Magda Sawon
File:Magda Sawon speaks to NYAP at Postmasters (14357647277).jpg
Magda Sawon is a contemporary art gallerist and art world figure who founded and owns New York's Postmasters Gallery (with her husband Tamas Banovich), a gallery for young and established contemporary artists, especially those working in new media, in the Tribeca neighborhood of New York City. The gallery is considered to be one of the "leading experimental galleries" in New York City.{{cite news|last=Viveros-Faune|first=Christian|title=How Uptown Money Kills Downtown Art|url=http://www.villagevoice.com/2013-02-06/art/uptown-money-kills-downtown-art/3/|accessdate=3 April 2014|newspaper=The Village Voice|date=February 6, 2013}}
Early career
Magdalena Sawon came to Manhattan from Poland in 1981, having studied art history with an emphasis in Japonism in Warsaw, earning a Master's degree.{{cite book|author=Ann Fensterstock|title=Art on the Block: Tracking the New York Art World from SoHo to the Bowery, Bushwick and Beyond|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0X83AAAAQBAJ&pg=PA271|date=17 September 2013|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|isbn=978-1-137-27849-4|pages=271–}} After a job in a shoe store, and emboldened by a class she took at the New School taught by Estelle Schwartz, she struck out with partner Tamas Banovich, opening an art gallery in the East Village on Avenue A between 4th and 5th Streets{{cite web|last=Lanfranco|first=Katerina|title=tArt roundtable discussion with Magda Sawon at Postmasters Gallery|url=http://tartblog.wordpress.com/2012/11/29/tart-roundtable-discussion-with-magda-sawon-postmasters-gallery/|accessdate=30 March 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140330221848/http://tartblog.wordpress.com/2012/11/29/tart-roundtable-discussion-with-magda-sawon-postmasters-gallery/|archive-date=30 March 2014|url-status=dead}} in December 1984.{{cite web|title=Postmasters Gallery|url=http://www.postmastersart.com/gallery_window.html|accessdate=30 March 2014}} The name of the gallery referenced being "post" the European masters, alludes to Postmodernism, and also points to an early interest in mail art and its distribution by the postal service.
In 1988, Sawon and Banovich moved Postmasters Gallery to a Soho loft space at Greene and Spring Streets.{{cite news|last=Smith|first=Roberta|title=ART VIEW; The Gallery Is the Message|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/04/arts/art-view-the-gallery-is-the-message.html|newspaper=The New York Times|date=October 4, 1992}} Later, the gallery was relocated to Chelsea (1998){{cite book|last=Friend|first=David|title=Watching the World Change: The Stories Behind the Images of 9/11|date=2011|publisher=Macmillan|isbn=9781429933155|page=251|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D3YQIY1ShFYC&q=%22Magda%20Sawon%22&pg=PA251}} and Tribeca in October 2013. Sawon lived in the East Village and Chelsea prior to her move to Soho.{{cite news|last=Wilson|first=Claire|title=Turning the High Line Into the High Life|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/18/realestate/18cover.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0|newspaper=The New York Times|date=December 18, 2005}} In 2002, Sawon sold a work from her gallery (by artists Jennifer and Kevin McCoy) to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which she described as a highlight of her career.{{cite web|last=Joseph-Hunter|first=Galen|title=Electronic Arts Intermix - Conversation with Magda Sawon|url=http://www.eai.org/resourceguide/collection/computer/interview_sawon.html|accessdate=30 March 2014}}
Other contributions
In addition to her directorial and curatorial activities at Postmasters Gallery, Sawon was elected to the board of Rhizome in 2002.{{cite web|title=Press:Rhizome.org Elects Magdalena Sawon to Board of Directors|url=http://rhizome.org/discuss/2409/|accessdate=30 March 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140330231847/http://rhizome.org/discuss/2409/|archive-date=30 March 2014|url-status=dead}} She also is a founding member of [http://www.seven-miami.com/ SEVEN] art fair, started in 2010.
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
- [http://www.crumbweb.org/getInterviewDetail.php?id=35&op=3 CRUMBS Interview with Magda Sawon and Tamas Banovich]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sawon, Magda}}