Friday, February 22, 2013

The Bruce High Quality Foundation University settles in on Avenue A



Been meaning to note this. You may have noticed the signage — BHQFU — on the third floor at 34 Avenue A near East Third Street...

The space is serving as home to The Bruce High Quality Foundation University (BHQFU), "a learning experiment where artists work together to manifest creative, productive, resistant, useless, and demanding interactions between art and the world."

Here's more via an article last fall in the GalleristNY, which describes BHQFU as "the mostly anonymous artist collective founded by a group of Cooper Union alumni." The unaccredited art school started in 2009 on West Broadway as a response to the "$200,000-debt-model of art education."


[The third-floor classroom, via Facebook]

Spring sessions on Avenue A include "You Watching Me Googling You." Find the school's website here.

And so, for now, this closes the book on 34 Avenue A, home to some angry-neighbor angst in recent years... from the closure of Mo Pitkin's ... to the opening and closing of flip-cup mecca Aces & Eights ... to CB3 rejecting all plans for a bar-restaurant-performance space here.

Today, the building is home to Ruff Club, a dog-friendly social club, a karate center and an artist collective.

Progress?


5 comments:

Anonymous said...

All I can say is...thank god there's not another bar there. And that there are organizations that can live in our neighborhood other than nightlife.

blue glass said...

wait
they haven't applied - yet

Gojira said...

Dogs "wooof", they don't "wooo" and throw up in your doorway. Or if they do, they then eat it. I am fine with the doggies.

Anonymous said...

MO PITKINS

Anonymous said...

The karate school is Chinese Hawaiian Kenpo Academy, and they have actually been in the EV for over 20 years. They only moved to this location in 2011. They hold free classes on Tuesdays (women only) from 7pm to 8:30pm, and an open kickboxing class (all genders welcome) on 1pm to 3pm.