ATOA Website Archive
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October 1998
Greetings from your Director:
Welcome to Part I of ATOA's 1998-99 season!
My first year as director of ATOA has been the most exhausting and rewarding time of my life, the exhaustion due to foot and leg surgery. But now all is well and I'm ready to jump in with, well, both feet.
We have a great season for you, beginning with a panel on women photographers, an area of art where women are making great achievements and receiving the recognition due them. Also, ATOA's Bill Rabinovitch will interview the Village Voice's Peter Schjeldahl, and you'll be in for an evening of wit and intelligence. In December we salute our beloved host, the Phoenix Gallery, with a 40th-anniversary panel on co-ops to celebrate their tenure as the oldest cooperative in town. And much, much more. Just look at the Calendar.
ATOA got three grants this year, one of which, from the Lily Auchincloss Foundation, will help enable us to expand a self-supporting business, that of marketing our treasure trove of video tapes to institutions such as universities and museums. All organizations such as ours have to find new ways of raising money, since our panels cost us more than we collect in gate fees.
And that's where you come in. All our good ideas come from our audience and passholders. Come to our monthly breakfast meetings and bring your ideas for panels, fundraising and our upcoming 25th-anniversary "Silver Benefit Auction" in 1999.
And please come visit (and contribute to) our web site here at www.nearbycafe.com.
Bear in mind that sometimes we have to change a panel or substitute a speaker at the last moment, for reasons beyond our control. Please call our office at 212-965-9515 to double-check our message for the latest updates.
Creatively yours,
Donna Marxer
Executive Director, Artists Talk On Art
ATOA board member Lelya Turcichen died of cancer this June. Although she was only in her early thirties, she had already served as the director of the now defunct Pindar Gallery in Soho and as director of the well-known WBAI Crafts Fair and fundraiser.
Lelya's involvement with ATOA began in the early '90s, with her organization of a panel on alternative galleries and venues, after which she was invited to serve on our board. During that time she also worked as a curatorial assistant on Vernita Nemec's "Art from Detritus" exhibit, a project sponsored by ATOA.
A graduate of Stuyvesant High and the University of Michigan, Lelya was working on her MFA thesis in Islamic art at Bard Center for Decorative Arts in New York City at the time of her death. Her quietly forceful and generous spirit will be missed by all who knew her.
-- Donna Marxer
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ATOA Website Archive
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