MoMA PS1 is one of the largest art institutions in the United States dedicated solely to contemporary
art.
It is located in the Long Island City neighborhood in the borough of Queens, New York City.
In addition to its exhibitions, the institution also organizes the International and National
Projects series, the Warm Up summer music series, and the MoMA PS1 Young Architects
Program with The Museum of Modern Art.
It also ran WPS1, an Internet art radio station founded in 2004.
MoMA PS1 has been affiliated with The Museum of Modern Art since January 2000.
History
Beginnings P.S.1 was founded in 1971 by Alanna Heiss
as the Institute for Art and Urban Resources Inc., an organization with the mission of
turning abandoned, underutilized buildings in New York City into artist studios and exhibition
spaces.
Heiss, the center's former director, was born in 1943 in Louisville, Kentucky, and raised
in a farming community in southern Illinois.
The daughter of teachers, she graduated with a B.A. from Lawrence University in Appleton,
Wisconsin, which she attended on a scholarship from the Lawrence Conservatory of Music.
Recognizing that New York was the worldwide magnet for contemporary artists, and believing
that traditional museums were not providing adequate exhibition opportunities for site-specific
art, Heiss decided to establish a formal, alternative arts organization.
She was working as a contemporary art organizer with various civic organizations when she
formed what became a long-term friendship and working relationship with architecture/theater
critic Brendan Gill.
In 1971, she and Gill founded The Institute for Art and Urban Resources, and began renovating
many old abandoned buildings in New York City.
That year, Heiss and Gill organized their first alternative exhibition, working with
the artist Gordon Matta-Clark in the unused spaces beneath the Brooklyn Bridge.
Among the sites transformed by the Institute were 10 Bleecker Street, the Coney Island
Sculpture Museum, and the Idea Warehouse in TriBeCa.
Later in 1973, the Clocktower Gallery, located in a 13-story municipal Beaux-Arts building
at 108 Leonard Street, opened with its inaugural three shows: Joel Shapiro, Richard Tuttle.
The Clocktower Gallery became a well-known alternative space and its distinctive location
"in the sky near" City Hall made it an icon of one-person shows.
In 1976, Heiss exponentially increased the organization's exhibition and studio capacity
by opening the art center in a deserted Romanesque Revival public school building.
This building, dating from 1892, served as the first school in Long Island City until
1963, when the First Ward school it housed was closed due to low attendance and the building
was turned into a warehouse.
In October 1997, P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center reopened to the public after a three-year,
$8.5 million renovation project designed by Los Angeles-based architect Frederick Fisher,
who had been working closely with Heiss and supervised by the New York architect David
W. Prendergast.
The building's facilities were increased from 84,000 to 125,000 square feet in order to
include a large outdoor gallery, a dramatic entryway, and a two-story project space.
In 2008, Heiss left MoMA PS1 and founded Art International Radio, which is unaffiliated
with MoMA PS1 but houses programs that originally aired on the now-defunct WPS1.
AIR produces its own arts-oriented material.
Affiliation with the Museum of Modern Art MoMA PS1 and the Museum of Modern Art formalized
their affiliation in January 2000.
New York City, which owns the P.S. 1 building, endorsed the merger.
The principal objective of MoMA's partnership with MoMA PS1 is to promote the enjoyment,
appreciation, study, and understanding of contemporary art to a wide and growing audience.
Collaborative programs of exhibitions, educational activities, and special projects allow both
institutions to draw on their respective strengths and resources and to continue shaping a cultural
discourse.
The first significant collaboration between MoMA PS1 and The Museum of Modern Art took
place in 2000 with Greater New York, an exhibition showcasing the work of more than 140 emerging
New York-area artists.
This ambitious effort was successfully repeated five years later with Greater New York 2005.
Both shows demonstrated the diversity and dynamism of the metropolitan area's artistic
community.
The two institutions also integrated their development, education, marketing, financial
planning and membership departments.
To mark the 10th anniversary of the merger between the former P.S. 1 Contemporary Art
Center and MoMA, the museum changed its name to simply MoMA PS 1 in 2010.
Community engagement In 2012, Biesenbach turned MoMA P.S. 1 into
a temporary day shelter for displaced residents after Hurricane Sandy.
Artist and exhibition programs
From its inception, MoMA PS1 has championed the innovative and the experimental.
The premiere exhibition, Rooms, held in June 1976, featured the works of 78 artists, some
of whom created site-specific installations in the former classrooms.
For Rooms, the sculptor Alan Saret cut a tiny hole in one wall, creating an almost heavenly
aureole of light at one end of the third-floor hallway.
Exhibitions in the 1970s included a feminist collaboration called The Sister Chapel.
The museum has featured the works of the artists Janet Cardiff, David Hammons, Hilma af Klint,
Donald Lipski, John McCracken, Dennis Oppenheim, Michelangelo Pistoletto, Alan Saret, Katharina
Sieverding, Keith Sonnier, Michael Tracy, Franz West, and Peter Young.
A focus has been on outsider artists such as Henry Darger, who was included in “Disasters
of War: Francisco de Goya, Henry Darger, Jake and Dinos Chapman”.
“Greater New York”, a survey of little known and emerging artists working in New
York City, was established in 2000 and is mounted every five years.
Many exhibitions organized by MoMA PS1 travel to museums in the United States and abroad,
and some are collaborations with its affiliate Kunst-Werke Institute for Contemporary Art
in Berlin.
Within MoMA PS1's exhibition seasons, a minimum of eight spaces have been reserved for International
and National Project artists.
This initiative, modeled after the inaugural MoMA PS1 Rooms exhibition in 1976, has been
regarded as the premiere exhibition opportunity in New York City for young and mid-career
artists.
These solo exhibitions are selected by the MoMA PS1 curatorial staff.
Artists are provided with a space to design their exhibition and assistance with the installation.
Artists who have participated in International and National Projects include Eberhard Bosslet,
Joe Bradley, Mike Cloud, Kira Lynn Harris, Drew Heitzler, Kalup Linzy, Curtis Mitchell,
Lisi Raskin, Su-Mei Tse, James Pernotto, and Thierry Geoffroy.
In 2008, MoMA PS1 exhibited Minus Space, a survey of 54 artists from 14 countries affiliated
with Minus Space curatorial project located in Brooklyn, New York.
It has also been the place where new ways for architecture to engage with audiences
have been experimented.
In 2012 PS1 presented "IKEA Disobedients", a work by Andrés Jaque, that connected PS1
with the networks in which domesticity was being produced in Queens and Long Island City.
Young Architects Program The Young Architects Program is an annual
competition hosted by MoMA PS1 and The Museum of Modern Art that invites young architects
to submit design proposals for MoMA PS1's courtyard.
The winning entry is converted from concept to construction and becomes the architectural
setting for MoMA PS1's summer Warm Up music series.
The winners of the 2013 YAP was CODA with Party Wall, an installation made of skateboard
off-cut benches which makes shaded space by the shadow it casts - that spells WALL on
the ground.
www.codapartywall.com 2006 YAP installation
OBRA Architects, the 2006 winners of the Young Architects Program designed BEATFUSE!, an
installation that featured interconnected shells made of plywood and polypropylene mesh.
The project also included wooden tidal pools, water misters, and light strainers that create
constantly changing shapes.
Three outdoor spaces: a caldarium, a tepidarium, and a frigidarium, offered three climatic
zones based on the divisions of a traditional Roman bath.
The installation was on view through October 2006.
Past YAP winners 2014 - Hy-Fi by The Living www.thelivingnewyork.com
2013 - Party Wall by CODA www.co-da.co 2012 - Wendy by HWKN www.hwkn.com
2011 - Holding Pattern by Interboro Partners & WHATAMI by stARTT www.interboropartners.net
2010 - Pole Dance by Solid-Objectives - Idenburg Liu
2009 - Afterparty by MOS 2008 - Public Farm 1 by WorkAC
2007 - Liquid Sky by Ball-Nogues Studio www.ball-nogues.com 2006 - BEATFUSE!
by OBRA Architects 2005 - SUR by Xefirotarch
2004 - Canopy by nARCHITECTS 2003 - Light-Wing by EMERGENT
2002 - Playa Urbana / Urban Beach by William E. Massie
2001 - Summer Oasis by ROY 2000 - Dunescape by SHoP Architects
1999 - DJ Pavilion by Philip Johnson 1998 - untitled?
by Gelatin' Warm Up
Warm Up is MoMA PS1's music series summer event.
The series is housed within the architectural installation created by the winner of the
annual MoMA PS1 and MoMA organized Young Architects Program.
Together, the music, architecture and exhibition program provide a unique multi-sensory experience
for music fans, artists, and families alike.
Warm Up was conceived in 1997 as a summer-long dance party to attract crowds to MoMA PS1
and Long Island City, Queens.
The series runs every Saturday from July through early September and draws thousands of local
and international visitors each day.
Highlights from the series include a stellar group of international DJs and live music
ensembles: DJ Harvey, Groove Collective, Afrika Bambaataa, Mad Professor, Richie Hawtin, François
K, Fischerspooner, Kid Koala, Arto Lindsay, Scissor Sisters, Luke Vibert, and many more.
WPS1
WPS1 was the Internet radio station of MoMA PS1, founded by Alanna Heiss in 2004.
In 2009, when Heiss left PS1 to become full-time Director of The Clocktower Gallery, WPS1 became
Art International Radio.
In 2013, the online radio station was renamed Clocktower Radio, a division of Heiss's Clocktower
Productions project.
The radio station provided a free 24-hour stream and an on-demand archive of cultural
programming.
It operated out of the historic Clocktower Gallery building in Lower Manhattan, New York
City, where a network of interlinked studios stream live and pre-recorded talk, performances
and historic recordings to a worldwide audience.
The radio station airs interviews with contemporary artists, poets, writers, choreographers, musicians,
art dealers, critics and other cultural innovators related to the current scene.
2009/2010 interviewees include abstract painter Ronnie Landfield, performance artist Carolee
Schneeman, founder of the Bowery Poetry Club poet Bob Holman, choreographer Martha Clarke,
authors and art critics Jed Perl and Dore Ashton among others.
Launched in April 2004, WPS1's web-tracking statistics showed that listeners from over
50 countries tuned into nearly 1,000 programs each day over the first year of operation.
Visitors select from a traditional radio program format or choose from an on-demand archive
of over 1,000 hours of material.
WPS1 featured talk radio style discussions and interviews with artists, authors, musicians,
actors, filmmakers, critics, curators, poets, educators, journalists, media experts, and
other cultural leaders, innovators, and challengers.
The station also carried a unique and important collection of music assembled by a team of
music curators.
This material ranged from live recordings of the MoMA PS1 summer Warm Up series, to
rare and thoughtful surveys such as the Robert Moog Memorial Hour, and the Gulf Coast Music
Special assembled from rare vinyl recordings.
WPS1 broadcast historic recordings from university and private collections, and from the audio
archives of The Museum of Modern Art; presented live remote programs from festivals including
The Armory Show, Art Basel Miami Beach, and the Venice Biennale; and frequently features
panel discussions hosted by different New York cultural institutions.
This material is now available on the Art International Radio website.
Long-term installations Although MoMA PS1 does not have a permanent
collection, it does house several long-term installations:
Richard Artschwager, Blips, 1976.
Location: Throughout MoMA PS1 Richard Artschwager, Exit-Don’t fight City
Hall, 1976.
Location: First floor, hallway, Five red "exit" bulbs
Keith Sonnier, Tunnel of Tears, 1997.
Location: "Chimney" in the foyer of the lobby Lawrence Weiner, A bit of matter and a little
bit more, 1976.
Location: Front door, stenciled on glass Pipilotti Rist, Selbstlos im Lavabad, 1994.
Location: Lobby, single-channel video installation William Kentridge, Stair Procession, 2000.
Location: Staircase B Ernesto Caivano, In the Woods.
2004, Location: Staircase A James Turrell, Meeting, 1986.
Location: Third floor Hendrika Sonnenberg & Chris Hanson, Baudelaire,
1994.
Location: Stairs into building Alan Saret, Brick Wall and Sun, 1976.
Location: Third floor, eastern end of the north wing
Jennifer Cho, Haystacks, 2000.
Location: Basement floor Sol LeWitt, Crayola Square, 1999.
Location: Basement floor Matt Mullican, Untitled, 1997.
Location: Steel inset in basement floor Management
Board of Trustees Under chairwoman Agnes Gund, the MoMA PS1's
board of directors includes the artists Laurie Anderson and Paul Chan, art historian Diana
Widmaier-Picasso, fashion designer Adam Kimmel, and art collectors Richard Chang, Peter Norton,
and Julia Stoschek.
Finances Exhibitions at MoMA PS1 are made possible
by the Annual Exhibition Fund, which draws donations from the trustees.
As owner of the P.S. 1 building, New York City paid 85 percent of its renovation costs
in 1997, with the rest coming from private donors.
The city also contributes one-third to one-half of P.S. 1's total annual operating budget
of $1.5 million to $2 million.
Attendance MoMA PS1 attracts about 150,000 visitors a
year.
References
External links Official website
Gulf News article on PS1 Art International Radio, from which WPS1 programs
can be streamed The Museum of Modern Art
MoMA PS1 on Myspace WPS1 at Venice Biennale 2007.
Interview with Thierry Geoffroy PS1 MoMA on ABC News: Emergency Room
PS1 on hub_01