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Franklin Furnace and Martha Wilson: On a Mission to Make the World Safe for Avantgarde Art: an interview: Part I: Art and Real Estate
- Franklin Furnace and Martha WilsonOn a Mission to Make the World Safe for Avantgarde Art
Ed. note: Franklin Furnace celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2001. During that period, Toni Sant, who has served as the organization's resident researcher since 1999, had a series of conversations with founder and director Martha Wilson about the early days of the Furnace and the Tribeca neighborhood, its mission and programs, managing an artists' space in New York, the institutions legal and political battles, and the move from 112 Franklin Street to the web. These talks with Wilson run throughout this section, in four parts.1
Part I:
Art and Real Estate
Franklin Furnace gets its name from a place: 112 Franklin Street. From the very first day that you and I started planning the celebration of Franklin Furnace's first 25 years, we agreed to address not just that place but also the spatial dynamics that have determined the organization's modus operandi and aspects of the events presented by the Furnace. How did this decision to put so much emphasis on real estate come about?
At one point in the early 1990s, when I was looking at new homes for Franklin Furnace, I remember thinking to myself, I'm spending 80 percent of my time on the question of real estate! Franklin Furnace had a home that started out as a sanded patch of floor in front of the loft that was also my home, and then it expended into the belly of the loft, and then I moved into the mezzanine and just the kitchen in the back.
When you signed that lease back in 1975, what were you looking for in terms of space?
Honestly, I was looking for a place to live, as everybody in the building was looking for a place to live.
So the landlord had spaces he was letting out for people to live in?
No, no! It was a net lease of the entire building to a gaggle of artists: Willoughby Sharp, Duff Schweniger, Virginia Piersol, Patrick McEntee, Kurt Maneske, Martha Wilson, Haviland Wright. And we had an agreement between parties that Haviland and I shared the ground floor, Willoughby had the top floor, Virginia had third floor, and so on. [End Page 29]
Was the original concept that all five floors would be living quarters for artists?
Well, no. Not exactly. Willoughby's original concept was that it would be the Franklin Street Arts Center. Each floor would have an activity. I was on the ground floor and since there were already bookcases and I was interested in books I would obviously have a bookstore, and he would have a video theatre, somebody else would have film screening and editing services, I guess that was going to be Virginia, I'm not quite sure anymore. Anyway, nobody took it seriously at all; everybody bought hot-water heaters and moved in, including Willoughby! No, that's not true:Willoughby mounted some programs of what he called Live Injection Point in the basement. But his vision was of a building full of artists that would be creating public events and the whole building would be a place for public and community gathering.
Does this mean that Willoughby was the first live-art event organizer at 112 Franklin Street?
Yes. I would say so. Willoughby and Virginia Piersol, an artist whom I had seen perform at the Idea Warehouse, Alanna Heiss's space on Reade Street. Alanna Heiss was busy getting city-owned properties and turning them over for art-use all over the city through the Institute for Art and Urban Resources.2
What was the first thing you did when you moved in?
The first thing I did was buy a vacuum cleaner, the second thing I did was buy a hot-water heater, third I bought a stove; converting the space slowly.
Was the space officially recognized as a mixed-use building? I don't know what the laws were like at that time, but was it possible for you to be living in...
