Robin Rice, owner of the eponymous art gallery at 234 Warren Street in Hudson, typically rouses before dawn. Her third floor bedroom affords a fine view of the Catskills but most mornings she only catches a glimpse of their shadowy silhouettes before coffee and emails. Recently, Rice took the time to do something rare: she stopped and pondered her majestic neighbors due west. She stood motionless at her bedroom window for nearly half an hour, watching the blue-grey light wash over the mountains like an ocean wave. She stood entranced and beguiled, as grateful as she was incredulous by the view she so often ignores, too busy to get on with her demanding day.
The subtle irony of Rice’s hushed morning meditation is that her aesthetic, the photography she’s made (Robin is also a fine art photographer) and curated as a beloved gallerist in the West Village and now in Hudson, has been that of a sublime and ephemeral nature. She’s long been drawn to the alluring, the quietly pulsating, the restrained but opulent. The artists whom she represents all seem to have one thing in common: they too seek out and capture moments that feel as mysterious as they do life-affirming. Exactly what Rice felt watching the sun rise over the Catskills.
Robin Rice moved to New York City in 1975 from the suburbs of Philadelphia. By the end of the decade, she was working as an in-demand professional photographer. Notably, she shot opening night at Studio 54 for Discoworld Magazine, images so stunning and historically relevant that they were included in a 2020 Studio 54-inspired retrospective at BAM (some of these images, including close-up dance floor shots of Andy Warhol and Grace Jones, are currently on display in the bathroom of Rice’s Warren St. gallery).
In 1990, Rice opened her first gallery space on 11th Street in the heart of the West Village. She nurtured the careers of photographers, painters and sculptors whose vision she felt simpatico with, exposing their work to buyers and collectors around the world. Her opening parties were straight up bashes, bringing together generations of art-loving, culturally-curious New Yorkers, a tradition Rice plans to continue in Hudson. She closed her city gallery in early 2024 to focus entirely on Warren Street. She says she wants the new gallery to feel less like a traditional exhibition space, more like a plush home, one that affords those who enter a moment to get lost in the transcendent power of both art and nature.
The opening reception for David Saxe’s exhibition, “IMHO” happens on Saturday, April 27th, 4-7pm at Robin Rice Gallery 234 Warren Street, Hudson, NY, 12534.
Brian Pearson is a writer and photographer based in Hudson, New York.
I’m an artist and I’d love to be on your mailing list to keep up to date of what’s happening in your gallery. WELCOME to Hudson!