CONTACT: Jinny Khanduja, Director of Strategic Development [email protected] or 212.431.5795 STOREFRONT FOR ART AND ARCHITECTURE, IN COLLABORATION WITH THE NEW YORK COMEDY FESTIVAL, PRESENTS: JONAH FREEMAN AND JUSTIN LOWE PARANOIA MAN IN A RAT FINK ROOM NOVEMBER 2, 2016 - FEBRUARY 18, 2017 NEW YORK, NY - Storefront for Art and Architecture, in collaboration with the New York ​ Comedy Festival (NYCF), has commissioned Jonah Freeman and Justin Lowe to create Paranoia Man in a Rat Fink Room at Storefront's gallery space. The exhibition opened on ​ November 8, 2016, with special preview performances from November 2 - 6, 2016 during the NYCF. Paranoia Man in a Rat Fink Room continues after the festival with events and ​ ​ discussions brought together by Storefront through February 18, 2017. The exhibition follows a tradition of spatial experimentation at Storefront where the boundaries between architecture, art, and the subject are dissolved into one continuous environment. The installation is a historical pastiche of urban and architectural experiences linked through a mise-en-scène comprised of three architectural environments - a Canal Street style kiosk filled with the leftover DVDs and VHSs from Jungle Video (a now defunct media superstore in Los Angeles); a comedy club partially inspired by the original Rat Fink Room (the world's first dedicated stand-up comedy club, which opened in 1963); and a bathroom that has been converted into surveillance headquarters that will keep audio/video recordings of the last days of Storefront. ABOUT PARANOIA MAN IN A RAT FINK ROOM Storefront for Art and Architecture is closing its doors for good*. The real estate vultures have ​ ​ descended to feed on the malnourished carcass of its signature Kenmare Street space. Its replacement will most likely be a Juice Press supplement administered through fiber-optic eyeliner. The official announcement is that it will be something called SAN SAN. A flagship store ​ ​ for BAMA Cosmetic Pharmaceuticals, OCTOPUS Entheobotanical Data Networks and Fata ​ Morgana Entertainment Systems brought to you in a fancy new package designed by interior ​ starchitect Henri Erkins. "A multiplatform consumer experience where virtual and tactile ​ interaction merge in a new marketing sphere." A kind of combination Pizza Hut-Taco ​ Bell-Google Daydream for the Lower Manhattan demographic. But before the polish of recycled paper, space rock and smartphone flirtation brings the point-of-purchase orgasms, Jonah Freeman and Justin Lowe have arranged for an interim scenario. The overstock of Jungle Video, the now defunct media superstore you may remember from your ​ ​ drive to LAX via La Tijera Boulevard, is coming to Storefront for Art and Architecture for a fire sale of such gray market classics as Linguini is Not a Flower and Thank God For My Forties. A ​ ​ ​ ​ Canal Street-style kiosk of bootleg handbags and toxic perfume will stage a pop-up shop for all manner of DVD, VHS, Compact Disc, Louis Vuitton, Calvin Klein, Prada and perhaps a dime bag of heavily stepped on cocaine if you know the password. But this will only be the first stop on the path to the headlining act: a reprisal of the infamous Rat Fink Room. The Rat Fink Room, the first dedicated stand-up comedy club on planet earth, opened in September 1963 on 50th St. and 3rd Ave. in New York City. It's proprietors, Morris Levy and Jackie Kannon imagined an ad hoc gathering place where two-bit insult comics settled scores and "working blue" pushed the limits of good taste. Jackie Kannon, its ringmeister, was a mobbed-up sycophant comic, who felt pressured to buy himself a nose job in the hope of breaking out of the borscht belt. He was not even dimly aware of what might be at stake in the obscenity trials of the time, around such now classic works as Howl and Naked Lunch. For him, "working blue" was about the money. Morris "The Octopus" ​ ​ ​ Levy, the founder of Birdland and Roulette Records, was a mob connected music business executive who is mostly remembered as a crook who stole from recording artists, and was convicted of extortion and suspected of heroin distribution. Levy used the Rat Fink Room and his other venues as a place to surreptitiously record comedy acts and release records without the comics' permission. He gave them no portion of the proceeds and threatened bodily harm if they sued. In the spirit of this, Freeman and Lowe have converted the neighbor's bathroom (Staci age 12, addicted to synthetic marijuana) into a surveillance headquarters that will keep audio/video recordings of the last days of Storefront. It is true the New York City of the 20th century imagination is gone and never to return. But there will be a copy of New Jack City shot on a handycam in 1993 at Worldwide Cinemas on ​ ​ 50th St. and 8th Ave. available for purchase. *Storefront is figuratively "closing its doors" for the purposes of this exhibition. ​ ​ COMEDY PERFORMANCES & PUBLIC PROGRAMMING The installation opened in tandem with the 13th annual New York Comedy Festival, which took place November 1 - 6, 2016 at venues throughout New York City. As part of a special week-long preview, Caroline Hirsch, founder and owner of the New York Comedy Festival and Carolines on Broadway, curated comedic programming inside the installation, bringing to the space a functioning nightclub and entertainment venue complete with live stand-up performances and podcast recordings with more than 20 comedians. The public opening on Tuesday, November 8th coincided with the US presidential election. Live comedy performances were interspersed with the election coverage throughout the evening. Additional events are scheduled to take place within the installation throughout the course of the exhibition. To learn more about the schedule or the exhibition, please visit www.storefrontnews.org, or see #paranoiaman and @storefrontnyc on social media. ​ ​ Photos by Lars Niki/Getty Images for Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. ABOUT STOREFRONT FOR ART AND ARCHITECTURE Storefront for Art and Architecture advances innovative and critical ideas that contribute to the design of cities, territories, and public life. Storefront's exhibitions, events, competitions, publications, and projects provide alternative platforms for dialogue and collaboration across disciplinary, geographic, and ideological boundaries. Since its founding in 1982, Storefront has presented the work of over one thousand architects and artists. ABOUT THE NEW YORK COMEDY FESTIVAL Now in its thirteenth year, the New York Comedy Festival is produced by Carolines on Broadway in association with Comedy Central. The festival has featured the country's top comedians, including Aziz Ansari, Judd Apatow, Hannibal Buress, Bill Burr, Louis C.K., Margaret Cho, Billy Crystal, Larry David, Ricky Gervais, Kathy Griffin, Kevin Hart, John Leguizamo, Norm Macdonald, Bill Maher, Tig Notaro, Nick Offerman, Amy Schumer, Sarah Silverman, and Wanda Sykes, to name a few. In 2007, the festival launched the "Stand Up for Heroes" event to benefit The Bob Woodruff Foundation, which has featured performances by Ricky Gervais, John Mayer, Seth Meyers, John Oliver, Conan O'Brien, Ray Romano, Jerry Seinfeld, Bruce Springsteen, Jon Stewart, and Robin Williams, among others. To date, the "Stand Up for Heroes" events have raised over $33 million. For more information please visit the NYCF website, like the NYCF Facebook page, and follow the NYCF on Twitter, @NYComedyFest. This year the festival has a new hashtag - #MakeNYLaugh - for use in all of its social media platforms. ABOUT JONAH FREEMAN AND JUSTIN LOWE Jonah Freeman was born in 1975 in Santa Fe, NM and lives and works in New York City. He holds a degree in Film Production and Dramatic Writing from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Since 1998, he has been exhibiting film/video, photo and environmental installations in galleries and museums worldwide. His several interconnected bodies of work primarily focus on the phantasmagoria of the constructed world. Recent solo exhibitions include In The Kaleidoscope Room, Mitterrand + Sanz, Zurich, Switzerland (2009); The Long Goodbye, John Connelly Presents, New York, NY (2007); The Franklin Abraham, Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York, NY (2005); and In the Public Realm: Sixteen Scenarios, Public Art Fund, Brooklyn Public Library, Brooklyn, NY (2002). Freeman's solo films have screened in several film festivals including The International Film Festival Rotterdam, The Locarno International Film Festival and The Rome International Film Festival. His work has also been represented in the recent group shows: Paper Exhibition, Artists Space, New York, NY (2009); The Future As Disruption, The Kitchen, New York, NY (2008); Le Centre pour l'Image Contemporaine, Saint Gervais, Geneva, Switzerland (2008); Grow Your Own, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, France (2007); Busan Biennale 2006, Busan, South Korea (2006); Intouchable (l' Idea transparence), Centre National d'Art Contemporain - Villa Arson, Nice, France (2006); Day Labor, PS1/MOMA, New York, NY (2005); Vanishing Point, The Wexner Center for the Arts, Wexner, OH (2005). Justin Lowe was born in 1976 Dayton, Ohio. In 2004, he received his MFA from Columbia University. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles, California and New York City. Since 2003, he has been exhibiting large scale, immersive, site-specific installations in galleries and museums worldwide. Solo exhibitions include Hair of the Dog, Pepin Moore, Los Angeles, CA (2011); Werewolf Karaoke, Wadsworth Museum, Hartford, CT