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5/9/2012

Thomas Beale

Honey Space, New York

It is with supreme pleasure that I announce Honey Space, the final exhibition and experience to occur within Honey Space. Bringing the life-cycle of the space full-circle, Honey Space takes the form of an exhibition of sculpture as well as a celebration of this anomalous, shape-shifting entity that has improbably taken root and opened and closed its doors on the West Side Highway since 2007. Following the exhibition, the building housing Honey Space will be closed, dismantled brick by brick, and this space, and moment in time, will be folded back into the ever-layered memory that is New York City.

Six years on, the experiences I have had within this building seem as impossibly unlikely as the opportunity laid before me the day I first set foot in here, in the spring of 2006. Who would have ever considered finding a ground floor space in Chelsea under such circumstances? No lease, a gentleman's agreement, a trade of art, all so loosely defined, rich with so much freedom. No matter how I ever explained it, there was never any good, rational sense to it. The better question always seemed to be "what will I do with this?" And that query has, throughout, been my guide.

I opened the gates to the space for the first time in 2007, with an exhibition of my own work. That show, as well, was titled Honey Space, before I ever considered the space as an entity of its own. At the time, I wasn't sure I would still be in the building even three months later. I built a facade of found wood, with windows set at varying levels, each framing a small sculpture. There were sculptures in holes in the floor and under the stairwell, large pieces set throughout the space, a rope bridge and a kitchen I had constructed where my friend Mickey, who I had enlisted to join me as my "gallerist", and I made lunch everyday. It was perfectly raw, we were equally innocent, and it all felt entirely right.

One experience inspired confidence towards the next, and before we knew it, we were building new walls, hanging paintings on the street and on a wooden whatchamacallit we built up to the ceiling, opening the gates again and this time walking away for the length of the day, to come back in the afternoon and see what, if anything, had been lifted, and reading the most profound and entertaining comments people had left in the book on the table. We went down into the hole and pasted Silvia Elena's portrait on the back wall, lit candles, hid speakers in the rubble, set a ladder in there, and again, we walked away. We built a new facade, stark white, no sign (as always), with a low opening, shrouding the space in darkness for Midori's carousel of the mind. We covered the room in tin-foil and announced saloons, salons, and silver ceremonies; built curved walls and rolled out the sacred scrolls of our resident bishop John Wells, shared pink drinks, and again, we left the space for hours at a time, wide open to the street. Superconductors and Softing followed, with so much in-between. We formulated our own language as we went, we made something, and then we made something new. We carried forward, as our lease on life was extended far beyond what we ever imagined possible, conjuring our way by what felt right and good.

To those of you who have followed and participated in this space, thank you. It has been the experience of a lifetime.

And a very special thanks to Alf Naman, without whose vision and trust none of this would have ever been possible.

Join us one last time.

forever grateful,
Tom Beale

opening Thursday, September 6, 6-9pm

Honey Space
148 11th Ave (btw 21st & 22nd)

stampa

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