Elizabeth Dee Gallery’s new space in Harlem.
Image: Courtesy of the gallery.

Big changes are on the horizon for New York’s Elizabeth Dee Gallery.

After a 15-year operation in West Chelsea, the gallery is moving uptown to take over a two-story building on Fifth Avenue in Harlem, which will be open to the public this spring. Notably, the 12,000-square foot property in between 125th and 126th streets carries a special history of its own. From 1968 through 1979, the building was home to the loft that the Studio Museum in Harlem rented before moving to their present address on 125th Street.

In addition to its relocation, the gallery also announced a program of events slated to run before its spring opening, including a new educational initiative for neighborhood kids, as well as a series of pre-opening performances. The programming arguably comes with hopes of netting the surrounding neighborhood’s rapidly gentrifying audience as well as winning the community’s support.

“The neighborhoods are so economically diverse and racially diverse, and they make you start to think about your audience in a different way,” the gallery’s founder Elizabeth Dee, who is a co-founder of Independent art fair, told the New York Times. “[It’s] an audience rooted in African-American culture, of course, but also one of many kinds of demographics.”

In a statement to artnet News, Dee revealed that she and her team previously considered re-locating to two other Manhattan neighborhoods. “I was looking on the Upper East Side because I really like the gallery network up there,” she said. “I was also looking at SoHo, which is the place where I first started at the very beginning.”

Artists who have exhibited with Elizabeth Dee include Mac Adams, Mark Barrow, Philippe Decrauzat, John Giorno, Miranda Lichtenstein, Carol Ostendarp, Adrian Piper, and Julie Wachtel.

The gallery joins Gavin Brown, who relocated to 461 West 126th Street between Amsterdam Avenue and Morningside Avenue, occupying a former brewery now known as the Malt House.