Wednesday, February 15, 2023

Building out O'Flaherty's

Photos by Stacie Joy 

As we've been reporting (here and here), O'Flaherty's is opening its new art gallery here on 44 Avenue A at Third Street. 

The space debuts tomorrow evening (Feb. 16) with a performance series titled "O’Flaherty's gelitin O'Flattering," which will also include the U.S. premiere of "Stinking Dawn," a full-length feature film by Liam Gillick and gelitin. (Find more details and the schedule here.)

EVG contributor Stacie Joy was with artist-curator Jamian Juliano-Villani when she first received the keys to the space on Jan. 2... and began renovations.
This space has been empty since Upright Citizens Brigade Theater closed UCBeast amid financial challenges in February 2019. The comedy venue opened in September 2011, and UCB took over part of the expanded Two Boots empire — the video store on Avenue A and the Pioneer Theater around the corner on Third Street.

O'Flaherty's did keep the small theater for screenings...
Stacie stopped by again on Jan. 18 for a progress check ...
Juliano-Villani's friend and business associate Ruby Zarsky (one-half of Sateen) was also on hand... 
The awning arrived on Jan. 27...
Juliano-Villani moved her gallery into this space after a year at 55 Avenue C at Fourth Street (we covered the opening here, culminating with a barn burner of a show late this past summer).

You can read more about the gallery here. And follow them on Instagram for updates and creative uses of EVG comments.

6 comments:

JAM said...

Love these folks, bringing energy to the downtown arts scene. I have no idea where they get the money to do what they do, some past exhibitions don't even have art for sale. Maybe they won the lottery, more power to 'em!

Anonymous said...

Oops. I didn't realize we were still doing ironic

Anonymous said...

The owner Jamian Juliano-Villani is a successful painter; her paintings sell for six figures. She enjoys poking fun at the pretentiousness of the art world eco-system. I imagine this gallery is an artwork. This durational, public performance of a "gallery" in quotes will only add to her value as an artist.

XTC said...

@7:15- Provide your link or source that states her paintings sold for six figures USD. This space is nothing more than a gimmick. A clever one, I'll give her that. At the end of the day it's not about goofy instagram pics. It's always about the curatorial content presented at the gallery. My hope is that she shows cool, interesting, engaging work. However the very notion of the art gallery as an anti-art performance space is at least 100 years old, Cabaret Voltaire. Maybe her thing can be both fun and serious at the same time. We'll see.

Anonymous said...

@9:46 yes, it's a gallery, but also a performance of "gallery". From artnet.com

"Jamian Juliano-Villani’s surrealist figurative paintings have attracted a cult following and fetched more than $400,000 at auction. But the market demands for her work have left the artist feeling limited in terms of what she can do creatively. Now, in an effort to rebrand herself “beyond my stupid, cheeseball paintings,” as she put it, she’s opening her own gallery in Manhattan." ......... "While the space will function as a commercial gallery, she also sees it as something of a performance in disguise. “I’m going to start wearing black, really cool fake Prada suits,” she said."

https://news.artnet.com/market/jamian-juliano-villani-oflahertys-gallery-1996663#:~:text=Photo%20by%20Lia%20Clay%20Miller,more%20than%20%24400%2C000%20at%20auction.

Anonymous said...

yeah. great. until they start blocking your sidewalk. that's a tight spot and last night i had to walk in traffic because of all the metal barricades and "VIP's". and that awning is really unattractive and def not the east village. 1 more thing to add to the messy pile of what use to be a good neighborhood.