As part of NADA’s New York Gallery Open, some of New York’s most celebrated galleries talk to Collecteurs about the current cultural landscape and why community is the key to the vitality of the overall arts ecosystem. Here we sit down with Linnea Vedder and Owen Duffy of Essex Flowers.
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When was the gallery launched? And how did it get started?**
The gallery opened in the basement of the eponymous flower shop at Essex and Grand in 2013. There were nine artists involved in the opening of the space: Phillip Birch, Patrick Brennan, Amanda Friedman, Heather Guertin, Van Hanos, Jeffrey Tranchell, Lizzie Wright, Denise Kupferschmidt and Joshua Smith. Some were involved in the Occupy Wall Street movement and were interested in exploring alternative gallery models.
Local support systems seem to be the key to success in the current cultural landscape. We’d love to know more about any current support systems you have in your neighborhood.
As a cooperative, we wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for local support systems. Namely, the dozens of artists who have been members at various points in the cooperative’s history, and the greater New York artist community. We also wouldn’t have got our start in the first place if not for the invitation of Bill Frazer, the local businessman and owner of the flower shop.
As consumption of culture shifts more and more online. What creative ways are you exploring to continue to be relevant? What part does the community play in this?
Community is everything to us, and a lot of our recent programming reflects this. See, for instance, our recent exhibitions like Gangs of New York at Adds Donna in Chicago, Home Edition (which featured 40+ artists), and Savannah Knoop’s SCREENS: a project about “community.” In August we’ve been doing the annual New York Flower Festival, a programming series that packs Essex Flowers for two weeks with readings, screenings, performances, and other events.
It’s becoming increasingly challenging to drive steady foot traffic into gallery spaces. What brings your gallery visitors?
Great shows, experimental programming, word of mouth, and bringing new members into the cooperative.
Tell us a little bit about your program. What initiatives does your gallery support?
Our program celebrates the weird, the off-beat, collectivity, emerging and underrepresented artists, grit, the DIY, and, of course, flowers, when possible.
So many of the gallery spaces have interesting “past lives”. Does yours have one?
Anyone who visited the original space will remember the magic of walking through the flower shop for the first time to discover something.
Artwork: Linnea Vedder Soft/Hard Composition 2, 2019