Pearl Paint: On Tour

When the Pearl Paint mothership suddenly shuttered last year, artists all over the city--and the country--wept.

Soon after, artist Barry Fellman recreated the interior of the store, traveling to Texas to buy Pearl's original cabinets, fixtures, and various products, and turn them into an installation. "Art Show" is on view once again at the Center for Visual Communication in Miami, and will soon be touring the country.



From the press release:

"The installation provokes questions about the availability of art supplies, how they are purchased, and how their use is changing as artists adopt digital technology and new forms of presentation. Art Store extends Duchamp's seminal Readymades, sourced from consumer culture, to a collection of mass produced objects actually used to create art."

"Art Store will be launched in 2016 as a traveling installation to activate communities nationwide by serving as a point of engagement to support local museums, schools and organization involved in arts and education. Institutions may contact CVC for more information on exhibiting Art Store in their community."

Meanwhile, back on Canal Street, the Pearl Paint space remains vacant, another casualty of high-rent blight.

Tribeca Cinemas

VANISHING

Reader Shade Rupe writes in with the news that Tribeca Cinemas will be closing: "just last week the landlord told them they have to move out by the end of the month. They’re razing the building and...you know the drill."

The drill, according to the New York Post, is that the building is on the market and "could be transformed into all residential or all office... 'We think it will trade for over $120 million,' the broker told the paper. 'It has high ceilings and is great loft space--it’s what Tribeca is all about.'" As the Real Deal reported last year when the building was first being shopped around, "The property also comes with unused air rights which could allow for the construction of more units."

While the Post does not specifically mention the cinema's closure, a source close to Shade spoke to some employees: "They told me they just found out last week. Everyone there is really shocked as this came out of nowhere... Apparently, the landlord wants to tear the building down."

I have not been able to confirm with anyone at the cinema.



The little independent movie house opened as The Screening Room in 1996, a combo restaurant and theater, the "dreamwork of two young corporate malcontents in love with the movies," according to Gael Greene in a 1996 New York magazine. Every Sunday, they showed "Breakfast at Tiffany's."

The Screening Room closed in 2003. "The venue had been struggling since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11," reported the Post at the time, "as well as suffering from competition from newer venues like the Sunshine Theater in the East Village." The theater was then purchased by Robert DeNiro and his Tribeca Film Festival partners.

Since then, the theater has not been a regular for showing films, but dedicated to festivals, special screenings, and private events. At the moment, they're still scheduled for June 11 to host a 30th anniversary screening of Berry Gordy's "The Last Dragon": "An urbanized flip on Bruce Lee movies and chop-suey cinema," says Tribeca Film. "The Last Dragon combined NYC’s mid-’80s hip-hop culture with vintage kung-fu storytelling into what’s become a beloved cinematic time capsule."

Pearl Paint

VANISHING?

A tipster has written in that "Pearl Paint will be closing its Canal Street store soon," according to an employee.

The information has not been confirmed with Pearl; however, Tribeca Citizen also notes this week that the Pearl building is for sale or lease: "the store is a downtown icon, and from the sound of the listing, Pearl isn’t likely to survive a transition. The entire six-level, 11,850-square-foot space is listed on Massey Knakal’s website for sale or rent—or teardown."



A mecca for artists, with six floors of absolutely everything art supply, Pearl began closing stores in 2010. People worried about the Canal Street location, but it soldiered on.



Now, at the same time that artists are being pushed further out of town, it looks like time is up for this important piece of the old creative city.



What might come to replace it? The realtor suggests it's an "Outstanding Condo Conversion Opportunity."



And invites interested tenants to "Join Neighborhood Retailers" like Subway, 7-Eleven, Bank of America, and Starbucks...