NO MORE HIERARCHY IN THE ART WORLD.
NO MORE BLUE CHIP.
NO MORE STATUS SALES.
ARTWORK FOR ARTWORKS SAKE.
Pushup Gallery is run by 4 artists/friends/curators: Libby Richey, M Shimek, Jacob Hartman, and Elizabeth Sundahl. The origins of Pushup can be traced back to a nomadic collective Verdant run by Libby and Elizabeth. They were hosting shows rotating between friends’ apartments when they met Jacob and M and began curating as a team. After several years of pop-up group and solo shows in alternative spaces, the team of now 4 artists with full time jobs pooled personal funds and time to make the transition into a permanent space, now known as Pushup Gallery.
“Verdant started I think like 5 years ago. Elizabeth and I went to college together and then ended up in New York for different reasons. When we reconnected I said, ‘I’m finding it really hard to find any community here… and Elizabeth said, ‘we should just do a show in my apartment.’”-Libby
FLEXIBILITY THROUGH POP UPS AND ONE NIGHT SHOWS
Because of their wealth of experience with pop ups and one night shows in non-art spaces, the Pushup team is well acquainted with pivoting within specific constraints.
“We were pretty nomadic for a while, and were definitely doing [shows] in apartments and random pop up spaces that were like, ‘one night only.’”-Libby
“the 4 of us have been in shows that have been like in basements, on roofs, in music venues… I think the 4 of us have been in more ‘one night only’ shows than anyone.”-libby
“Part of being an artist run gallery is seeing your work in those one night shows… its beautiful its magical, you’re happy to be shown, but not always do you feel like your work was totally respected at the end, there’s not a ton of time to correct it…”-M
ON BENEFITS OF THE PERMANENT SPACE
While they have so many more resources with a permanent space, the team retained an experimental curiosity in their curation through site-specific, performance-adjacent pieces. In the group show UNDERFOOT curated by Elizabeth Sundahl, chosen works examined the entropy blurring the lines between our inhabited systems, both natural and created. An excerpt from the show statement reads, “Moving beyond representations of landscapes as passive or decorative, the works position the city as a conglomerate of resilient, adaptive systems that bur the boundary between nature and the built environment.”
“In being able to have a permanent space you can talk to the artist, see what they want, how they want their work to be shown, what will make them feel the most respected, excited, get good photographs… all these things are huge benefits of having a more long-term space.”-m
One of the benefits of a permanent space is allowing work to age with the gallery.
“I thought it would be cool to put a live patch of grass in the front window and see how that kind of changed throughout the couples weeks it was up.”-Elizabeth
“We had the patch of grass in the front which we custom built a bay for and put all this sod down. It had to be watered and upkept, and you could walk on it which was really cool. Also in your show we had handmade paper that was made into the floor. It was cemented into the floor and as people walked on it throughout the show, it kind of crumbled and dispersed.” libby
“its been nice to have a space where artists who are working more durationally can also put things in that can be interacted with, monitored, those kinds of things.”-libby
“And it allows for really complicated work in the space, like work where if you had to show up that morning and get it on your way home, it would be completely impossible. One of the works in my last show needed a full 10 foot U-HAUL to be moved, it was incredibly difficult to instal and weighed a couple hundred pounds. If you’re doin git that day maybe you could do it that day but it would probably be a piece you would pass on if you had such a small amount of time to make it happen, because it’s overly complicated for how long you have to engage with the work.”-M
ON SACRIFICE
“The biggest hurdle for all these DIY spaces and artist-run spaces is that none of us make enough money and the world is getting more and more expensive, wringing the money out fo the pockets of anyone that’s not the top .1% of americans. there’s some risk involved. its more expensive to do this than to do a one day pop up in your house. but that’s part of making it work, taking it professionally and taking it seriously.”-jacob
“there’s a real time sacrifice. we all work a ton and then do this with every iota of our free time, and then have our own art practice on top of this. so there is a real sacrifice, but because of that we take it very seriously.”-libby
ON ADDITIONAL PROGRAMMING
in addition to shows Pushup hosts critique club nights, secondary events to solo shows like performance work and poetry events, etc.
THE WHY THEY DO THIS-whats unique about artist-run spaces
“its hard to get into non artist run spaces. A lot of these places in New York, in LA have a huge barrier for entry and we’re doing it the best we can. We feel that we have a lot of flexibility but also there’s a huge financial barrier. Theres the freedom of it, the craftiness of it, but also… its hard to say what it would feel like to curate with all the resources. this is all that we know and are fighting tooth and nail for it.”-M
“its born our of necessity. if we were getting shown in non artist run spaces there would be no need for artist run spaces.”-jacob
you gotta do it for yourself. you gotta put yourself on. no one else is gonna put you on.-jacob
“a lot of this was born out of the idea that we were either gonna do this ourselves or keep waiting..and i don’t think any of us were gonna keep waiting.”-libby
“its special to be able to put the people of the artists first and let them play and use our space as a more expansive place instead of a place where they maybe feel tied down or selected in a very small way.”-libby
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