Park Place, The Gallery of Art Research, Inc.
On the occasion of the intertwining exhibitions of work by Robert Grosvenor and David Novros at the Paula Cooper Gallery, we are looking back at the Park Place cooperative, of which both artists were members.
The Park Place Gallery was the first large-scale artists’ cooperative active in New York. Motivated by shared ideals for art, community, and collaboration, and in large part educated in California, the group of painters and sculptors started showing together informally at 79 Park Place in 1962. Although the group moved locations a few times, eventually settling at 542 West Broadway until they disbanded in 1967, they stuck with the name Park Place and consistently mounted shows combining painting and sculpture on a scale that had never been seen before.
Having begun as an unofficial collaboration, the Park Place Gallery was incorporated in 1965 through the support of an unusual business model. The cooperative was comprised of five sculptors (Mark di Suvero, Peter Forakis, Robert Grosvenor, Tony Magar, and Forrest Myers), five painters (Dean Fleming, Tamara Melcher, David Novros, Edwin Ruda, and Leo Valledor), and five collectors (Virginia Dwan, Allen and Betty Guiberson, J. Patrick Lannan, Vera List, and John and Lupe Murchison). In exchange for financing the gallery, the collectors were each given one major work by every artist annually.
During its two years of operation the gallery mounted groundbreaking shows, and the artists received invitations to execute major commissions and participate in historic exhibitions, both as individuals and as a group. They hosted the work of peers such as Chris Wilmarth, Robert Gordon, and Brice Marden, as well as Carl Andre, Robert Smithson, and Sol LeWitt. The gallery also frequently sponsored musical performances and screened experimental films. The first director of the newly incorporated gallery was John Gibson, who shortly hired Paula Cooper. When the cooperative closed in 1967, Cooper continued to support innovative artists in all media by opening her space to similar events.
The artists were deeply involved in the construction and maintenance of their gallery. In the image below, Paula Cooper leans on a wide, curving desk that Robert Grosvenor made from part of a failed sculpture. A few years later, Grosvenor used the other part to make a new work––a triangular, three-wheeled car.
Robert Grosvenor, 3 Wheeled Car, 1969, aluminum, enamel paint, plexiglass, car seat, wheels and steering gear, 35 3/4 x 52 x 116 1/2 inches (90.8 x 132.1 x 295.9 cm)
Art and music went hand-in-hand right from the start, with frequent improvisational jazz sessions taking place at 79 Park Place in the presence of spontaneous installations of abstract painting and sculpture. Jazz continued to be an important way for the community to collaborate, and the gallery also hosted avant-garde musicians. Steve Reich’s first concerts in New York were held at Park Place, including the premiere of “Come Out” in 1966. Reich is pictured below during a performance with artist William Wiley. The following images show the Park Place band at a Ruda & Di Suvero exhibition; Robert Grosvenor at work; and Peter Forakis, Bernie Kirschenbaum, Paula Cooper, and Chris Wilmarth in front of a work by Alan Shields. The Park Place Gallery marked the opening chapter in the careers of many of the members, exhibiting artists, and the wider community, nurturing relationships that would prove generative throughout their careers.
Daisy Charles
All images are reproduced courtesy of the Archives of American Art at the Smithsonian, which holds the records of the Park Place Gallery from 1963 to 1967. Photographs by Peter Moore © 2021 Barbara Moore.
Further reading:
Liza Kirwin, “Art and Space: Park Place and the Beginning of the Paula Cooper Gallery,” Archives of American Art Journal vol. 46, no. 1/2, 2006, pp. 36–40.
Linda Dalrymple Henderson, Reimagining Space: The Park Place Gallery Group in 1960s New York City, exh. cat. (Austin, TX: Blanton Museum of Art, 2008).