Raucous, Disorderly Downtown

Richard Hell | New York Review of Books | 27th March 2017

Art history tends to focus on the commercially successful. In 1950’s New York the big uptown galleries feted Jackson Pollock while downtown an eco-system of humble artist-run galleries promoted lesser names. An exhibition about these galleries shows that they promoted an “especially raucous art”. They tell “alternative art histories” and reveal “the robust roots of art-making, rather than only the flowers.”