TONIGHT AT LIKE THE SPICE GALLERY!!

June 26th 8 to 10 PM

As part of Northside Fesitval Saturday's a big day here at the gallery, as we host a full evening of music. Be here by 8pm, because we're welcome the team from Heat Retention Records and a three-band showcase of their very latest sounds. Heat Retention's 29th release is the Acid Soil LP by The Dan Peck Trio, a limited addition of 100 LP's with Screen Printed cover art and insert by Matt Minter (Wretched Worst/X Hair Police). In celebration of this release Heat Retention Records will be presenting an evening of live music at Like The Spice Gallery, in Williamsburg Brooklyn, in conjunction with L Magazine's Northside Festival. The evening will feature musicians which have had their work presented by the label. Joining the Dan Peck Trio will be Grasshopper and Drunk Decade (Michael Barker and Marc Zajack of Sharks with Wings). Come and enjoy a summer's night of music and fun.

One More Little Thing

Hey! Hey! Did you see? Good ol' Like the Spice got noticed by the The New York Observer! Not only are we "worth looking at", which is pretty cool, we also got the nod because of our regular Monthly Dinner Series events. Pretty darn cool, right? Thanks, NY Observer, for being so observant!

(PS, this is a great place to mention that, if you RSVP for Figure Ates right now, we'll tell everybody you signed up weeks ago, and it'll really make you look like you're ahead of the curve. But places are limited, and we've got a deadline! So do it right now! We'll see you Friday!)

Four Times Two, We Want To Feed YOU!

Have you already reserved your place for Friday night's Figure Ates? If not, now's the time. Like all our Monthly Dinner Events, this one is RSVP only, so save your place today!

Served family style in the gallery itself, each dinner has been better than the last, and since previous dinners have sold out, we think you'll want to get in early. Among the artists joining us will be the lovely Jenny Morgan, as well as the equally lovely Reuben Negron. They're both veterans of our fast-paced dinner scene, so you can expect a fantastic time. Come and meet them before they're too good to be seen with us!

Remember, Figure Ates is on Friday, June 25th at 8:00pm. RSVP now and get ready for a fantastic conversation with the artists behind Marked, as well as an absolutely delicious dinner. We want YOU to join us!

Like Appreciative Vuvuzelas, They Buzz About Our Glory

We're entering another week for our very latest show, Marked: A Show Of Figure, and we have to say, the press has been pretty darn kind. Take a gander at Brooklyn The Borough who put us under their "Art Buzz" category. And then there's Edmund X. White who took a special interest in Jenny Morgan's Inner Island, a piece that traveled with us to Chicago and is currently a part of this fantastic figure-based show.

Remember, we've got Inner Island, two more brand new Jenny Morgans, and a whole host of other works from artists such as Chino Amobi, Alison Bickle, Brendan Lott, Reuben Negron and Robin Williams, all waiting for you to come and enjoy. Marked will be running until August 8th, so make plans to join us this week!

But we're not done! We're not done yet! Because we've got some other artists that have been getting attention of late! Our pal Ross Racine has been making the rounds again, getting some kind words from local boy Chris Hamby, as well as Texas based We Are 1976. See how wide Ross's appeal can be? Keep an eye out, guys, and maybe we'll have something to say about Ross Racine this fall.

Someone else who deserves a little love is Dean Goelz. Thankfully, he's got some! Myturtleneck.com takes a very nice look at the depth of Dean's insanity skill with dot-making. We think you should take a look, and stay tuned, because we can't wait to see what Dean's going to be showing us next.

See? When we say our artists are cooler than our air conditioning, we're not kidding. Hope to see you soon!

Here Kapoor, Kapoor, Kapoor...Dove è il Kapoor?

Chanti part two, Art:

Luckily, I was with Sabine on my search for contemporary art in Italy. As an avid collector and a contemporary art lover, Sabine does not mess around when it comes to interesting contemporary art. As a women who is very often interested in work that some might find challenging, she has a keen eye for a good artist and has little patience for the average “tuscan landscape” (which is just one of the many things I love about her btw). So upon her suggestion, we specifically went to San Gimignano to visit Galleria Continua.

As we walked towards the town I found a very interesting street map simply titled Art in the city (Arte in Citta). What's that in the very top right hand side of the map? Anish Kapoor you say? Yes please. Here began the hunt.

The first stop was Galleria Continua:

More akin in size to a museum, Galleria Continua sits on a cliff like corner of San Gimignano. Galleria Continua boasts more then 16 rooms, plus one really cool smaller tomb–like gallery in another building “down the block”.

Galleria Continua is stunning. A piece of art in itself. I found a great many of their pieces to be interesting and smart, especially in their “Basement Gallery”. I would say I'm a fan of all the work I saw there, but I most want to focus on the stunning exhibition of Hans Op De Beeck.

Beck's “Still Life” is made up of three table-like pieces topped with post-modernesqe Marquette style sculptural renderings of the objects which interject into many of our modern day lives.

The tabletops are coated with a 1984/Big Brother shade of grey, drawing attention to the still life like qualities of the objects. Academic qualities of shade, line, depth and perspective are all taken into account. The tables act as stages, with each small sculpture playing the multiple roles of art historian, context curator, and director. My short summary? I love them and I want one in my living room.

There's also one stunning video work titled “Staging Silence”, a comical black-and-white film noir style video that points out the trickery, the brilliance, and the poetry found in the mundane. It's fit for those who appreciate a good visual pun or magic trick and I wish I could have an edition of my own.

In the film, Op De Beeck shows the beauty of silence, using a loud form of slapstick to make light of the similarity between public and private banal moments. I could have watched it over and over (and if I was not being considerate of my friends I probably would have).

From there, one of the lovely assistants from Galleria Continua led us to their installation space, just down the block from the main gallery in a gorgeous old building. This space houses a large-scale work by Chinese artist Chen Zhen.

Courtesy of Galleria Continua

There are many things that can be said about this piece; on first glance it is quite simply beautiful to see all those objects covered in terracotta. Unfortunately, when thinking about it critically, I became stuck. ”Purification Room” comes off as a visual one liner (and as many of you know, I ♥ a good one liner) but with a piece as large as this with so many loaded objects, pouring mud over shit just doesn't do it for me. It's pretty though, pretty in the Serrano kind of way.

Now began our search for the Kapoor, around corners, through churches, down cobble stone streets. Dove è il Kapoor? People looked at us as if we had two heads. But at last, a “Gallery”! Showcasing more of Sabine's “favorite” type of paintings! We asked the owner, “do you know where the sculpture is by artist Anish Kapoor”. NON! Ok, not the friendliest man, but still. We continue on...

...then. right past the gallery, we found a little walkway. We made our way down the windy road up to a private residence at the very edge of San Gimignano. Still no Kapoor! But out of the corner of my eye, stuffed behind a tree, I spot a interesting looking gate. Beyond that gate, down the stair, wedged into a tomb... THE KAPOOR!

“Underground” is literally that underground, and I love it. It was totally worth the search. Check out the panorama shot.

Seeing a Kapoor installed in someone's home is pretty fantastic. As we walk back towards the town to leave Sabine tells the man the Kapoor is right past the gallery, why does he not know about it? “That, that is not art, that is shit.” Well, it seems he feels the same way about the Kapoor as Sabine feels about his tuscan landscapes.

More to come!

Marked: A Show of Figure Gallery Opening

Greetings All! My name is Slater, a senior at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the newest addition (intern/crew person/photographer/garbage collector) to the Like the Spice Gallery team. I am in New York for the summer interning my heart out and it has started off with quite the bang. Seeing Manhattan, Times Square and the streets of Chelsea with 21 year old eyes makes everything look so much different and exciting! One of the highlighting moments so far has been the opening for Marked: A Show of Figure on Friday June 11th, at Like the Spice Gallery, for which I got the opportunity to be photographer of the evening.

The night began with a boom as faithfuls of Like the Spice gallery space poured in, ready to mingle and receive the work presented. With each arrival I grew more and more nervous, this being my first time on the "other side" of the gallery experience. As each guest arrived the energy accumulated and was very quickly streaming from the front doors and down the block, attracting not only the artist community but residents and families from the surrounding neighborhood of Williamsburg, Brooklyn. With the help and comforting words of Olivia and Roxanne( a fellow intern), my nerves calmed and I began to feel right at home.



The reception was amazing and if you weren't here, you probably wish that you were. As Gallery-goers surrounded the pieces from LTS artists Jenny Morgan and Reuben Negron comments such as, "Remarkable technique" and "beautiful composition" were heard over and over again.



Of course, the crowd was just as taken by the work of Robin Williams, Alison Bickle, Brendon Lott, and Chino Amobi, and all the pieces were getting their share of attention. If you'd like to see them now, head to the special online preview page, but naturally, they're much better in person and definitely worth the visit.



The gallery buzzed from wall to wall as the featured artists were greeted with handshake after handshake. As the night went on, the line between viewer and the viewed blurred, as the pieces and the crowd interacted, coming to dance and breathe with each other as one. Intimacy, narrative, exaggeration and emotions all resonated, fueling an energy that only an opening night at Like the Spice Gallery can provide. It was a great way for me to be introduced to the more structured side of the Art world and all the work that goes into installing, hanging and uninstalling a lot of work simultaneously.

At the end of the night the LTS crew packed up another successful opening. From the perspective of this "Fairly new to the Gallery Scene" artist, I am definitely looking forward to many more to come!



Remember, Marked is open right now, and we can't wait to see you. We also can't wait to have you join us for our latest Monthly Dinner Series event, Figure Ates, on June 25th. Places are limited, so please, RSVP today!

An American vegetarian fights the good fight against alcoholism in Tuscany and Chianti but loses... gracefully.

Chanti part one, food:

(Funny sign outside of Antica Macelleria Cecchini )
I was warned on the road to Lucca from the airport that I would be visiting a famous butcher of the Chianti region the following morning. Being the self-loathing vegetarian that I am, I kept quiet for the moment while nervously trying to muster up the words, non mangio carne.

(Sabine, Henning, Marianne, Elke, and Heinrich entering Antica Macelleria Cecchini )
OMG! Saying I don't eat meat in Williamsburg with the plethora of BBQ places that surround and taunt me with their hot hipster chefs and their fantastic whiskys is bad enough, but having to remind Sabine, a gloriously kind host and a bonified foodie, that I don't eata the meata is no fun at all.

(Butcher Dario Cecchini, has been a butcher for 35 years and is the owner of Antica Macelleria)
Her response: It's not meat! It's the “sushi“ of the Chianti region. But how will I tell her that I don't eat fish either???
After driving past the vineyard of my favorite red wine, Castello di Gabbiano's and taking in the beauty, we parked at the base of Panzano, a charming little village in Chianti. Inside Antica Macelleria Cecchini, where butcher DARIO CECCHINI (pictured above) does his infamous butchering, we were promptly greeted by Kate! Kate's a feisty Southern California native who has been in Italy for over 20 years now, so it was great to see her.


She came with a carafe in hand and served us a local house red. She then passed us home made bread drizzled with locally grown and pressed olive oil that had been sprinkled with their special salts and herb mix (which I promptly purchased for myself). Yum!
We toured the shop littered with cooking books, butcher related paraphernalia, meat inspired art... oh, and carne.



Right pass the designer meat locker was a secret staircase which lead up to the restaurant where a pudgy and boisterous waiter stood excitedly waiting to feed us his beef. NON MANGA CARNE ? “Ok, ok, ok for you my love, anything ” he shouts. He brought me a full plate of veggies, potatoes, Insalata Mista, and some phenomenal cheeses with homemade ketchup and other mysterious, scrumptious sauces.

We ate a feast, even poor me, the veggie. With a tragically beautiful view of Chianti just beyond the deck we toasted to Chianti with some Chiante.

I took a short walk around the town and after seeing many watercolors and oil paintings of Chianti we were onto San Gimignano where the scavenger hunt for contemporary art in Italy began.