hive nyc

oriana on 15 Jun ’11

neighborhood: bushwick | space type: art collective | active since: 2011 | links: website, facebook, twitter

During this year’s Bushwick Open Studios, I had an ambitious roster of spaces to hit, and by a fortuitous chance, one of those was Hive NYC, a nonprofit multidisciplinary art space that is home to a collective of musicians, visual artists, writers, actors, photographers, and aerialists. There was fantastic art on display, by Jewel Lim, Tamar Meir, Our Guy, Sigal Arad Inbar, and Fumie Eshii. And the artists who were there—Yula, Isaac, Kate, and Melanie—were just amazingly warm and welcoming.

Yula, Isaac, Kate, and Melanie, photo by Maximus Comissar

They showed us all around the space, then brought out a lovely little impromptu lunch: salad and couscous, hummus and boiled eggs, avocados and cheese and coffee. They were bubbling over with excitement about their space, their projects, their bands, and the life they’re making for themselves. In addition to art and music, they have plas to green their home with a rooftop garden, compost, a water accumulation system, and doing more buiding with salvaged and reused materials. They even have their own living metaphor: an actual beehive on the roof.

photo by Maximus Comissar

brooklyn spaces: How did the space get started?
Kate: There was a group of us all playing music together, and we were all into different forms of art as well, like I write, Isaac does theatre productions, we have a saw-player who paints, our trombone player is working on a rooftop garden, stuff like that. So the idea was just to bring in as many people as possible and give them a place to create whatever they wanted to create.

photo by Alix Piorun

brooklyn spaces: How did you find the space?
Yula: It was so amazing, it happened really fast. About a year ago, I told a friend, “What I want is to have a little sanctuary for the people I know and love, so they could do whatever they want to do.” And in no more than a year, the Hive started coming together. All these people started being drawn in, our friends brought more friends, and each one of them were geniuses in their little ways. So we were like, “Okay, we need a home.” And a month later, I found this place on Craigslist. Isaac came here, and he was like, “It’s amazing. It’s amazing. It’s amazing!” The landlords are awesome, they’re artists, they said, “As long as you don’t burn the place down, you can do anything you want.” And so we moved in and started doing things. It’s a lot of hard work, but it’s also really rewarding and fun.

photo by Maximus Comissar

brooklyn spaces: What was the last show you had?
Yula: We had a show last night, and our band The eXtended Family played with Dolchnakov Brigade. There were so many people here, it was ridiculous.
Kate: It was so overwhelmingly positive too, everyone was just having a great time. I think there’s a mutual understanding that this isn’t a club, this is a place where people live. We had so many people dancing, and all this artwork all around, and nothing got disturbed, there were no problems at all, there was just a really beautiful, positive energy.

Yula and the eXtended Family, photo from streetcredmusic

brooklyn spaces: What are some of the other projects people here do?
Yula: The eXtended Family is the heart, it’s all of us. The music is very eclectic. We call it ro-punk, romantic punk, but you can’t really define it, it’s a mix of a lot of shit thrown together with a kind of punchy attitude, but in a positive way. And then Dolchnakov Brigade is just like a megalomaniac onion, an underdog-ish, fascist kick in the face. There are several other bands who work with us too, there’s Crooks & Perverts, Gato Loco, This Way to the Egress, Torcher Chamber Ensemble.

photo by Maximus Comissar

Kate: We have a website that features writers, artists, music, sustainability projects, and humor, as well as allowing members to barter for goods and services.
Yula: There’s also a Philly Hive. They’re doing events in a place called BookSpace, with aerialists and circus-ish type stuff and book readings and poetry.
Kate: One of our members is the editor of Helo: The Crisis Story Magazine. We’re also in the middle of a Kickstarter to try to raise money to get our roof garden off the ground, ha ha.
Yula: We have bees on our roof now. Thirty thousand little sweet bees! I never thought I would be so comfortable around so many bees. But you can be one foot away from this huge swarm, and they don’t bother you, they just mind their own business.
Kate: Didn’t you name them all Deborah?
Yula: Yes, Deborah the Hive. It’s one organism made of many little things, which is a perfect metaphor for us.

photo by Maximus Comissar

brooklyn spaces: Do you feel like Brooklyn has influenced the way you conceive the space, or do you think spaces like this are having an impact on the way that Brooklyn is right now?
Yula: I think the second. For us at least. You can do pretty much anything you want here if you respect everything else. And if you set that tone, people respond to it wonderfully. Little by little, if you just spread it slowly, you might be able to make a difference in a larger way. As soon as Bushwick Open Studios started and I started walking around the neighborhood, I was like, “We’re not the only people doing this!” It’s wonderful. We just need to make some connections and make this trust circle bigger, broader, and stronger, and then who knows what can happen? I’m hoping that this is just the beginning, that everybody’s going to pick up from this and just do more and more.
Kate: There’s been a pretty big snowball effect since we’ve started. We’ve been picking up more and more people and having a great time. This space has definitely come together very quickly.
Yula: If we can just continue to do what we do and enjoy it, that’s all we really want. Just don’t bother us doing it. World, don’t interfere. If you have any bad intentions, just stay out.

Like this? Read about more communal art spaces: The Schoolhouse, Swimming Cities, Arch P&D, Silent Barn, Monster Island, Flux Factory, Bushwick Project for the Arts

big sky works

oriana on 12 Jun ’11

neighborhood: williamsburg | space type: circus | active since: 2011 | links: website, facebook, twitter

Wau Wau Sisters at Big Sky Works

When I was in college in New Jersey, we used to come to Brooklyn to hunt for weirdness as much as we could. The first time I came to Galapagos was probably in 1998, when it was still in Williamsburg, and I saw some totally insane shows there. One of the best was the Wau Wau Sisters (Tanya Gagné and Adrienne Truscott), an “acroband” who wear crazy costumes and sing ribald songs while balancing on each others’ shoulders or sharing a trapeze. They were sensational.

 

Tanya, photo by Maximus Comissar

Where are they now? Still performing, of course, mostly in the UK and Australia. But when they’re home, Tanya—who happens to be one of the warmest, most exuberant ladies I’ve ever met—runs a circus school, Trapeze Loft, in an incredible community art and performance venue, Big Sky Works. At Trapeze Loft you can take classes in things like partner acrobatics, hula-hoop, trapeze, wire-walking, silks, cloud swing, and contortion. And at Big Sky Works you can see an insane variety of crazy, crazy, fabulous shows, with acrobatics, circus freakshow stunts, live music, projections, pie fights, clowns, burlesque, drag, and just all manners of creative weirdness. I actually got to see the Wau Wau Sisters do a farewell show there before they headed overseas, and they were even more sensational than I remembered. I’ve since been back for a handful of events—including Coney Island–based Mermaid Musee, the spectacular Morgan O’Kane‘s CD release party, and a benefit for Vic Thrill—each more weirdly wonderful than the last. Big Sky also collaborates with lots of amazing local groups, including Funny Bone Theatre, a comedy-based after-school program for kids.

Head over there for some old Williamsburg–style freakiness as soon as you can. But first, check out my interview with Tanya!

from Great Aerial Reef, 2006

brooklyn spaces: Have you been a performer your whole life?
Tanya: I grew up doing theatre and gymnastics and all that, but I don’t come from a show-biz family. I started studying circus when I moved to New York in my early twenties, and then I moved to France and Spain and San Francisco and trained really hard for a few years, and then I came back to New York and opened the Trapeze Loft in ’99. I started off giving private lessons, and I was slammed. We were a little bit ahead of this grand circus curve; at that point there was no Elizabeth Streb, no Circus Warehouse, no Sky Box, nothing. Now there’s so many spaces, which is wonderful.

Miss Ekaterina as the world's most terrifying unicorn

brooklyn spaces: Is it a good community? Do you guys all share tips?
Tanya: I definitely check them all out, and I know a lot of the teachers over at House of Yes and Lady Circus. A lot of the students take classes at all the spaces, and that’s cool because they can see what everyone has to offer. I’m kind of jealous of the students now, because when I came to New York there was only one person to train with, Irena Gold, this crazy old Russian lady who trained for Big Apple Circus.

brooklyn spaces: Why did you move the Trapeze Loft into Big Sky Works?

Tanya: I wanted to expand the possibilities. The Trapeze Loft was about half this size, so you couldn’t have a class with more than four or five people. This space is really ideal. The ceiling is seventeen feet high, and you can rig anywhere. I knew it would be a lot of work, because when I first got it, it was just an empty space. But I decided to take the risk. I think there’s a need for it in the neighborhood, there’s not enough underground, kooky things going on, you know? So I got the space and drew up a really basic plan. And then one of my students who’s a welder was like, “I’ll weld the railing!” And one of my friends who’s a carpenter was like, “I’ll build the stage!” Janet Clancy and Kris Anton, who are my technical directors now, and the most awesome people in the world, they helped install all the lights, sound, and rigging. It was like a tiny village all coming together. It was really nice seeing all these people saying, “We want to help make this happen.” It came together really fast, like within six weeks. It was a ton of work, but we kicked ass.

photo from Big Sky Works' Facebook

brooklyn spaces: Do you choreograph all the shows yourself?
Tanya: It depends. Some of the shows I choreograph, but the one we had last weekend was a circus cabaret, everyone coming with an act, everything from aerial to clown to juggling. Other times people will come in with their own show all ready to go. The space is open to whatever. I’ve had friends shooting music videos, my friend had his wedding here, another friend had an art opening, another wants to do a pie-fight show, clowns running around with shaving cream and whipped cream pies, and I’m like, “Yes! This is your place!” I want any kind of shows, whether it’s rock and roll shows, puppet shows, dance parties—whatever the fuck you want to try out, bring it here, we’ll see how we can make it happen. It’s not just a circus space. I want it to be seen as a funhouse. That’s the kind of New York I want.

photo from Big Sky Works' Facebook

brooklyn spaces: Tell me about some cool shows you’ve had here.
Tanya: The last few were the circus cabaret shows, which bring in a great mix of people from the professional circus scene. There’s people who teach at Circus Warehouse, TSNY, Sky Box, there’s people from LAVA, an all-women’s dance and circus troupe I used to be a part of. It’s a great way to try out a new act and meet new people in the community. Usually I have a host; among them have been amazing performers like Circus Amok‘s Jennifer Miller, Miss Saturn, and Murray Hill. Recently Butt Kapinski, she’s like a private eye investigator clown, put on an amazing show with a live jazz band. Some other great performers I’ve had here are Ambrose Martos, Chris Rozzi, Magic Brian, Amy G, Amazing Amy, Vic Thrill, Lone Wolf & Cub, Mermaid Musee, Miss Ekaterina, and members of Suspended Cirque and the Bindlestiff Family Cirkus A couple of weeks ago one of my teachers did a student showcase. My friend BAMiAM.tv is going to start putting on a monthly party with bands, aerialists, video projections.

Corn Mo, photo by Maximus Comissar

brooklyn spaces: Do you think being in Brooklyn influences a space like this, or that spaces like this have an impact on Brooklyn?
Tanya: Yes, yes, yes. When I moved into the neighborhood in 1992, I lived in a place called Keep Refrigerated, near the Mustard Factory, and there were so many crazy abandoned buildings. This place was full of crack and cars on fire and hookers. So if you wanted to put on a show, you just went into a abandoned building and put on a show. Obviously that doesn’t exist anymore, that period’s over. But I feel like anyone can still put on a show, you don’t need a million dollars or a fancy producer and director. In that sense I think Brooklyn has definitely influenced how I look at making shows. Just because all the fancy high-rises and people with money are moving into the neighborhood, that doesn’t mean this place can’t be kooky anymore, and it doesn’t mean we all have to leave. It’s still awesome here, just in a different way. I want to keep some freakiness, and I think the new people moving in want the freaky shit too. That’s why I want the space to get more visibility, because I feel like it’s still pretty underground, and I want to get people here to see all this great stuff.

***

Like this? Read about more performance spaces: House of Yes, Red Lotus Room, The Muse, Cave, Rubulad, Gowanus Ballroom, Chez Bushwick

death by audio

oriana on 7 Jun ’11

neighborhood: williamsburg | space type: music venue | active since: 2007 | links: website, myspace

I’ve been to Death By Audio a few dozen times, but somehow I always forget how cool it is. My friends’ doom metal band Bloody Panda played a brain-meltingly loud show there a few years ago, and I saw my other friends’ band Dead Dog there last summer. Todd P books there a lot. The shows are always raw and raucous, which of course befits one of the early Williamsburg DIY venues.

all photos by Maximus Comissar

When I went a few weeks ago, the show was as crazy as I expected. First was Bubbly Mommy Gun, a weird psych rock outfit, who had their saxophonist hiding behind the wall and playing through a tiny window. Next was Mugu Guymen, a duo with the guitarist kneeling over dozens of pedals and the drummer just going crazy, playing faster than anyone I’ve ever seen. Last was Makoto Kawabata (from Acid Mothers Temple) with Pikachu (from Afrirampo), who flailed around and leapt up onto her drum kit and grabbed a microphone from out of the ceiling to scream into. Amazing, amazing show.

Bubbly Mommy Gun

Q&A with Edan, Death By Audio’s booker

brooklyn spaces: Give me a quick history of the space and your involvement.
Edan: Death by Audio was a pedal company before it was a show space. Oliver Ackermann from A Place to Bury Strangers moved in in 2005. At first they rented out the front part as a photo studio, but after a while that didn’t pay the rent, so they started throwing shows. I worked the door at some of the earlier shows. I was booking shows around town, but I just kind of started bringing everything here. Then one of the bookers didn’t want to do it anymore, and I took over.

Pikachu

brooklyn spaces: Is there a particular kind of music that’s generally the focus?
Edan: It’s whatever I want to listen to. I wouldn’t have a show here if I didn’t want to see the band. But I feel like I have a pretty broad musical spectrum. It tends to go toward noisier music, heavier rock, heavier metal, and weird harsh noise stuff. But there’s all kinds of pop here too. If it sounds awesome, and if I think it’s going to be cool live, we put it on.

Bubbly Mommy Gun

brooklyn spaces: What are some favorite shows you’ve booked or seen?
Edan: Last summer we had Ty Segall, Charlie and the Moonhearts, and a bunch of other awesome bands. That show was amazing. The best part of that was Ty and Michael had a project together before that, and they did a duet at the end as an encore. That was really cool, it was something I never thought I’d see. And all kinds of band reunions, or people saying they saw videos on YouTube of bands playing here and were like, “Oh man, I want to play there.” Universal Order of Armageddon said that, Party of Helicopters said that. Paint It Black, we did a show for them, that shit sold out in an hour. I never even sell advance tickets for shows, and that one was gone in a day, which was crazy.

Makoto Kawabata

brooklyn spaces: Do you have a struggle or a triumph you want to share?
Edan: I have all kinds of trials! The more it’s a personal thing, the more effort you put into it, the harder it is when you lose to things like money. That’s not what it’s about, but you know, sometimes bookers come in and put holds on dates and tell me I’m going to get some band and I’m like, “That’s fucking awesome, they’ll be great.” And then a month later the booker’s like, “Oh, we were never actually going to bring the show there, we were just holding it in case we couldn’t find a bigger space.” That kind of stuff is soul-crushing. Or there’s always some show that I’m missing a band on, and I end up sitting in front of a computer for hours, emailing tons of bands and getting so many nos. It takes a long fucking time. Then I go to work at like seven, run sound all night, get off at three in the morning, have to clean the place twice. But it doesn’t matter, because I get to see all the shows, you know? I’m always excited about anything that’s here.

Mugu Guymen

brooklyn spaces: What are your thoughts about being in South Williamsburg these days?
Edan: Some of the first underground DIY shows I saw were around here. There’s a place that’s just now newly a condo where I watched Lightning Bolt play in a dirt pit, and Liars, and Panthers, it was a really sick show. Glass House Gallery was one block away, I saw tons of shows there, I saw Dirty Projectors play to like three people there. I grew up on that, in my adult life, my Brooklyn life. I’ve watched Williamsburg go from totally weird-ass back streets to something more normal, although people still walk down here thinking it’s the edge of the world. I used to have people leave after their shift and get mugged for the $20 they’d made, but it’s not fucking like that now. It’s totally safe, totally normal. Death By Audio and Glasslands and 285 Kent and Glass House and Main Drag Music and so many other spots, we’ve helped change what’s safe and unsafe.

brooklyn spaces: What are your goals for the future of the space?
Edan: Just to continue, to maintain the quality, and to keep appreciating it. I don’t want to get bored of doing this.

***

Like this? Read about more music spaces: Silent Barn, 285 Kent, Shea Stadium, Bushwick Music Studios, Newsonic, Dead Herring

idiotarod

oriana on 4 Jun ’11

neighborhood: all over | active since: 2003 | space type: silliness | links: website, wikipedia

This post is a cheat, I know. The Idiotarod is not a space, and it’s not even always (or only) in Brooklyn. But it is so ludicrous, so fantastically silly, that I don’t care. There’s so many things like this—Lost Horizon Night Market, Improv Everywhere, Newmindspace, Fluff’s Stuff—silliness and spectacle just for the sake of it, which is what makes this the best, funnest place to be. It’s part of the essence of Brooklyn for me.

image via nileguide.com

So what’s the Idiotarod? Well, as their website explains: “The Iditarod is the famous long-distance race in which yelping dogs tow a sled across Alaska. The Idiotarod is pretty much the same thing, except that instead of dogs, it’s people, instead of sleds, it’s shopping carts, and instead of Alaska, it’s New York City.” How this works is that teams of five people pick a theme, steal acquire a shopping cart, dress themselves and their cart up accordingly, and race from checkpoint to checkpoint, usually for about five miles and over at least one bridge. Sabotage is encouraged, as is throwing food or snow, and, of course, drinking. No one knows where the race will begin or end, or where the checkpoints will be, until the last possible minute. Prizes are awarded at a secret afterparty for things like fastest team, best costumes, best sabotage, etc.

photo by Colin Colfer

Want to hear more from people who have done it? Check out my interview with Alix and Leila! (That’s them in the top photo on this page, Alix on the right and Leila on the left, part of team Andrew W.K.art in Idiotarod 2012.)

picture by pixietart, via Gothamist

brooklyn spaces: When was your first race?
Leila: I did it for the first time in 2007, and our theme was the Cold War Kids. Half of us were dressed as Americans and half as Russians, and we divided the cart in half, and in one half we had a vodka bottle and the Communist Manifesto, and in the other we had an old McDonald’s carton that we found on the street, and then I took a dish towel and covered it with duct tape and wrote “The Iron Curtain” on it and hung it on the front. In 2008 I was Jem, and 2009 we were the Oregon Trail of Death. In 2010 I took off, which I’m glad I did, because Alix says that was the coldest day of her life. This year we did it together, and we were Clam Rock.
Alix: I first did it in 2008, and we were the Boston Tea Party. We had wet teabags to throw at people—there was a lot of food throwing then. Our cart had a Sam Adams picture on it, and we decorated it as a boat. In 2009 we were The Price Is Wrong, Bitch! In 2010 we were Gilligan’s Island. I got my boyfriend to do it, and two other friends. I was like, “It’s going to be really fun!” And then it was just the coldest day ever. I only had fingerless gloves on and I could not feel my fingers once we started running. We’re running, my eyes are tearing and I can’t see, snot is flying. My friends were like “Why the fuck would you do this? This is not fun at all.”

photo by Tod Seelie, vie Brooklyn Vegan

brooklyn spaces: Tell me about the actual mechanics of the race.
Leila: Okay, the mechanics of the race are stupid, it’s incredibly disorganized. It takes a lot of effort to even figure out when the race is happening.
Alix: They don’t really have much information on the website. It used to be run by COBRA, Carts of Brooklyn Racing Association, and then I guess they “sold” it to Corporation X. Or no, COBRA gave it to Team Danger Zone, and then they gave it to Corporation X.
Leila: Once you’ve figured out when it is, you have to figure out how the sign-up works, because the fact that you’ve done it in the past doesn’t mean they’ll assume you might be interested again and tell you about it. And they make it really hard for you to sign up. This year we had to complete an eight-page form filled with stupid questions, which we had to get notarized—we faked the notary. Then they text or email to say where it’s going to leave from, and everybody knows it’s a lie. That used to be to mislead the police, but now it’s just tradition. You have to wait until like 8:00 on the morning of the race to find out where to go. One year we started in Chinatown, one year we started in Queens, one year we started at fucking like 63rd and York or something.
Alix: Every race goes over at least one bridge, so it’s cross-borough. But this year there was a lot of snow still on the ground, and I think that they changed it around at the last minute, because we just stayed in Brooklyn. Anyway, you have to go to four or five checkpoints, and you have to complete stupid tasks before they tell you where to go next. Sometimes you can leave early if you bribe the people there, so a lot of people bring mini bottles of booze for that.

photo from Kotaku

brooklyn spaces: What are some of the tasks?
Alix: This year, one was you had to blow a feather and keep it in the air longer than the other team, or there’s races around the bar, or you have to find someone and have them give you something.
Leila: Sabotage used to be a big part of it. One time we were going across the bridge into Queens, and people were pouring dishwashing soap down the bridge, and everybody started doing the thing like you see in cartoons, where people are like “Whooooaaaa!” with their legs.
Alix: There was another sabotage where someone had a bowling ball they would put it in people’s carts. They put it in ours and we didn’t notice. We were running, going, “Why is this thing so heavy?” And with the sabotage, you never know if you’re going to the right place. The first year I did it there was a fake checkpoint, they just said, “You have to stand here for twenty minutes, this is the first checkpoint.” Some people were like, “This is fake, we’re leaving!” and then you’re like, “Well, is that a sabotage?” You can’t trust anyone.

photo by Colin Colfer

brooklyn spaces: What are some of your favorite carts that you’ve seen?
Leila: The Roman Chariot was really good. They had like forty people, including Remus and Romulus, and there were all these people in matching costumes, and this triumphant Roman Empire–style music
Alix: My first year there was a team that I think was called Two Girls One Cart. They had two blowup dolls and this huge tub of poop-looking stuff, and they were throwing the pudding-poop at people. When we were running over the Manhattan Bridge, there was this huge goop of pudding just dripping down the railing of the bridge.

photo by Matthew Bradley via geekoutnewyork

brooklyn spaces: Does anyone get in trouble?
Leila: One time when we were outside of a checkpoint, a cop drove by very slowly, and shouted over his bullhorn, “Please at least try to not let me see that you are drinking in public!” And everyone was like “Okay, we’ll try.”

photo by Aaron Short, via Brooklyn Paper

brooklyn spaces: And so is it the funnest thing you do all year?
Alix: I love it. If you have a really good cart design, and other people have really good cart designs, it’s great. Just looking at the carts is really cool. When you line up at the starting point, everyone’s checking out all the other carts and taking pictures.
Leila: It’s also a cool way to see neighborhoods you don’t usually get to see.
Alix: It’s the only time I ever run, too. It’s like a five-mile run every year. So yeah, it’s fun. And it’s a tradition. It’s this thing we do every year that we get to amaze our friends with.

***

Like this? Read about more public art spectacle: Lost Horizon Night Market, Dumpster Pools, Broken Angel, Bring to Light, Cathedral of Junk

central booking

oriana on 31 May ’11

neighborhood: dumbo; cobble hill; lower east side | space type: art gallery | active since: 2009 | links: website, facebook, twitter

I love books. LOVE them. So imagine my delight when I learned that there was an all book-art gallery in Dumbo! I should have known, of course; Brooklyn has everything awesome, so why wouldn’t we have this?

Central Booking is the curatorial vision of Maddy Rosenberg, herself a book artists (among other media). She has filled the gallery’s permanent collection with work from nearly 200 artists, presenting a stunning variety of pieces, which still forms a beautifully unified whole. In addition to the book art, Central Booking has a second gallery with rotating exhibits on arts & sciences, a quarterly magazine, a zine library, events, and an online presence that includes slideshows and statements from all the artists whose work is featured in the gallery.

Update: As of 2013, Central Booking will be moving to a new storefront on the Lower East Side. Sad to lose such a terrific gallery in Brooklyn, but definitely visit them in the city. In the meantime, read my interview with Maddy below.

Read More about central booking

bond street studio

oriana on 26 May ’11

neighborhood: gowanus | space type: studio | active since: 2005 | links: website, tumblr, facebook, twitter

On my way to Bond Street Studio, I had one of those lovely Brooklyn realizations: I’ve been living in this city for a decade, but I’ve never walked down this particular block before. I love how this blog project has really given me the opportunity to explore new corners of our fabulous borough!

Like Factory Brooklyn, Bond Street Studio is a blank canvas of a space, which can be rented out for photo and video shoots. They’ve had some really diverse clients, including Google, General Electric, Italian Elle, and Ted Leo and the Pharmacists. As Tiasia, Bond Street’s branding consultant, told me, “It’s the right amount of space to make an intimate set, it’s not too grandiose. You really have the option of molding and playing with the space here, the way the light falls, the skylights, everything.” Photographer Robert DiScalfani, the owner, also uses the space as an art gallery, specializing in giving lesser-known artists a new audience. It’s such a versatile space, and Robert’s got plenty of tricks up his sleeve for new ways to use it, so expect to hear about a lot of cool events here soon.

 

brooklyn spaces: What made you decide to open the studio?
Robert: I’m a photographer, I do mostly fashion photography, high-end wedding photography, and food photography, and I started doing videography a few years ago as well. I’ve owned two studios in Manhattan, and the rents just got too crazy, so I moved to Brooklyn about ten years ago. I owned a photo gallery down the street called Bond Street Gallery, which was a happening little spot. Unfortunately, we opened up just prior to the market crash, and then all hell broke loose, no one was buying anything. So I was working out of a live/work loft in Cobble Hill, and I was approached by some builders in the neighborhood who asked me if I needed a workspace, and I did. This is a new construction, it was a dirt lot a few years ago. When I started renting it out, it was about 80% still photography and 20% video, but now it’s completely the opposite. There’s so much filmmaking going on in the area, it’s incredible. And last year we start having some exhibitions here, as well.

brooklyn spaces: What have been some favorite shoots, or interesting people who have been through?
Robert: Google was here recently, shooting a video called “Chromercise,” about their browser Chrome. Italian Elle comes through several times a year, with a terrific photographer named Paulo Sutch. Kristen Schaal from The Daily Show was photographed here. Recently we had Saunders Sermons shoot a music video here, he’s a jazz musician but he also sings R&B, and he’s played trombone or saxophone for Jay-Z and Fantasia songs. I also had Ted Leo and the Pharmacists here not long ago. It’s great seeing all the creative people come through and whip this place into something you would never imagine possible.

brooklyn spaces: What are some things you’d like to do that you haven’t had a chance to yet?
Robert: A gallery I know in Soho has a monthly photo salon, and I’d love to do that here. I’d also like to do something similar for independent film. Another thing I want to do with the gallery is to showcase more new artists. It’s not easy to get an exhibition in New York; you don’t just walk into a Chelsea gallery and get an exhibition. So I’d like to open up the space to people who need an opportunity to show their work. There’s so much talent out here. I found this artist from Haiti last week, I walked into his apartment in Bushwick and looked at the paintings and I was stunned. His stuff is so detailed and deep and layered. Just beautiful. And this guy has never had a show!

brooklyn spaces: Do you feel Brooklyn has had an influence on the space?
Robert: Oh, I’m thrilled to be in Brooklyn. It’s such a great place, the creativity is just over the top here, it’s fantastic. Whatever your imagination can come up with is possible in Brooklyn.

Like this? Read about more film and video businesses: Film Biz Recycling, Running Rebel Studios, Factory Brooklyn, Acme Studio

boswyck farms

oriana on 23 May ’11

neighborhood: bushwick | space type: farm | active since: 2008 | links: website, facebook, twitter

Amid all the other creative movements in Brooklyn these days, farming is one that’s gaining ground. Brooklynites are farming in gardens (Trees Not Trash, Bushwick City Farm), on rooftops (Eagle Street, Roberta’s), even in trucks! And of course they’re experimenting with different kinds of farming—which brings us to Boswyck.

in the Grow Room, researching how plants grow with no natural light

Boswyck Farms is a working hydroponic farm as well as a research and development center, focused on building and testing different types of hydroponic growing systems. They grow all manner of produce—from artichokes to dill to a dwarf apple tree—and they’ve placed smaller offshoot farms around the neighborhood, including on the roof of the Bushwick Starr. They also do a ton of outreach and projects within the community, like growing lettuce at an institution for adults with mental illness, teaching botany programs and summer school classes in NYC schools, and running hydroponic workshops for adults. They even bring students into the farm as interns. It’s not just for kids, of course—anyone can volunteer.

herb garden in a flood-and-drain system

Q&A with Lee, Boswyck’s founder

brooklyn spaces: Give me a quick hydroponics tutorial.
Lee: Hydroponics at its core is growing without soil. All the food that the plants need is mixed into a nutrient solution. We try out many of the different types of hydroponic systems here. We’re growing tomatoes in a flood-and-drain system, and the way that works is and six times a day the roots get bathed in nutrients, and then it drains back down into the reservoir. All of our systems re-circulate. We have ancho peppers growing in a drip system, where nutrients are dripped through the roots continuously, twenty-four hours a day. We have an herb garden, with basil, dill, cilantro, oregano, and thyme, growing in another flood-and-drain system. We have several self-contained drip systems, growing broccoli, cauliflower, and pink flamingo chard. We have artichokes growing in a deep-water system, which has about two inches of nutrients that the roots sit in all the time, and a raft system growing cucumbers, sage, dill, cilantro, and spinach. Lastly, we have basil, dill, and cilantro growing in a tower system built out of milk crates. Every nine minutes, the pump turns on and rains down nutrients through the roots. That system was designed by two students at City College.

ancho peppers growing with no natural light

brooklyn spaces: And this is all great for the environment, right?

Lee: Even though it’s counterintuitive, hydroponics uses 70–90 percent less water than traditional growing: there’s no runoff, and there’s very little evaporation. People ask whether hydroponics uses a lot of electricity, and usually they look at the lights, which do use a lot, but they actually have nothing to do with hydroponics. If we were growing indoors with soil, the lights would be the same. At Boswyck, we’re starting to look at how we can offset some of the electricity usage with wind and solar power, and we’re always looking at ways to build these systems from reclaimed materials.

pink flamingo chard in a self-contained drip system

brooklyn spaces: Have you always been a farmer?
Lee: No, I’m a computer programmer. I read a magazine article and took a visit to the Science Barge, which is a teaching boat that’s hydroponic, and I just got hooked. I decided that I was going to turn my life upside-down and become an urban farmer. It’s very exciting and very terrifying, because I’m putting my life savings into it. If I wasn’t frightened, I’d be delusional.

tomatoes in a flood-and-drain system

brooklyn spaces: Who are some of your clients?
Lee: One is a place called Fountain House, in Hell’s Kitchen, which is a residency and day center for adults with mental illness. They wanted to grow the lettuce that they use in their cafeteria, so they had a 165-sq-ft room that we built out just for growing lettuce. Another client is the Child Development Support Corporation in Bed-Stuy. They do a lot of early childhood classes for families, and they run an emergency food pantry. They gave us a 250-sq-ft room, and we’re going to be growing lettuce, bok choy, and collards.

herbs growing in reused milk crates

brooklyn spaces: Tell me about the work you do with students.
Lee: We started in a fourth-grade class in the West Village. The last time I had been in a fourth-grade classroom, I was in fourth grade. I had a lot of respect for teachers going in, but now I simply don’t understand how they do it. I’d spend an hour and a half with the kids and then come home and take a nap. Now we do informal internships with college students and formal internships with some high school students in the neighborhood. It’s been really eye-opening working with these kids. They have been fucked by the system, from start to finish. I can’t put it any other way. I’ve got eleventh graders in who are reading at a fourth- or fifth-grade level, very little math skills, and nobody’s ever taught them a work ethic. I feel my job is teaching them how to work, what it is to be in a workplace, and things like personal responsibility. Not too long ago, we had a workshop with a number of sixth-grade students from a school out in suburban Queens, and these kids were so focused, the questions they came up with were so insightful. Seeing the contrast between them and the kids we work with in at-risk areas… I always knew this was going on, but it hit me really hard when I saw it in person. It makes me want even more to bring that kind of experience to schools in our neighborhood, because all kids deserve it.

artichoke in a deep-water system

brooklyn spaces: Are you the only hydroponic farm in Brooklyn?
Lee: There aren’t a lot of legal hydroponic farms in the New York City area. We don’t shy away from the fact that most of the people doing hydroponics in the city are growing pot. In fact, the pot growers are doing some great research, and we wouldn’t be where we are without them. But there’s a number of different farms in the city that are doing everything from small-scale to large commercial greenhouses. I think we’re the only ones who combine hydroponics, education, and working with social service providers. There is definitely a lot of great urban farming going on all over New York, and Brooklyn seems to be the epicenter.

***

Like this? Read about more community groups: Trees Not Trash, Books Through Bars, Brooklyn Free Store, Trinity Project, Time’s Up, Film Biz Recycling, Bushwick City Farms

lifelabs new york

oriana on 19 May ’11

neighborhood: nomadic | space type: skillshare | active since: 2001 | links: website, facebook, twitter

In Brooklyn these days, we’re in the midst of a renaissance in shared learning experiences, like skillshares, interactive teaching, and different kinds of adult “ed.” There’s so many different avenues of nonconventional learning, from places like Brooklyn Brainery, TradeSchool, Brooklyn Kitchen Labs, Alpha One Labs, and The Commons, and series like OCD Lectures, Nerd Nite, Adult Ed. And one of the older groups focused experiential learning is LifeLabs NYC.

Started by social psychologist LeeAnn Renninger, who has a doctorate in urban ethology from the University of Vienna, LifeLabs is “an incubator for ideas on living wisely and well, offering courses, labs, and events for the common good.” What kinds of classes? Oh, awesome things like Yapper Lab (the art of better conversation), Sense School (fine-tuning your five senses), and Surprisology (adding surprise to every aspect of your life).

Read More about lifelabs new york

shea stadium

oriana on 16 May ’11

neighborhood: east williamsburg | space type: music space | active since: 2009 | links: website, facebook

There is something magical about the little corner of East Williamsburg south of Grand Street and east of Bushwick Ave. Within just a few blocks you have 3rd Ward, House of Yes, Werdink / Ninja Pyrate, the Acheron, Bushwick Project for the Arts, Paper Box, and Shea Stadium. Plus the Anchored Inn, Yummus Hummus, Main Drag Music, a slew of other factories and art spaces, and who even knows what else. Brooklyn creativity is dense all over, but even so, that’s quite a little group.

DJ Unicornicopia, photo by me

I live ten minutes from the whole cluster, but embarrassingly, I’d never been to Shea Stadium before. It’s a really nice space, roomy and welcoming, with some good beat-up couches and a great terrace. As with most DIY Brooklyn venues, Todd P has thrown shows here. My friend’s band Krallice has played here—that’s them in the big picture at the top of the post.

I interviewed Adam, who started the space, and then I stayed for a quirky cool show, with Pam Finch, Duncan Malachock, and DJ Unicornicopia.

Demander, from Konstantin Sergeyev's Flickr

brooklyn spaces: Give me a quick history of the space?
Adam: We moved in here July 1, 2009, and we had our first show on July 4th. That show was a lot of fun, because we hadn’t done anything in terms of building out the space; we just plugged PA speakers into the walls and went for it. There was no stage, nothing. People were dancing and these enormous clouds of sawdust were getting kicked up. After that we took a week or two to just put up walls. It’s a slow process: you add this, you add that. It’s always a work in progress.

Fiasco, from Brooklyn Vegan

brooklyn spaces: How many people are involved in making this happen?
Adam: The main people are me and my friend Sean, who was with me from the beginning, and Nora. My friends in the band So So Glows all live here and help out with the shows, and we have a revolving door of some other really cool people who help out. Nora actually started as an intern, but it was clear from the beginning that she was going to become more than that very quickly. She just was really hungry, and she had the right attitude and the right ideas.

photo by me

brooklyn spaces: Tell me about the live archives.
Adam: The live archives was sort of the impetus behind the space. I work in music—I’m a producer, engineer, and  musician—and I always wanted to open up some sort of space, but I felt like the last thing this area needed was another recording studio. Plus I wanted to do something a little less sterile and a little more fun and interactive. So I was like, “Let’s start throwing shows and I’ll record them, and we’ll build up this massive archive of performances.” I think at this point I have about 1,400 sets.
brooklyn spaces: What’s the goal? Just to amass a huge amount of recorded live music?

Worrier, from Konstantin Sergeyev's Flickr

Adam: Yeah. I think that in ten, twenty years, what’s happening in this area is something people are going to want to know about, and it’s nice to be able to capture it. When we first launched the site, I was getting letters from people who live in Alabama, Kentucky, Australia, New Zealand, saying, “It’s logistically impossible for us to get to New York and see these bands that we love, but through your archives, we can connect.”

brooklyn spaces: Is there an overarching kind of music you aim for?
Adam: If we like it, we book it. It’s really that simple. The stuff we have is all over the map. And it’s a pretty healthy mix of local bands and touring bands and bands from other countries.

Jefferson High, photo from Impose Magazine

brooklyn spaces: What’s your relationship like with the community?
Adam: I have a pretty good relationship with all of our neighbors, especially our landlords next door. They’re from Lebanon, and they’ve been here since the seventies. They used to own all of Meadow Street, from Morgan to Waterbury. Every single building. Now they’re down to only two or three, and they run a furniture business across the street, Mona Liza Fine Furniture. Gorgeous, gorgeous stuff. They were sort of the pioneers of the neighborhood; they came when it was just junkyards and tire fires and gang violence. And they’re the coolest. When the weather gets nice, they bring a big table out onto the sidewalk and cook dinner for everybody. It’s like old-school New York. And they’ve been nothing but supportive of us. It wouldn’t be possible to do what we do if they weren’t so cool.
brooklyn spaces: Do they come to the shows?
Adam: Sometimes, but usually they don’t stick around very long. What happens more often is people at the shows will go over there, because they’re outside all the time, hanging out, smoking hookah, cooking. People wander over and hang out all night, getting drunk with the landlords.

photo by me

brooklyn spaces: Was this neighborhood in particular a place you wanted to be?
Adam: I didn’t know too much about the neighborhood before we moved in. I grew up in Bay Ridge, and I’ve lived in Brooklyn for the majority of my life, but this neighborhood was one of the few in the borough that I really wasn’t very familiar with. I’m happy that we landed here because this is really a great, great neighborhood. And I think it’ll continue to get better, unfortunately probably to a point that will prohibit us from being able to keep doing what we do, but that’s part of the cycle. Eventually your time comes and you have to reevaluate and figure out a different path. This neighborhood is changing rapidly, and we’ll just see what happens.

Fresh and Onlys, from The Owl Mag

brooklyn spaces: It’s true; even in the last five years, it’s become completely different.
Adam: Totally. It’s such a strange neighborhood, because it’s so close to the things you want to be close to, and kind of far from the things you want to be far away from. You have privacy, you have space, and there aren’t many public businesses around, so you don’t have noise complaints. It’s completely amazing to be three blocks from the L train and not have to worry about noise complaints. I don’t really think that’s possible anywhere else. You basically have the keys to do what you want, and in Brooklyn in 2011, that’s so rare. These few blocks might be the final frontier.

brooklyn spaces: What are your goals for the future of the space?
Adam: Really just to keep doing what we’re doing for as long as possible. I know it’s not going to last forever, so I want to enjoy it while we can.

***

Like this? Read about other music spaces: Silent Barn, Death By Audio, Fort Useless, 285 Kent, Newsonic, Bushwick Music Studios, Monster Island

gowanus ballroom

oriana on 12 May ’11

neighborhood: gowanus | space type: art & events | active since: 2010 | links: website, facebook

Gowanus Ballrooom is one of my very favorite spaces, one I can’t help updating and re-writing about again and again. (In fact, check out my article from their Fall 2011 show “Paint Works” on Gowanus Your Face Off!) The space, most of the time, is home to Serett Metalworks, but three or four times a year it gets transformed into a massive art spectacle. They’re doing so much to make a home for emerging and underground artists in New York, and every one of their shows is spectacular—and necessarily ambitious, given the sheer scope: the Ballroom is 16,000 square feet on two levels, with 50-foot ceilings. You have to slink down a super-sketchy dark alley on the canal to get to it, but oh, man, is it worth it.

The group shows feature outrageously great art from up to fifty  artists at a time, including huge metal sculptures, lush photographs, hyperreal paintings, abstract assemblages, quirky dioramas, stained-glass windows, woven cloth streamers, giant wooden installations you can climb around in, collages you can run your fingers through, intricate ink drawings, shifting projections, and more. Plus live entertainment! Aerialists like Seanna Sharpe (in her first performance since her stunt on the Williamsburg Bridge), fire dancers like Lady C and Flambeaux Fire, and of course bands, including Crooks & Perverts, Les Bicyclettes Blanches, Apocalypse Five and Dime, Yula and the eXtended Family (from Hive NYC), and Morgan O’Kane, the absolute most phenomenal banjo player you’ve probably never heard (unless you ride the L train a lot). At the 2011 Art & Architecture Show, he played past 2 a.m., almost two hours of just the best music ever, and I haven’t seen so much foot-stomping, arm-flailing, whooping joy since… well, since the last time I saw Morgan play, I guess.

2011 Art & Architecture show

Crooks & Perverts, photo by Megan K O'Byrne

 

Q&A with Josh, the Ballroom’s founder, and Ursula, art show curator

brooklyn spaces: Give me a quick history of the space.
Josh: I run Serett Metalworks, and I moved the shop here a year ago from Nostrand Avenue. This is twice the space I need, but it was the bottom of the economy crash, and when I saw the space I knew that I would use it for other things besides metalwork. It’s a fucking beautiful shit hole, I love it. It doesn’t make sense for me to run a metal shop here, because you can’t heat it in the winter, there’s always water leaks, and it gets too hot in the summer. But we deal with it. We build weird art and architectures structures, so the people who work here, it kind of inspires them to do better work, to be happier about their job. That’s a big part of it, just the beauty of this insane old place. It used to be a steel mill, a boatyard, a cannonball factory, a chemical factory. The history here is ridiculous.

photo by me

brooklyn spaces: In the metal shop, is it all your projects? Do other people do their projects here too?
Josh: It’s mainly our shop where we fabricate our stuff, but I also work with all these different groups. Someone comes and says, “Hey man, I need lockdowns for this WTO protest, can you help me build them?” Or like Swimming Cities, a bunch of fucking hippies who are building pontoon boats they can collapse, ship to India, and sail five hundred miles down the Ganges River. How fucking cool is that? I want to support those fucking maniacs, because that is awesome.

photo by Ursula Viglietta

brooklyn spaces: What made you start doing art shows?
Josh: I always wanted the space to be dedicated to art and architecture and engineering, mostly because architects and engineers, their social life is so fucking boring. But it’s a really interesting group of people doing really interesting work, and I like the idea of art and architecture and engineering together, because there’s a lot of aspects of engineering and architecture that are art. So the idea was to have a space for all three. We did the first Art & Architecture show in early 2010. The whole thing was thrown together in two weeks, and it went real well. Then we did another one about six months later that was really successful and really fun. But I learned it’s a lot of fucking work putting on a show, it’s an insane amount of coordination, and the person who’s doing the coordination loses their mind not at the end, but halfway through.
Ursula: I stayed pretty sane.

Flambeaux Fire, photo by me

Josh: Yeah, I’m getting there. I’m just finishing the story. Anyway, it blew my mind how much work it was. So I was like, all right, if our next show is going to be twice as big, it’s going to be a major ordeal. So I asked Ursula to get involved, and she came in and took the steering wheel, coordinating, organizing, categorizing, social working, all this stuff that has to come with an intense art show. And it was a great move, she really handled the stress well. There’s a lot of fucking stress involved. We pick people who do great art, but when you do that, you’re going to be dealing with some characters. That’s where the social-working aspect comes in.
Ursula: I’m actually training to become a social worker, so it worked out well. I think my background is just the right balance of art and psychology. It was a challenge and it was fun. I like doing really difficult things. If I see something that looks like you can’t do it, I’m like, “Okay, let’s figure it out!” I met a lot of really great people, and it was pretty inspiring for me as an artist.

Morgan O'Kane, photo by me

brooklyn spaces: What happens to the metal shop during a show?
Josh: Believe it or not, moving the whole shop out of the way only takes three or four hours. And while the art show is up, we’re still fucking welding and grinding. All my guys love it. Setting up for this show, every single one of them came and worked fifteen, twenty hours for free, just because they loved it.
Ursula: Of course, they snuck their own artwork in as well. I’d come in and be like, “Where did that come from?”

photo by me

brooklyn spaces: How do you think Brooklyn affect a space like this, or how does a space like this affect the future of art in Brooklyn?
Josh: The beauty of the Gowanus Canal is that it’s now a Superfund site, and that means that 2,000 feet from the edge of the water, in any direction, you can’t build housing or food service of any type. So this area is going to be a great place for about ninety years. There’s always going to be this nice mix of industrial industry and art studios. It’s not going to be McKibben Street—puke my brains out.
Ursula: There’s also an artistic community here that’s a little bit hidden, so it’s a really nice spot to have a new exhibition space, because we’re not competing with what’s going on in Williamsburg or Chelsea. It’s a place for emerging artists to do what they want, and it’s huge. I mean, to be able to invite people who do the kind of large-scale installations that we had, and to tell them, literally: “You’ve got two weeks. Build something.” Not many places can do that. Especially when you’re dealing with artists who don’t have a name, and you’re just trusting them. So I think that’s something that we can offer to the neighborhood, and to the art community in general.
Josh: I started off working for Cooper Union, working with a lot of pretty big-name artists, and I was really turned off by the art world, how nasty it was, the money, everything was just politics and crap. This space is great because we can do it our way. We just fill it full of cool shit, and people fucking love it.

Lady C, photo by Megan K O'Byrne

brooklyn spaces: Do you have any advice for other people who want to take on a project like this?
Josh: Just call us. You got something crazy? You think you have schizophrenia? That’s beautiful. Call us. We like that.

***

Like this? Read about more art & events spaces: Monster Island, Big Sky Works, Red Lotus Room, Gemini & Scorpio loft, House of Yes, Cave, Rubulad, Vaudeville Park, 12-turn-13, Werdink / Ninja Pyrate