Vorderzimmer: What is it?

Vorderzimmer (“Foahduh-Tsimmuh”) means Front Room in German. At Vorderzimmer, artists and makers show their works in the warm setting of a private brownstone’s ground level, street-facing room in Bed-Stuy/Brooklyn. Our classic old moldings and wainscotings contain the scuffs and character of a modest house from 1892.

Quarterly salon-style shows can ONLY be viewed during the 3 hours of the opening, which is also the closing.

Vorderzimmer strives to introduce viewers to the many beautiful and interesting things that people everywhere create - be they learned artists with day jobs, or self-taught makers of some sort. Our world is alive with such people, and Vorderzimmer shows it, in the lived-in, loved room of a lived-in, loved house. However limited in time, space and turnout, Vorderzimmer gets creators, thinkers and appreciators together “over artwork” physically, not virtually. Intimacy is key. What does it mean to live with something that someone created, in the same quarters where one eats, sleeps, thinks, and receives only those people one wants there; where one retreats from the exterior world?

Vorderzimmer visitors enter under the stoop - the entrance historically reserved for servants and staff who kept the house going, but were supposed to remain unseen by house owners. These workers were the unsung makers of countless households.

Occasionally live music or readings take place in the Hinterzimmer (“Hintuh-Tsimmuh”: Back Room) during the opening.

Vorderzimmer showcases single artists who live locally. We do not take a percentage of sales initiated at our shows. Instead, we ask that artists donate 20% of such sales to Earthjustice, a not-for-profit law organization that defends the environment.

Beverages will be provided. (Rock-bottom donations suggested: Keep us going!)

VZ
280 Van Buren Street
Brooklyn, NY 11221

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