New York Gallery Biographies:
Each of our bios adhere to a strict template we created. This template was created, in part, for future researchers, as a way to easily track and organize information. This template was also designed to make patterns across galleries and gallerists easier to identify. Footnotes were a key component of these biographies to make our fact-finding and tracing simple for future researchers.
New York Gallery Map:
Google Maps allows for a maximum of ten layers, an organizational tool that we used to differentiate gallery locations. This fixed system presented us with a problem as we had fourteen gallery biographies needed to fit on the map that only called for ten. We had to come up with a way to accommodate all these spaces. We resolved this challenge by merging galleries onto one layer. Our pairing order was based on size (locations with fewer locational changes) rather than explicit gallery relationships. Babcock Galleries, for instance, switched locations fifteen times, and so we didn’t merge that layer with another gallery. Currier & Ives, and the Nye Gallery, however, moved locations on once. The merging of gallery spaces did not reflect gallery locations, although, in the future, this might visually be a better way to group smaller galleries.
When you click on a plot point you will notice a picture associated with the gallery (a piece of art, exhibition catalogue, or display image) appears. Underneath that image you will find the date (if there is one) associated with that move, and also a link to our website for this project, specifically the gallery bio page that corresponds with that exact point.
These historical dates are nested onto a contemporary map of New York. The next step would be to layer these locations onto a historical map. New York’s landscape changed during this time, and so we recognize that our map, as it stands, does not account for these sweeping changes. This would be the next step: tracking change over time both in terms of location and landscape.
New York Gallery Website:
The website acts as a platform to research and compile existing gallery bios, as well as a platform for other researchers to contribute to the project. Visual representations, including the tracking of these locations, was a central goal of this project, so images that correspond with the space (images of works, exhibition catalogues, or architecture of the space) are enlarged at the top of the page. These images can also be found alongside (if applicable) more images of the gallery which can be enlarged by clicking on them. Zoomable images and captions appear.
The gallery bios have been entered into the website using the same template as the saved documents. The purpose of this decision was to keep the aesthetics of the gallery bios uniform and to adhere to an organized historical representation of the galleries. Unlike an academic paper, the footnotes on the website are interactive. Citations appear when you scroll over the footnote, as opposed to being found at the bottom of the paper. Animated links allow the reader to easily move between sites for further research on specific biographical details.
PDF documents are meant to be used for research; this is a more efficient way to look at multiple gallery bios side-by-side with each other and with the map, to track trends and patterns of gallery locations.
New York Gallery Virtual Exhibitions:
Many galleries made exhibition catalogues that have been digitized and are used as primary resources in researching individual galleries and understanding the movement of exhibitions, artists, or artworks. A digital gallery allows the viewer to see an exhibition and to imagine walking through these gallery spaces. The Whistler exhibition, which took place in H. Wunderlich Gallery in 1883, is a preliminary example of a recreated exhibition.
There are platforms, including Kunstmatrix, a platform that allows you to create augmented galleries, Artsteps and Ortelia, which can be used to create three-dimensional gallery spaces and exhibitions that can be moved through. These platforms allow you to “walk” around these exhibitions, zoom into individual artworks, and select artworks to learn more. This is the intended next step for these galleries spaces.
The current exhibition consists of two walls of the Wunderlich exhibition recreated on Adobe. A short description of the exhibition provides context of the artworks on display, as well as citations of the work and descriptions of the gallery space. These descriptions provide historical data of the exhibition, including date and location of exhibition as well as artists and works.