Community of Tribeca: CANADA

PLUS MAGAZINE: What first drew you to Tribeca, not just as a location, but as a context for the kind of gallery you wanted to build? At what point did it begin to feel like a home for CANADA?

CANADA: In 2019, our space on Broome Street was forced to close when the building was sold and demolished. We looked at Tribeca because it was familiar; our first location in 1999 was a basement on Broadway. Besides Kerry Schuss, who has been in Tribeca since the Jurassic era, Stefania Bortolami, James Cohan and Andrew Kreps had opened or were opening, and welcoming, so it seemed like a fit. 

We worked with the architects at Common Room to design the space. They were old friends and an incredibly talented team. This was the first time we were able to build a space the way we wanted it, which still feels like a miracle. 

P: How have you seen the Tribeca community evolve over the years, both culturally and artistically?  

C: Tribeca keeps grooving along; it’s busy with art galleries, adding more into the mix all the time. This is by far the largest neighborhood of galleries we’ve ever found ourselves a part of.

P: Where are your go-to spots in the neighborhood?

C: Our next-door neighbor, Go Catering, has take-out for breakfast and lunch. Gabby and her husband, who run it, have been in the neighborhood forever. Also, Grandaisy has amazing sandwiches and weirdly good walnut raisin rolls. East Season Restaurant at 244 Canal Street for roast pork and an old-school Chinatown atmosphere. Soho art material because everyone who works there is pretty friendly, and Dream House by La Monte Young, Marian Zazeela, and Jung Hee Choi, the sound and light installation on Church Street, since 1993. Plus Chinatown Building Supply on Walker St!

P: CANADA is notable for operating as an artist-run gallery, which remains rare today. How does this artist-run structure influence allow you to do differently, and how does it shape collaboration and community with artists?

C: Having artists run the place gives us a chance to do things the way artists might want. The hope is that an honest degree of trust between us and the artists will make things work better. Having a broad partnership is complicated and keeps things dynamic and/or confusing. The hope has always been to form a more porous art world where there’s less gatekeeping and more community. In many ways, that has been a harder goal than we imagined, but it still seems worth trying for.

P: Adding on, how do you see CANADA’s role in nurturing experimental or emerging practices within today’s art ecosystem? In what ways does the gallery support risk-taking that might fall outside traditional commercial expectations?

C: As a small group of art makers and enthusiasts, we try to put on shows that we might want to see. The risk-taking is letting artists speak their mind while we cover the rent.  We try to build support, context, and community for this endeavor through all kinds of hopeful outreach.  Our upcoming show in September is with an old friend and phenomenal artist, Kahlil Robert Irving.  Being our first solo with Kahlil, we will try to balance whatever guidance we might offer with his already highly developed practice; it feels like a meeting of minds.

P: What legacy do you hope CANADA will leave within the contemporary art scene, and how do you envision the gallery’s influence evolving over the next decade?

C: They tried to help a few artists along the way, could be our legacy?  As for the next decade, that’s anyone’s guess…