Creating art can take some time, and the new art space Williamsburg Biannual hopes you, too, will take your time examining it. By offering artists an extended residency over multiple months, Williamsburg Biannual, located at 20 South 4th Street, hopes to showcase a wide breadth of an artist’s work — and offer visitors a longer period to drink in the work, perhaps more than once. Open to the public on Fridays and Saturdays, the organization has been in the works for over a dozen years. Now, it has emerged in a glistening new facility that, above all, and per the Board in an interview below, aims to be a “love letter to the city” and its dynamic artists. See below for their discussion and images of artist Brian Alfred’s current show, You Could Feel the Sky.
Greenpointers: Welcome to the north Brooklyn community! You launched in September; tell us a little about your origin story.
Williamsburg Biannual Board: The Williamsburg Biannual is a new artist space in Brooklyn. Our name is a playful reinterpretation of the international art biennials, such as those in Venice, São Paulo, and Gwangju. WB presents two exhibitions per year that allow exhibiting artists to show a comprehensive body of work for an extended period of time. The long exhibition period also encourages slow looking, so visitors may return and reconsider artworks.
The organization was founded in 2023 by five friends — Jorge A. Zapata, Divya Mahindra, Tom Morbitzer, Goil Amornvivat and Irene Mei Zhi Shum — who sensed a great urgency to support New York City’s creative community that was disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. The Williamsburg Biannual is our love letter to the city and the arts community that nurtured and sustained us. Â
How did you come to find this location on South 4th Street?
The building was acquired in 2011 with the intention to create an art center, a year before Two Trees acquired the Domino site, when the waterfront development plans were still undetermined. Our Board President and the architect of Williamsburg Biannual, Jorge Zapata, was drawn to the original 1920s two-story masonry warehouse. Design for WB’s home took three years, from 2012 to 2015. Construction started in 2015 and was substantially completed at the end of 2019, but the pandemic in 2020 put its further development on ice. We picked up again and received TCO for the galleries in 2024.

You are open Fridays and Saturdays for your inaugural show. Tell us about the show, You Could Feel the Sky.
Our inaugural exhibition You Could Feel the Sky is a mid-career survey of artwork by Brian Alfred, including paintings, drawings, collages, and animations. The show debuts several never-before-exhibited artworks. Brian was the ideal artist to launch the space because he is a Williamsburg resident, who is very active in the community, as the founder of the Triboro United Soccer Club and host of the long-running podcast Sound and Vision. His integrated approach to art and life aligns with WB’s mission and values. The exhibition is up until Friday, February 7. We hope you come see it before it closes!

For days when you are not open to the public, how is the space used? Are there any goals with it?
During the week, we welcome college and high school groups, and we were pleased to participate in OPEN HOUSE NEW YORK last October, welcoming over 200 guests. We continue to schedule free public events, such as the recent live recording of Sound and Vision Podcast when artist Dana Piazza was interviewed. As we build our capacity, we intend to increase our hours and have regular hours.
Although WB occupies the majority of the building, we share the premises with Jorge’s design firm, JAZ Architect, whose office is on the upper levels. There’s always activity somewhere within the building!
You’re registered as a non-profit, yes? How did that feel important to your mission?
The Williamsburg Biannual is a registered 501(c)3nonprofit. Education and accessibility is central to our mission. The Board individually cherishes and understands the transformative power of education. When we decided to establish the Biannual, we immediately reached out to the schools and universities. Our first and most active educational partner is the WIlliamsburg High School for Architecture and Design, a magnet school in the New York City Public Schools system. We have also worked with Barnard College, the women’s college of Columbia University, and Kenyon College to provide paid-internship opportunities. We hope to expand our network of educational partners.
What can folks look forward to next? Anything else to add? Thank you for your time!
We are very excited to host a special live performance by the new-music ensemble Counter)induction on April 4. It is a collective, and its members include several notable musicians and composers, including guitarist Daniel Lippel. The concert will be free and open to the public. We also plan to announce our spring exhibition shortly, so please stay tuned — all are welcome!
