17th annual City-Wide
Open Studios:
Transported/Illuminated
October 11–12, 2014
Artspace
50 Orange St
New Haven, CT
www.artspacenh.org
www.cwos.org
For the 17th Annual City-Wide Open Studios (CWOS) festival, Artspace will debut a new curatorial initiative to support the realization of 18 large-scale site-responsive works in the historic Goffe Street Armory, a vacant 200,000-square-foot building that is the site of this year’s Alternative Space Weekend, open to the public October 11 and 12. These commissions were selected through an open call by CWOS Curator Sarah Fritchey, designed to give artists, architects and performers the opportunity to create work in an unconventional, historic space. The commissions are made possible by an NEA Our Town and Andy Warhol Foundation grant.
This temporary activation hopes to illuminate the building as the potential site for a visual and performing arts center that could be open year-round to serve and connect New Haven’s artist communities, institutions, student populations and visitors. The project models itself after the Park Avenue Armory in New York City, which launched a similar initiative in 2007 that has since drawn record crowds and international acclaim. The Goffe Street Armory was built in the Dixwell neighborhood of New Haven in 1929 and has served multiple purposes over the years—as a military facility, social club, expo center and basketball stadium. It has been vacant since the National Guard departed in 2007.
Featured artists & installations:
Mahdi Alibakhshian, QASTIC Lab Floatastic / Monique Atherton, A Brief Encounter / Regan Avery, War Stories / David Borawski, Here Today Gone / Leah Caroline, Nature Transported / Sukkah / Megan Czekaj and Mark Geist Observations of Beautiful Forms / Michael Robinson Cohen, Earth Cylinders / Jeanne Criscola and Joan Fitzsimmons, Oral History: A Recipe for Memory / Dooley-O Haywire / Michael Galvin and Kyle Skar, Archived / Willie Hoffman, Playable Studio, which will also serve as the setting for a newly commissioned work performed by the Elm City Dance Collective / Allison Hornak, A Struggle, A Painting in Two Acts / Aude Jomini, Stack / Scott Schuldt, Received from Parts Unknown / Lise Seidenberg, Eberswalder Strasse – Comings & Goings in Syncopated Time / Shallow Studio (John Kleinschmidt & Andrew Sternad), Against the Grain / Jonathan Sun, Light Column / Jo Yarrington, Accendo
Learn more about each project here.
The Alternative Space is open to the public on October 11 and 12 from noon to 6pm. In addition to the 18 commissioned works, over 100 artists from across Connecticut will also present and install work in the Armory, including live music and performances. The Goffe St Armory is located at 290 Goffe St, New Haven, CT.
Learn more
A special ticketed patrons dinner and preview evening on Friday, October 10 will feature a keynote address by Tom Eccles, Director of Bard’s Center for Curatorial Studies, on the vital roles that unconventional spaces can play in communities, and tours organized by Daniel Belasco, Samuel Dorsky Museum; Daniel Fuller, Maine ICA; Theresa Choi, Storm King Art Center; Terri Smith, Franklin Street Works and John Hatfield, Socrates Sculpture Park. Purchase tickets here.
The full City-Wide Open Studios festival runs October 2–26, and will feature 350+ artists over four weekends. Details about guided tours, locations, and events can be found here. CWOS is a program of Artspace, a contemporary art nonprofit whose mission is to catalyze artistic activities; connect contemporary artists, audiences, and resources; and to enrich art experiences and activate art spaces.
Artspace is very grateful to receive exhibition and operating support from the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the City of New Haven Office of Economic Development, the Connecticut Office of the Arts, the Greater New Haven Community Foundation, the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the National Endowment for the Arts, Yale University, and local foundations, businesses and individual Friends of Artspace.
