Depature from Familiarity

Even in a small Island called Manhattan whose size is only 6000 ha., still, for everybody, there would be some places or streets that mean something special with full of memories, I assume. In my case, they are the streets, Irving Place and 26th street between 10th and 11th. From Irving Place, I shall say that my life has started, which I talked about in the former article. Then, my life has got elaborated from 26th street where my gallery is located. Since the beginning of last year, I have been working in a full-time schedule up until now. In rainy, snowy, hot and humid, windy, cloudy or bitterly cold days, this familiar look of the street has always welcomed me. No matter how the state of my mind has been, when I make a left at the corner of 26th st on10th Avenue, exposing myself to the winds from the Hudson River, I have felt good. As somebody who was new to the gallery work, there has been always something to learn. People who I had known before then or people whom I got to know after are working somewhere on 26th street. I felt at home. Two weeks ago, however, I made my decision to leave the gallery and the street soon. Being in a gallery IS quite work, which is definitely heavier than it looks. Especially, since the gallery is not a big like Gagosian and I am the only employee, I’ve had to cope with almost every aspect of gallery business from installation, administrative work, handling the artworks, to the sales. It was fun, but I started wondering if this was really what I wanted to do. Since my graduation from the University, I have been running, taking any job opportunities that came along without inspecting. An assistant of a great curator and the gallery, many involvements of art related projects here and there, a reviewer, a sort of dealer…I was extremely lucky, but now I am a little overloaded and overwhelmed. Though I am scared, the time has come to think on what I could do or how I could situate myself in the art world. Departure from the familiar place is not always easy, I have to say. I will miss the street where I felt home. I will miss all the memories, good and bad, that I had. I will miss people who are there and people whom I met. Once in a while, however, an orbital adjustment on life is necessary. That is a law of nature and I am in the cycle of evolvement without exception. Once the old door is closed, the new winds will blow. Now, I wonder which streets would be the next to be special in the city and I am excited about unknown.