DAVID ZWIRNER DIRECTOR Ebony L. Haynes is opening a new space in Tribeca at 52 Walker Street. Nine months ago, Haynes joined the gallery with a unique arrangement providing her the latitude to run her own David Zwirner location in New York. Haynes announced more details today about the stand alone space and the exhibition programming she is developing.
52 Walker is launching in October with a solo show of Kandis Williams, an up-and-coming Baltimore-born, Los Angeles-based artist.
The gallery program will reflect Haynes’s curatorial interests, focusing on conceptual and research-based work by artists from a variety of backgrounds, ranging from rising talents to more established figures. Artworks will be for sale, but the artists will not be represented by David Zwirner.
Haynes plans to present four exhibitions each year. Rather than cycling through shows every four to six weeks, on a standard commercial gallery schedule, exhibitions will be on view for three months. Documenting the program, exhibition catalogs will be produced through a new publication series called Clarion, from David Zwirner Books. Haynes likens her vision to a kunsthalle.
Staffing at 52 Walker, Haynes has indicated, will reflect her desire to address opportunity and representation deficits in commercial art galleries and commitment to creating a pipeline of Black talent in the field.
“Ebony and I started talking in January (2020) about the possibility of her joining the gallery. Over the course of our conversations, Ebony introduced me to her much more ambitious idea. Like so many of Ebony’s stellar exhibitions and projects, this space will undoubtedly create a new mold for gallery programming today. I am so excited to work with her on realizing her vision,” David Zwirner said upon hiring Haynes.
“Like so many of Ebony’s stellar exhibitions and projects, this space will undoubtedly create a new mold for gallery programming today. I am so excited to work with her on realizing her vision.” — David Zwirner
Williams works across collage, printmaking, video, and performance exploring issues such as race, nationalism, authority, and eroticism. She is also the founder of Cassandra Press, a publishing and educational platform that hosted Haynes’s Black Students Only Sessions, online talks offering candid insights about the art world to students in “art-track” programs.
Currently, Williams is participating in the Made in L.A. 2020 biennial. “A Field,” her first museum show, is a site-specific installation examining prison farm labor and “regimes of control” on view at the Institute of Contemporary Art at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond through September.
For her first solo show in New York at 52 Walker, Williams will create a new body of work while in residence in the city. Following the inaugural exhibition with Williams, four exhibitions are planned for 2022, all solo shows dedicated to women artists.
The group is primarily African American, including Nikita Gale, whose first solo museum exhibition was on view at the California African American Museum in Los Angeles earlier this year. Working with sculpture and installation, Gale considers the politics of space and sound. Philadelphia-based Tiona Nekkia McClodden is a filmmaker and visual artist who participated in the 2019 Whitney Biennial and won the exhibition’s Bucksbaum Award.
The 2021-22 exhibition schedule at 52 Walker features the following solo shows:
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Kandis Williams | October–December 2021
Nikita Gale | January–March 2022
Nora Turato | April–June 2022
Tiona Nekkia McClodden | July–September 2022
Tau Lewis | October–December 2022
Named for the gallery’s location, 52 Walker will occupy the first floor of a five-story landmark building. Selldorf Architects is designing the new space.
Haynes is from Toronto, Canada. Prior to her appointment at David Zwirner, she was a director at Martos Gallery in New York and its sister space Shoot the Lobster, with locations in New York and Los Angeles. She is a visiting 2021 curator and critic at the Yale School of Art.
“After years of exploring ways to reframe the gallery, I’m thrilled to provide a space for artists to create and present their work for an extended period, encouraging deeper engagement between the artists and the public,” Haynes said in a statement.
“We approached the opening of 52 Walker with the idea of an art space that is welcoming to all within a curatorial-driven and commercial context.” CT
FIND MORE about the artists Nikita Gale, Tiona Nekkia McClodden, and Tau Lewis on their websites, and Kandis Williams and Nora Turato on Instagram
FIND MORE about Nikita Gale’s first museum exhibition on Culture Type
LISTEN MORE Hear Ebony L. Haynes and collector Bernard Lumpkin in conversation about Art’s Potential to Reflect Society and Influence Progress on the Fair Enough podcast from Independent and Crozier
Gallerist Ebony L. Haynes is establishing her new David Zwirner location at 52 Walker Street in Tribeca. The space used to house M1-5 Lounge. | Photo by Jason Schmidt
BOOKSHELF
“Made in L.A. 2020: A Version” documents the biennial currently on view at the Hammer Museum and . Kandis Williams is among the participating artists.
