Dumbo NYC

Notes from the DUMBO, Brooklyn NY neighborhood


PowerHouse Arena Launches New Gallery Space on Main Street

November 8th, 2007


 (Photo courtesy of PowerHouse Arena)

The powerHouse Arena, home to independent art book publisher powerHouse Books, announces the launch of the Windows on Main: The powerHouse boilerRoom a new gallery of 250 square feet frontage on Main Street in Dumbo. From PowerHouse:

“Visible from street level, the boilerRoom will be open to the public 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, allowing exhibiting artists maximum visibility in this hot young arts community. Exhibitions will run for one month, and will combine a mélange of fine art, commercial work, retail products, advertising, and other forms of dynamic visual ephemera for which powerHouse is best known.”

The first exhibition is from Eric Payson, presenting You Can’t Spell America Without Eric, a pictorial travelogue across the landscape of the United States. More about Eric’s book here: powerhousebooks.com/books!/youcantspell.html

Filed in Dumbo Art, Dumbo Events, Main Street at 12:50 pm
Comments
  • punko
    Dumbo is hardly a "hot young arts community." No young artists can afford to live there. Dumbo is an artificial neighborhood, not the product of gradual gentrification--which might very well have bred an arts community if greedy developers hadn't condo-ized everything in sight.
  • Prof. Harold Hill
    thats right. a better name would be DUMPO. One big pile of J Condo.
  • Wrongo Punko. That's why Galapagos is moving here, and we're starting a photo festival here: there is a vibe to the environment; the gentrification card is an old canard. What, you want to live where? Harlem? LIC? What isn't gentrified? Jersey City! Wrong; that too (and what is gradual anyway? 10 years? 20? your lifetime? Walentas buying the area in the 30 years ago is overnight?) What is it about NYC and whining?
  • resident artist
    Punko, the same can be said about SoHo, Tribeca, and Williamsburg. The fact is, Dumbo is an arts community. Whether or not we can afford to live in Dumbo is another matter. Galleries such as PowerHouse, Larsen, Halcyon, DAC, Smack Mellon, BAC, 111 Front St galleries, and even Almondine Bakery all give artists such as myself the opportunity to showcase our work here. I've been here for 15 years, and while its true that gentrification has hit dumbo, it could have turned out much worse. Daniel, keep doing what you do and bring on the creativity. Punko, instead of complaining about it, why not be positive and help foster fellow artists?
  • KD
    Maybe more people would support the "local artists" if they didn't create total crap.
  • punko
    Just for the record, I am an artist, and have been living in NYC for 25 years.
  • L.E.
    well said Daniel!
  • Jo
    wow. the reader commentary on this entire blog has turned into a giant crap hole... no post is safe!
  • punko
    An "arts community" seems to me to be one where artists can live and work, much like Soho was in the 70s, Tribeca in the 80s, and so on. Dumbo feels like a movie set. And the population is primarily white families with kids and some Europeans for "exoticism." A few venues do not equal an artists' community. The venues go where the dollars go, and Dumbo is full of tourists. I live very close to Dumbo, and fifteen years ago real artists lived there. All the ones I know have left now, victims of increasing rents.
  • If the artists were any good they would make enough money to stay in Dumbo. The sad fact is that all the elephant drawings etc are just not good enough to pay the bills.
  • Jonboy
    Q: How many artists does it take to change a light bulb?
    A: Ten. One to change it, and nine more to moan about how people don't appreciate this 'installation of light' and their elephant dung paintings.
  • mike
    As an art enthusiast, I find the artists and galleries in DUMBO pretty mediocre overall. And the main difference between DUMBO and say, Tribeca, is that the new people here show very little interest in art. Mr Power, I appreciate your efforts but I am pretty sure most of your customers don't live in DUMBO (except those buying the kids' books maybe). It is also safe to say that the typical patron at Galapagos won't be a local resident.
  • JJJJJ
    It's worth pointing out that a good chunk of DUMBO artists (although not all) didn't necessarily leave because they were PRICED out. They left because they had to...the buildings they were in were either converted to condos or torn down and replaced with condos. Or just condemned altogether.
  • Lady Z
    Dumbo is a set, not an arts community. Art directors love it as a backdrop for mainstream national ads for fashion conscious brands. City vibe minus the anoying filth and most of the dirty poor people (read: reality) of the city which completes/reinforces the middle American fantasy of NYC. I like to use Dumbo as a location when producing ads. Its perfect. As far as art goes, Dumbo is not artist friendly unless there is money to be made. How much do you have to pay to be in the window at powerhouse? How much for an exhibit? How much for a review of a project? How much to publish your book? How many cliche 70's-80's hip hop retrospectives does the world need? This rant is not aimed at anyone in particular but rather is a slam on the art business world which is killing our culture. One last word: In 2000 I was mugged on Front Street walking to my fomer studio. Last I was in Dumbo I was almost run over by a Stokke stroller and then was yelled at by some db in a Range Rover after he almost hit me. I felt better after I was mugged.
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