THE KITCHEN AND WESTBETH ARTISTS HOUSING TO PRESENT A WEEKEND OF PROGRAMMING AS PART OF WEST SIDE FEST 2024, JULY 12-14

Together, Both Institutions Will Host a Kick-Off Party (Friday, July 12) for the Second Annual Festival from The West Side Cultural Network, with Other Engagements from Both Organizations Unfolding Throughout the Following Two Days

The Kitchen will present a weekend of programming for The West Side Cultural Network’s second annual West Side Fest, which brings together museums, parks, performing arts centers, and cultural institutions to celebrate the cultural village along the western Manhattan waterfront. The festival, joining cultural hubs within a half-mile portion of historic Manhattan, offers free admission, special indoor and outdoor programming, crafts for kids and families, artmaking activities for all ages, and performances.

On Friday, July 12 (6-8pm), The Kitchen and Westbeth co-host a kick-off party for the festival, celebrating the shared histories of the two institutions whose current intersection is predated by five decades of overlapping history central to New York’s avant-garde, and has resulted in The Kitchen finding, in Westbeth, a kindred organization to call its temporary home. The event takes place at The Kitchen’s loft within Westbeth (163B Bank Street, 4th Floor Loft), where it will feature music, drinks, and a poster sale offering attendees the opportunity to take home vital emblems of The Kitchen’s storied and influential past.

On Saturday, July 13, from 11:30am to 1pm, The Kitchen hosts a free and open to the public Tai Chi Workshop, led by Kitchen artist Chuck Martin and Westbeth resident Mitch Moses. From 1-6 pm that day, The Kitchen’s poster sale continues at a table at Westbeth's Art & Craft & Vintage Market in the Westbeth Courtyard. (Westbeth’s market also takes place Sunday, July 14.)

Westbeth’s programming will include the Penny Jones & CO Puppets’ Peppi and the Pop-Up Dragon—a puppet show for children of all ages inside a giant Pop-Up book (Saturday, July 13 at 11am); self-guided open studio tours offering attendees glimpses into iconic artists’ live/work spaces (Saturday, July 13 and Sunday, July 14, 1-5pm); and a theater piece from You’re Never Too Old to Play (Saturday, July 13 at 7pm), an improvisational, story-telling acting-workshop for seniors at Westbeth Center for the Arts.

Amid transformative renovations to The Kitchen’s Chelsea home in a moment of momentous growth, the Kitchen’s participation in West Side Fest demonstrates its recommitment to its community, and its aims to expand its already-multigenerational audience. It also underscores the organization’s interconnectedness with various boundary-breaking arts institutions and movements that have emerged in lower Manhattan since its founding over 50 years ago. Since its temporary move to Westbeth Artists Housing, the organization has doubled down on its commitment to porousness, flexibility, and collaboration—taking a “without walls” approach to its institutional identity and programming and emphasizing its existence in dialogue with others that exemplify and uphold the framework of experimental creative practice and pedagogy.

The Kitchen is part of the West Side Cultural Network, which also includes the Center for Art, Research and Alliances, Chelsea Factory, Dia Chelsea, the High Line, Hill Art Foundation, Hudson River Park, The Joyce Theater, Little Island, The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center, New York City AIDS Memorial, Poster House, Print Center New York, Rubin Museum of Art, The Shed, Westbeth Artists Housing, West Village Rehearsal Co-Op, White Columns, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Schedule of Events Throughout the Weekend

Kick-off Celebration & Poster Sale Fri, July 12 6–8pm The Kitchen at Westbeth

Join The Kitchen in collaboration with Westbeth Artists Housing for a kick-off celebration party at Westbeth. The event celebrates the sharing of histories across two institutions— both founded in the early 1970s to nurture alternative artist communities. Hosted at The Kitchen's loft within Westbeth, the party features drinks, music, and an opportunity to view and purchase select posters from The Kitchen's 50+ year working archive of experimental art.

Tai Chi Workshop Sat, July 13 11:30am–1pm The Kitchen at Westbeth

Tai Chi community program led in collaboration by Kitchen artist Chuck Martin and Westbeth resident Mitch Moses. The 90-minute workshop sessions consist of Tai Chi Health preservation practices, along with principals and methods of cultivating internal power.

Chuck Martin has studied Tai Chi with William C.C. Chen, Ken van Sickle, and Jinny Du, to name a few, and has made the film Some Tai Chi, which can be viewed on his UMAXXI YouTube channel. Also a photographer and former professor of Comparative Literature, English, and African American Studies, he spends this fall as a Sheila Biddle Ford Foundation Fellow at the Hutchins Center for African & African American Research, Harvard University, at work on a book of photography and text, Optical Thinking.

Mitch Moses began his journey in the Martial Arts at the age of ten in Brooklyn, New York, when at his own request his father enrolled him into a local JiuJitsu school. After that initial exposure, at age 16, he then went on to study Southern Praying Mantis Kung Fu (in Chinatown, NYC) under Master Gin Fu Mark and Japanese Goju Karate under Sensei Harry Rosenstein throughout his high school years. It was in 1983 that Mitch first began his study of Tai Chi Chuan under William C.C. Chen. In 1998 he enrolled in the North Eastern School of Tai Chi under Eric Schnieder, and then in 2003 he began classes with Maggie Newman, all students of the late Yang Tai Chi Master Cheng Man Chang.

Poster Sale Sat, July 13 1–6pm Westbeth Courtyard

Stop by The Kitchen's table at Westbeth Artist Housing's Art & Craft & Vintage Market for an opportunity to view and purchase rare posters from The Kitchen's extensive 50+ year working archive of experimental art.

About The Kitchen Founded in 1971 as an artist-driven collective, The Kitchen today reaffirms and expands upon its originating vision as a dynamic cultural institution that centers artists, prioritizes people, and puts process first. Programming in a kunsthalle model that brings together live performances, exhibition-making, and public programming under one roof, The Kitchen empowers its audiences and communities to think creatively and radically about what it means to shape a multivalent and sustainable future in art. The Kitchen seeks to cultivate and hold space for wild thought, risky play, and innovative and experimental making, encouraging artists and cultural workers alike to defy boundaries and sending them into the world to remake art history and catalyze creative change.

Among the artists who have presented significant work at The Kitchen are Muhal Richard Abrams, Laurie Anderson, ANOHNI, Robert Ashley, Charles Atlas, Kevin Beasley, Beastie Boys, Gretchen Bender, Dara Birnbaum, Anthony Braxton, John Cage, Lucinda Childs, Julius Eastman, Philip Glass, Leslie Hewitt, Darius James, Joan Jonas, Bill T. Jones, Devin Kenny, Simone Leigh, Ralph Lemon, George Lewis, Robert Longo, Robert Mapplethorpe, Sarah Michelson, Tere O’Connor, Okwui Okpokwasili, Nam June Paik, Charlemagne Palestine, Sondra Perry, Vernon Reid, Arthur Russell, Cindy Sherman, Laurie Spiegel, Talking Heads, Greg Tate, Cecil Taylor, Urban Bush Women, Danh Vō, Lawrence Weiner, Anicka Yi, and many more.

Website: thekitchen.org Instagram: instagram.com/TheKitchen_NYC Facebook: facebook.com/TheKitchenNYC

Press Contact: Blake Zidell at Blake Zidell & Associates: blake@blakezidell.com or 917.572.2493