Downtown Dealers Podcast Episode 1: Featuring Jordan Barse, Tara Downs, Nicole Klagsbrun, and Jay Gorney - Features

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Downtown Dealers, a live conversation series bringing together New York art dealers from multiple generations, is now available to stream as a podcast. Organized by Bill Cournoyer at Tara Downs Gallery and moderated by Independent’s Founder Elizabeth Dee, the first Downtown Dealers talk took place in May 2023 with guest speakers Jordan Barse (Theta), Tara Downs, Nicole Klagsbrun (Cable Gallery and Nicole Klagsbrun), and Jay Gorney (Jay Gorney Modern Art). In this episode, Nicole Klagsbrun and Jay Gorney share their experiences of the small but vital gallery system in the late 1980s, while Tara Downs and Jordan Barse discuss entering the New York art scene with the advent of technology at the start of the 21st century.

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Downtown Dealers Podcast Episode 1: Featuring Jordan Barse, Tara Downs, Nicole Klagsbrun, and Jay Gorney - Features - Independent Art Fair

Photo by Tony Chrenka.

Jordan Barse received a BFA from the Stamps School of Art & Design at The University of Michigan. She was the curatorial intern at Artists Space in 2014 and then curatorial intern at the New Museum for the 2015 Triennial under Lauren Cornell and assistant curator Sara O'Keeffe. She became the co-director of an artist-run space in Ridgewood called Kimberly-Klark and later as a director at Kai Matsumiya gallery. Barse opened her own gallery named Theta in 2021.

Tara Downs graduated from Queens University with a Bachelor of Arts and completed her Master of Fine Arts at OCAD University in Sculpture and Installation. In 2011, Downs founded the Tomorrow Gallery with Aleksander Hardashnakov and Hugh Scott-Douglas. In 2014, Downs relocated the Tomorrow Gallery to New York City as the sole proprietor. She moved to Berlin for a position as associate director at Tanya Leighton Gallery, while continuing to direct the Tomorrow Gallery, before returning to New York. In 2017, Downs merged the Tomorrow Gallery with Hester, by Alex Ross, to create the Downs & Ross Gallery in New York City. In 2022 she opened Tara Downs gallery under her name.

Jay Gorney earned his BA art history from Oberlin College, where he was a student of Ellen Johnson, a distinguished art historian who wrote early books about Frank Stella and Claes Oldenburg. He was an intern at Leo Castelli as an undergraduate. During the first semester of his senior year, he attended the Whitney Museum Independent Student Program in curatorial studies. His first art related job after college was at the esteemed Sidney Janis Gallery. He then worked for the now notorious Andrew Crispo, where he met Pat Hamilton. He was her assistant when they opened the Hamilton Gallery on 57th Street in 1977—showing Joan Snyder, Rafael Ferrer, Grace Hartigan, Ron Gorchov and Louise Bourgeois. Gorney opened his own gallery, Jay Gorney Modern Art, in the East Village in 1985 and moved it to nearby SoHo two years later. In 2005, he became director of contemporary art at Mitchell-Innes & Nash in New York, worked as an adviser and independent curator at Paula Cooper Gallery in Chelsea until 2017.

Nicole Klagsbrun attended arts school in London and received a degree in costume design in Brussels. She moved to New York to work at Julliard. She got her start in the art world assisting Tony Shafrazi set up his gallery. Afterwards she worked at the Olsen Gallery in the East Village where she met Clarissa Dalrymple. They opened Cable Gallery in 1983-1988. It was the site of early solo exhibitions of Ashley Bickerton, Steve DiBenedetto, Collier Schorr, Haim Steinbach, Phillipe Thomas, Christopher Wool, Tyler Turkle and others. Nicole Klagsbrun gallery opened in 1989 in Soho before moving to Chelsea.