Lower East Side Galleries Reaction L.E.S [Field trip]

"Lower East Side aka LES"

Our class went on a field trip to the Lower East side and to be honest I have lived in New York since 2007 and I have never made that journey to the Lower East Side. I had heard rumors that it wasn't safe to go there however, I was with my "friends" and we seemed very safe because our teacher was with us. Anyways on this trip we were asked to compare these galleries to the ones that we saw previously in Chelsea Galleries. As we walked around I had first noticed one of the biggest differences was the type of buildings that the galleries were in the first building that we came across I had took notice to the outside and it had a half broken sign on the outside that was labeled as a “shirt store.” I never would of known that it was an art gallery because it actually said, "S..irts" the word "h" was missing.

As we walked inside it was defiantly a “different kind” of gallery alright. They had an artist by the name of Ace Morgan on display and the building was actually the “Strange Loop Gallery.” There were a lot of surprising pictures on the wall of eroticism. I was defiantly thrown back by the idea that “this kind” of art would be there in the LES. When you walk into a Chelsea Gallery, I would never expect to see this kind of display of nudism or the display of men’s penis’s erected and someone smoking a crack pipe on the wall for all to see.

One of the next galleries that we visited pretty much I saw that people had the same reaction as the first gallery that we visited. What are these galleries doing here and in unmarked buildings, that don’t even seem to make sense? When we went to Chelsea it was defiantly apparent that you were walking into a gallery. The outside was immaculate and the galleries had lots of room to walk around in.

The best example that I can give is the Miguel Abreu Gallery. When I walk into the gallery it was small and reminded me of one of the galleries in Chelsea because it had “miniature” cement block on the floor as part of the instillation. I wondered what would be next.

I have to admit that the closer that we got to Grand Street the galleries seem to change. I saw that some of the galleries resembled some of the ones in Chelsea. The outside was nice and they seem to be more spacious inside. And the display of artwork was a more “cleaner” version that the first one we had visited earlier in the day. The gallery that I am referring to is “The Shin Gallery” I fell in love with this gallery. They had artwork on display from the artist name Ho Jun Ji and it was a different variation of “money” displayed in paintings. The one that caught my eye was a painting that I had saw at the MOMA when we had visited there. It was the “scream” painting contorted with a Chinese coin with a bull and it described how much the real painting was worth $119 million dollars.  Now that is a lot of money for a painting.

Overall I am thankful that I have been able to experience all these different kinds of galleries. It has opened my mind’s eye to what art truly is and with a better appreciation for what art stands for. In the end "art to me" is transforming what you feel on the inside and displaying it on the outside for the world to see no matter where it is displayed in "LES or even Chelsea" as long as it is being displayed and noticed that "I believe that is what truly matters."

Cited Artist and galleries

Strange Loop Gallery
Ace Morgan
2008
Miguel Abreu Gallery, 2013
Installation view

Ho-Jun Ji
Cion-cidence, 2013
Archival Pigment Print and UV Print on Glass
59 x 59 inches