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New York

Major art, jewelry exhibit evicted from Park Avenue Armory

Venue shifting to a focus on live performance

Park Avenue Armory
From left: The Park Avenue Armory at 643 Park Avenue on the Upper East Side (credit: Janine and Jim Eden/Flickr) and its interior (credit: Park Avenue Armory)

Five Years After The Park Avenue Armory began its massive $200 million renovation, its owners are shifting their plans to focus on live performance at the space, canceling a major craft show at the venue without offering alternative dates.

The New York Art, Antique & Jewelry Show, which paid $320,000 in rent for five days at the venue in November, was told it wouldn’t be invited back, the New York Post reported.

“They want to push all these shows out of the Park Avenue Armory,” the show’s owner, Scott Diament, told the Post. “The goal is only to have performances. It was a major shock to me.”

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The 84,000-square-foot Armory, at 643 Park Avenue on the Upper East Side, is also home to such events as the the Winter Antiques Show, the New York Antiquarian Book Fair and the International Fine Art & Antiques Show.

The venue, completed in the 1880s, received a $65 million gift from the Thompson Family Foundation this year to push forward its renovation plan, initiated in 2010.

The Armory is owned by a nonprofit conservancy which signed a 99-year lease with the state for the building’s site in 2006. In 2000, it was one of the World Monutment Fund’s “100 Most Endangered Historic Sites in the World.” [NYP] – Ariel Stulberg