Venus Over Manhattan, the Upper East Side gallery founded by collector and investor Adam Lindemann in 2012, is marking its 10th anniversary by opening a new space downtown in Nolita.
“We’ve always had an interest in downtown, but the timing never felt quite right before,” Lindemann told Artnet News. “We’re expanding our program to give more attention to younger artists, and younger seems best suited to downtown. But we will want to maintain the historic part of the program, which is fundamental to our mission.”
The gallery at 55 Jones Street is set to open April 7 with a show by buzzed-about artist Ana Benaroya, whose work focuses on women’s bodies.
The show, titled “Ana Benaroya: Swept Away,” will include seven paintings and seven works on paper and specifically looks at women’s relationship to water. It closes May 21.
Ana Benaroya, Kiss Me More (2021). Image courtesy the artist and Venus Over Manhattan.
Gallery partner Anna Furney said the goal was to connect contemporary artists with historic works Venus Over Manhattan has been championing for the past decade.
“You can’t look at an Ana Benaroya painting and not think about Peter Saul, Robert Colescott, or MAD Comics—all the things Venus has been immersed in for some time,” she said. “There will be an exciting cross pollination between the gallery’s recently arrived artists and the more historic figures. But also, we hope to make the same sort of cross-generational conversation happen among collectors.”
Lindemann added that Benaroya is part of “a great lineage but is creating her own path. So it made perfect sense to inaugurate the downtown space with her paintings and drawings.”
Prices for her works range from $12,000 to $50,000.
Ana Benaroya, The Breaststroke (2021). Image courtesy the artist and Venus Over Manhattan Gallery.
Furney said the gallery’s new location was in a neighborhood that feels “both a bit bourgeois and at the same time gritty.”
“The energy is palpable on Great Jones Street,” she said.
Ana Benaroya, By the Ocean’s Roar (2022). Image courtesy the artist and Venus Over Manhattan, New York.
Great Jones Street “feels like old New York somehow,” Lindemann added. “It’s a distinctive downtown neighborhood that’s got a great young energy but is full of history.”
Nearby galleries include Eric Firestone, Eva Presenhuber and Brendan Dugan’s Karma.
Another bonus? “Our space in Great Jones Street is next to one of my favorite restaurants,” Lindemann said. (Il Buco-Alimentari… shhh.)