Q: Okay, we're recording. All right, now we're both recording. We're sitting with Tony Fitzpatrick, I've known Tony, not as long as I wish I have, I mean maybe five, six years of knowing each other, pretty well maybe seven.
TONY FITZPATRICK: We've been aware of each other for a long time. I certainly remember your gallery and you know, spotted your galleries at the art fairs for the last 20 or so years.
Q: I think what's significant about Tony's and my relationship is how much I've learned from him. Because Tony, I think, is a consummate artist who takes really solid responsibility for his art and his career. And I've come at this as a former art dealer and as you listen to Tony you'll realize that he doesn't have a lot of love for most art dealers and I think with good reason.
There's a lot you know, there's an awful lot of the art world who thinks we would be better off if we didn't have artists. You know, there's a huge flaw in that equation and I think a lot of the reason I'm doing this class is about seeing artists empowered and I think a lot of that is it really coming from Tony and I think the notion, I mean I think a lot of artists enter this course thinking having an art gallery and an art dealer is a desirable thing and I'm not of that opinion.
I think it might be and it depends on the person and taking responsibility for that and one of the very reasons that we want to meet with Tony first is so that he can talk to us about taking responsibility and how art dealers are working for you if you have one or they should by working for you and that is shouldn't be some other sort of arrangement. Your turn.
TONY FITZPATRICK: That's a really good place to start. I think first of all I want to preface these comments with the fact that I've been well served by the art dealers that I have had. The ones I have now, Pierogi in Brooklyn we have a 35/65 split, which is I think is more than equitable. They have done wonderful work for me.
They put me in the Museum of Modern Art. So they did for an artist what they're supposed to do. They also did something else though, which is the thrust of what I want to talk to you guys about. Pierogi saw their mission is two pronged.
In addition to helping out individual artists, they built their gallery in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, they were open in 1993 and that's where I first met Joe Amrhein, who started Pierogi and the reason he built is there is because that's where all the artists lived. It's the same reason why Willy Sutton robbed banks, that's where the money was. And what he did was he galvanized that community.
When Pierogi first opened, they took only 20 percent and they had this great big space and they involved everybody that was part of that community. And then as it went on, he realized it was a much bigger community than he could possibly accommodate with regular show schedules. So he brought up the idea of getting several series of flat files and he said, look you're not ready for prime time yet, but I would love to have you in the flat files and have work on paper.
So on any given day to this day and in Pierogi's whole history, people have been able to walk in, look through the flat files and get works of art that are prayed anywhere from 75 dollars to 2000 dollars to 2500 to 175 bucks. He also, you know, in addition to galvanizing that community of artists and including them, gave birth to a whole new generation of collectors. You know, we're surrounded by art.
When I was a little kid I was surrounded by it but nobody ever bothered telling me what is art. I was surrounded by comic books, by tattoo shops, horror movies, you know, things that New York curators 30 years later decided for you and I, what was high art and what was lower art. Joe had an innate ability to find a place in those flat piles for all of the different kinds of artists.
There was work on paper and it was limited in the flat files. But pretty soon this community built around those ideas and he watched artists come along and gradually improve their craft until they were ready for a one person show. And then he did something interesting, he opened it up to artists from all over the world. And you know, in Brooklyn, we all became part of that community you know, and we were welcomed into it and every time I walked into a Pierogi Institute it was like walking into a living room full of my friends.