A gallery opening is the single most festive time in an exhibit’s run. Because the artwork is being shown publicly for the first time, artists, gallery owners and gallery directors are all likely to be there, excited to see and hear everyone’s reactions. Sometimes the bulk of that month’s sales happen in those first couple of hours. Free-flowing alcohol serves as a critical social lubricant.  Whether or not you’ve been to a gallery opening, you can experience several openings back-to-back on my Chelsea Gallery Openings Evening Tour on Thursday Sept. 4 at 6:00 PM.

New York’s galleries are typically open during the day, closing at 6:00 PM. But every 4 – 6 weeks each of New York’s 600 galleries premieres a new exhibit, and their receptions typically commence at 6:00 PM. As an extra inducement to attend, most galleries serve free wine and beer. In Chelsea’s 300 galleries, most openings happen on Thursday evenings, with the rest taking place Friday and Saturday nights. On a given Thursday during the gallery season, around 15 – 25 Chelsea galleries have openings, and on our tour you can be sure to attend the openings that we deem have the strongest advance buzz.

My gallery openings evening tours are VERY different from my Saturday afternoon “Best Exhibits” tours. Openings tours are more like party-hopping – fun and informal – while my “Best Exhibits” tours are more like class field trips – structured and informational. One reason for the difference is that, as the tour director and guide, I don’t get to see the art on an Openings tour until galleries open their doors after my tour begins. Indeed, anyone who enters the gallery before I do will get an earlier experience of the show. Therefore, all I can do is give my first impressions, as opposed to the in-depth analysis I offer on my “Best Exhibits” tours, for which I have the opportunity to spend lots of time in advance seeing the artwork and prepping for my group’s arrival. On an Openings tour I don’t even know whether the art will be good or not, and half the fun is witnessing some of the colossal failures, along with the occasional hits.

Another big difference is that lots more people pack the galleries during evening openings than they do during regular afternoon hours, because of the heightened buzz. Gallery openings are a huge social happening, so if you’re looking to meet people for dating or friendship – straight, gay, and everything in between — the opportunities will be endless.

I run a scheduled Gallery Openings tour just ONCE a year, and during the rest of the season our tours are more civilized, serious, and sane.

Rafael Risemberg, Ph.D.
Founder and Director
New York Gallery Tours