Long Island City, say goodbye to Art-O-Mat

Yeah, the world happened. Nothing lasts forever, especially if it’s modest and generous.

I want the republican guy and the michigan hipster guy to be in a cage match sometime. With the $15 drink guy as referee.

Here’s a link to an article in the Astoria Times:
http://tinyurl.com/mqjsyk

And another about the last exhibition:
http://tinyurl.com/lwqcpx

The property owners have been enthusiastic supporters of Art-O-Mat as they are of several other community groups. Closing had to do more with the many hours and days needed to keep the place running and organize volunteers. The effort was purely for the community because the folks who ran it simply wanted to see something like this exist. Art-O-Mat was all volunteer.

Hopefully its brief 3-1/2 year existence might inspire others to do the same or better.

Couldn’t they just continue to run Art-O-Mat on the web instead?

9, there’s nothing wrong with faceless, impersonal sales if it helps keep the artists in business until another Art-O-Mat comes along.

#11, huh? Artomat did not close until Sunday. It was open and quite busy all weekend.

13, Not worth the blog space and is moot at this point and don’t want to doubt your sanity but I’m pretty certain the door was never locked on Friday. Anyway, sorry you were disappointed NYCNative.

Art-O-Mat was a truly wonderful venture that I feel truly enriched not only myself, but the area as a whole. Kenny and Diane did a tremendous job, I think there are a whole lot of us out here who don’t quite know how to thank them for their efforts!

If you were not closely involved with the organization, you should really know the disbanding was not an act of acrimony- the family donating the property was super generous and truly supportive of the AOM efforts. As a volunteer at the scene, I just wanted to speak up on everyone’s behalf and let the area know it was simply time. Running such a big impact community scene takes a hell of a lot of effort, and face it- you know Kenny and Diane will hardly take much time off before they get way involved with a whole new deal!

LIC rules. Our neighbourhood is one of the best on earth. And rock on Nancy- thanks for the blogspace scene—-
looking forward to what’s next

I loved this place. I stopped by whenever I could to say hi… I bought things… I sold things… I played at events.

I’ll miss the Art-o-mat. Big thanks Diane, Kenny, Kristy, Louise, Matt, and everyone else that helped out and was involved. Sad to see it go, but I understand…