Opening reception Saturday, August 3rd. 4 to 6 p.m.
Open daily thereafter, Monday through Saturday 12:00 noon to 5:30pm. Closed Sundays.
On view until August 24th, 2002.

LOCAL

art chosen by people who work in the Essex Street Market

Organized by Paul Clay, Thiago Szmrecsanyi, and Natalia de Campos.

At CUCHIFRITOS art gallery/project space.

LOCAL statement:

CUCHIFRITOS is coming up on its one year anniversary, providing a venue for independent curators to show contemporary art in a context which brings the work into direct contact with the local community. This space operates as a real lab, or experiment - a live working attempt to bring the sometimes rarefied art scene into confluence with the everyday flow of life in the Lower East Side.

Our inaugural exhibit featured high resolution digital photographs shot by people who work in the market. Following this we have been graced with half a dozen strong exhibits by a brilliant new crop of independent curators, showing contemporary art in a wide variety of manifestations. We thank them for presenting such a fine collection of artists and works, and for helping us to pitch our vision of what contemporary art is.

Now we let go a little, and jump back to roots. We invite the people who work in the market to choose art to exhibit in the gallery. The move is not without risk. What will they bring? What would you bring? We learned so much about our own preconceived notions when we worked on the digital photography project, and the stunning works that came out of that are a testament to the creative vitality of the people who work here.

One of the biggest risks is actually the meta frame of the show itself. The current era of the art world is one where curating is taking on many aspects formerly reserved for art production. If the conceptual frame of the exhibit is too present, the art works become metaphorical building blocks serving more to support the idea of the show rather than as individual elements to be valued on their own. The idea here is to drop our own desires to make art conform to a particular vision. What kind of art do people value? What kind of art do people know? We put no constraints on who made the art, what it is, or where it came from. People who work in the market are choosing the work they wish to display.

Viewing art is partly about the process of discovery and revelation. We've been pitching thoughts and ideas for almost a year now. Here is our chance to follow someone else's lead and see what kinds of things we have yet to learn.

-Paul Clay 2002.