PortSide H2O Arts

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tanker Mary Whalen

4 the love of Red Hook

H2O Arts

PortSide will host art exhibits, readings, performances, movies etc. about, or inspired by, water and the waterfront. We like staging these in working waterfront locations. If you have an H2O Arts idea for us, to do on the Whalen or some other location, please email our Director of Programming John Weaver at weaver(at)portsidenewyork.org.

PortSide's Mary Whalen will soon move to GMD Shipyard in the historic Brooklyn Navy Yard! We are inaugurating our new home with a book launch where ships launch. This is the first cultural event ever at GMD Shipyard.

H2O Arts Event #2

Readings from The Graving Dock by Gabriel Cohen -11/27/07
A Multimedia Book Event - A Book Launch Where Ships Launch

We promised Literary Culture+Industrial Grit and we delivered it. This event at GMD Shipyard's Tailshaft+Valve Shop was a hit. "Best book event I ever attended," said one book publisher. The rain held, the fog lifted, and many attendees ogled and photographed the huge graving dock where welding work was underway on the tugboat exhaust stacks.

Once inside, folks chatted over hot cider, beer, wine and sandwiches while a slide show of images, overlaid with quotes from the novel, was projected on the shed wall. The hangar-sized space became intimate. A video of the churning waters of the Buttermilk Channel lit up the wall behind Gabriel Cohen while he read. BookCourt did a lively business selling books at the end. Thank you, GMD, for use of the space and for building that surprise podium for the author! and thanks to the Brooklyn Greenway Initiative for help at the event.

Sponsored by:

Press

The New Yorker "Above and Beyond" 12/3/07

Brooklyn Paper ‘Grave’ event 11/24/07

Gowanus Lounge Whalen moves to Navy Yard: Gabriel Cohen Kickoff Event 11/17/07

Newyorkology 'Graving Dock' launch party set for Brooklyn Navy Yard 11/15/07

Press Release about our move to GMD+this event

H2O Arts Event #1

We inaugurated this program September 2007 to rave reviews and sell out crowds with a performance of Puccini's opera Il Tabarro. This was performed by Vertical Player Repertory and staged on PortSide’s home, the tanker Mary Whalen, in Brooklyn’s Red Hook container port. Hosted by American Stevedoring.