy of 25 Allen St.
New York…NOW! is on view at 25 Allen St., New York, until November 15th, 2024. There will also be a closing reception on November 15th from 6pm to 9pm.
