A multiform arts gallery, storefront, and office for an arts council in the Staten Island Ferry Terminal.

Of Possible was commissioned by the Staten Island arts council to provide organizational analysis, strategic consulting, and the renovation of their new 2,500 square foot program space in the Staten Island Ferry Terminal. Beyond the traditional scope of architectural services, Of Possible worked with the arts council to lobby local politicians for their support, secure funding from the NYC Economic Development Corporation, conceptualize and win major financial support from the Rockefeller Cultural Innovation Fund.

The success of these initiatives came from a simple observation and question. Our cities and towns contain civic architectures for public schools, libraries, museums, parks, and government services. Can a new form of civic space be created by re-imagining where arts council’s are located, what they look like, and how they operate in our cities? As artists, architects, and urbanists, defining and answering this question has been at the core of our work with Staten Island Arts.

Arts councils have incredible agency to program events throughout their boroughs, towns, and cities. They offer invaluable support for all types of local art and cultural production. Nevertheless, arts councils do not hold a prominent and permanent place in urban environments like other civic institutions.

Locating Staten Island Arts in the Staten Island Ferry Terminal increased the organization's audience, allowed art to become a daily experience for commuters, and provided a conduit to connect visitors to the borough. This is an alternative model for urbanism which puts cultural capital at the forefront of economic development. It is a hybrid effort of the NYC Department of Transportation, Economic Development Corporation, Borough President's Office, and local community organized by their arts council.

The architecture designed is one of removal. It reduces the mire of articulation that defines the terminal and creates a comfortable space for Staten Island Arts’ new gallery, office, and market. A multi-form gallery and event space is designed as a petri-dish for testing new programming. It is a white box gallery with walls like pocket-knives providing program amenities such as acoustic curtains, utilities, movable partitions, storage, bleachers, and offices behind them. Cracking open a wall of the event space or looking through the glass wall from the terminal concourse reveals Staten Island Arts’ protagonists to the world.

This project is an example of innovation and permanent art and cultural programming in an urban transit hub. Most excitingly, this is a prototype for arts councils in cities and towns across the country. It is an example for how these institutions can create a new form of civic space in our cities.