Los Angeles’s artwork week in February is without doubt one of the busiest intervals on the worldwide artwork calendar, with galleries staging exhibitions, occasions and honest shows throughout town in an effort to maximise gross sales and visibility. This 12 months, The Gap was among the many extra outstanding members, displaying work by greater than a dozen artists, together with Dan Attoe and Monica Kim Garza, on the Felix Artwork Truthful, held on the Roosevelt Resort.
One other of the week’s hottest occasions was 99CENT, a pop-up exhibition co-organised by The Gap and Jeffrey Deitch. That includes works by Barry McGee, from his private assortment and by greater than 100 of his buddies and friends-of-friends, the undertaking remodeled a former greenback retailer on Wilshire Boulevard into a brief exhibition house, drawing sustained crowds all through the week.
The sprawling and chaotic pop-up exhibition 99CENT, co-organised by The Gap and Jeffrey Deitch, was one of many must-see exhibits of Los Angeles’s artwork week in February Picture by Jeff Vespa
The visibility generated by these short-term initiatives contrasted with The Gap’s long-term house in West Hollywood, which remained inactive throughout Los Angeles’s artwork week. It has now completely closed; its last exhibition, dedicated to the late Nicholas Hondrogen, got here down in September 2025.
As interviews with artists, former workers and the gallery’s founder illustrate, The Gap has suffered from a sample seen at many different galleries that expanded to bigger areas and extra cities as new patrons spent lavishly within the artwork market from 2021 to 2023. When these patrons disappeared, sellers who had banked on their continued patronage to develop had been all of the sudden left uncovered. Many galleries have shrunk or closed within the aftermath; within the case of The Gap, the fallout has resulted in late funds to artists and staff, unpaid hire and a shuttered Los Angeles location.
“I’ve been right here for 15 years and after two extra-successful years, gross sales had been down considerably beginning on the finish of 2023. For everybody in our zone, not only for us,” Kathy Grayson, the gallery’s founder, tells The Artwork Newspaper. “I’m recalibrating issues right here to concentrate on New York and getting the whole lot stabilised once more. The up can typically be as destabilising because the down.”
Fixture of the Downtown scene
Launched in 2010 by Grayson, a former director at Deitch Tasks, The Gap has established itself as a outstanding gallery recognized for internet hosting crowded openings, organising buzzy exhibitions and displaying a roster of rising and mid-career artists. Its massive Bowery house has been a cornerstone of the Decrease East Aspect gallery scene and, in 2021, it expanded to a second New York location within the ascendant Tribeca neighbourhood. In 2022, The Gap added a big West Hollywood house to its operations, becoming a member of a wave of New York galleries increasing to Los Angeles whereas sustaining a constant presence on the worldwide artwork honest circuit.
Courtroom information present that between July and September 2025, landlords for The Gap’s two Manhattan properties filed non-payment complaints in opposition to the gallery’s New York entities. The filings regarding the gallery’s Tribeca location declare greater than $120,000 in unpaid hire and actual property tax arrears. Courtroom filings from September 2024 and August 2025 allege that the gallery did not pay actual property taxes for a number of years: the 2024 submitting cites unpaid taxes for 2023 and 2024, whereas the 2025 petition provides alleged excellent taxes for 2025, indicating that the arrears had not been resolved on the time of the second submitting.
A separate submitting from September 2025 associated to the Bowery location alleges greater than $60,000 in unpaid hire and extra costs beneath a lease settlement that started in 2021 and runs by January 2031. In each instances, the gallery’s landlords had been in search of possession of the premises and financial judgments. Based on Grayson, the gallery is working to resolve each disputes. “We’re present with Bowery hire and paying off arrears for the Tribeca house, slowly however absolutely,” she says.
Artists and former workers who spoke to The Artwork Newspaper stated The Gap’s growth to Los Angeles, which occurred because the artwork market entered a interval of contraction, added substantial overhead, together with extra hire and working prices. A number of sources described the plan to open the Los Angeles house as rushed, with restricted infrastructure in place to assist the growth.
An Artnet Information article in September 2025 famous that the Los Angeles house had at one level been marketed as a sublease. Within the months that adopted, social media posts confirmed the gallery’s areas in each Los Angeles and New York getting used intermittently for occasions and model activations. Grayson says she tried to interrupt the gallery’s Los Angeles lease as early as 2024, however “we weren’t as fortunate there as different galleries who had been in a position to rapidly shut their LA house, sadly”.
A former employees member who joined The Gap as an intern in 2018 and took a salaried position in 2019 recalled a demanding, fast-paced surroundings marked by lengthy hours and excessive expectations in periods of progress. Based on that worker, the gallery didn’t seem like going through important monetary difficulties, with exhibitions persevering with to promote properly, together with throughout the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. The person labored on the Tribeca growth, assisted with exhibitions within the Hamptons and supported honest shows, together with at The Armory Present. Whereas operations had been typically loosely structured and workloads heavy, the previous staffer stated the gallery functioned successfully and issues of overdue funds had been uncommon.
Employees’ and artists’ experiences counsel cashflow and transparency turned recurring points at The Gap over the previous 4 years. One former worker who labored on the gallery in 2023 and 2024 characterised the Los Angeles operation as financially unstable, claiming that Grayson labored out of the house in its early months, overseeing openings and relationships, whereas one other senior determine was largely absent. The launch initially benefited from model activations and outdoors assist, however plans to ascertain a full-time native administration group didn’t materialise, leaving a small employees in place to run the California operation, the previous worker stated.
The Gap’s house on North LaBrea Avenue in West Hollywood previous to its opening in 2022 Courtesy of The Gap
Employees interviewed for this story stated they skilled delays in compensation all through this era. A number of people stated they had been required to comply with up repeatedly to obtain their wages, in some instances over the course of months. Information reviewed by The Artwork Newspaper present one freelance employee was owed practically $8,000, with invoices left excellent for prolonged stretches. In written exchanges, Grayson acknowledged the overdue steadiness and cited monetary constraints, stating that the gallery didn’t have enough funds and would resolve funds when potential. The quantity was finally paid in instalments, with the steadiness settled in January 2025.
Grayson says that in “2024 I attempted to take robust steps to cut back bills, that is after we first tried to get out of our LA lease”. She provides: “We stopped doing all artwork festivals apart from a pair core ones (we did Armory and Impartial solely in 2025). I lowered exhibition bills and we lowered our employees; minimize journey and hospitality to close zero, and so on.” (The gallery’s web site signifies it has dramatically lowered its honest participation, from 12 festivals in 2023 to, up to now, only one in 2026.)
Artists left ready
Artists displaying with The Gap described having equally drawn-out experiences receiving cost for works bought. Of the 5 artists who spoke to The Artwork Newspaper, two stated they had been finally paid in full, whereas the opposite three stay unpaid as of this writing. In every case, the artists stated their work had bought and that they had been required to pursue cost by repeated messages and calls. Some stated they had been solely compensated for gross sales of their work after threatening authorized motion in opposition to the gallery.
One artist who confirmed with The Gap supplied documentation spanning March 2024 to early 2025 regarding cost for a sale accomplished throughout that interval. Regardless of the artist’s repeated requests for readability, the matter remained unresolved for months. Greater than 9 months after the sale, Grayson proposed a 30-day cost timeline, referencing broader monetary setbacks in 2024. The artist finally acquired cost in late January 2025, practically ten months after submitting their preliminary bill.
One other artist who participated in a 2024 group exhibition at The Gap’s Bowery location stated they weren’t knowledgeable when their work bought and realized of the transaction months later by one other artist. The portray that bought had been priced at $13,000 beneath a typical consignment settlement, which stipulated {that a} low cost of as much as 15% may very well be provided with the artist’s consent. A gallery consultant later acknowledged that the work had been bought at a 35% low cost, with out the artist’s data or approval. When the artist raised issues about each the unauthorised low cost and the shortage of cost, they had been informed funds couldn’t be remitted at the moment regardless of the finished sale. Fee was issued greater than a 12 months later, in a number of instalments. The artist informed The Artwork Newspaper it was a course of “I had by no means skilled in my 20 years of displaying and promoting work”.
One other artist shared their expertise of collaborating in a bunch present at The Gap’s Tribeca house in 2024, with one in every of their works promoting. The artist’s consignment interval with the gallery was prolonged for a number of months following the present’s closure, throughout which period a gallery consultant indicated that the enterprise was experiencing monetary difficulties. To keep away from problems round return transport, the artist collected the remaining works personally. The artist says they’re nonetheless owed round $2,500 and described communication with the gallery as sluggish, noting that though a employees member responded positively in January 2026, they haven’t but acquired cost.
Grayson says that final 12 months “the enterprise was in restoration mode, squeaking by, paying off previous payments” and “now at the beginning of 2026 issues proceed to slowly enhance, nonetheless attempting to function as lean as potential”. She provides: “There’s a lot to do and enhance on, all of which is in progress.”
The monetary pressures going through industrial galleries like The Gap and even a lot bigger companies have grow to be more and more seen throughout the sector over the previous two years, with dozens of rising and established galleries saying abrupt closures or important retrenchments. In summer time 2025, Blum closed its operations, with employees reporting they got solely days’ discover. Final 12 months the New York galleries Tanya Bonakdar and Sean Kelly introduced they’d shut their Los Angeles outposts. Extra not too long ago, Stephen Friedman Gallery shuttered its New York and London areas and entered administration proceedings, and the London-based gallery Timothy Taylor shuttered its New York location. These developments mirror broader market pressures, together with rising overhead prices, shifting collector behaviour and the pressure of sustaining multi-location operations.
Based on the newest version of Artwork Basel and UBS’s Artwork Market Report, which analyses information from 2025, supplier exercise confirmed a modest restoration from the earlier 12 months, with gallery gross sales rising 2% to $34.8bn, though progress remained uneven throughout the sector. The biggest galleries returned to restricted growth, whereas mid-sized sellers noticed gross sales stagnate or decline amid rising working prices, and smaller galleries recorded stronger proportion positive factors, supported by leaner enterprise fashions. The report additionally factors to a shift in collector behaviour, significantly amongst high-net-worth people (HNWIs). Based mostly on a survey of three,100 respondents throughout ten markets, collectors allotted a median of 20% of their wealth to artwork in 2025, up from 15% in 2024.
Taken collectively, these dynamics level to a widening divergence between visibility and sustainability inside the gallery sector and the market at massive. On this context, the scenario at The Gap displays pressures confronted extra broadly within the commerce. Whereas festivals and pop-up initiatives proceed to supply crucial publicity and gross sales alternatives, the challenges of sustaining everlasting areas, significantly in cities like New York and Los Angeles with a few of the costliest industrial actual property markets on this planet, danger making a powder keg for the broader ecosystem.
