This is another one of those New Kid on the Block posts where “new” has to be taken as relatively as possible. Art Projects International opened at 434 Greenwich in October, and I did notice at some point the discreet red sign, but whenever I walked by and figured I’d stop in, it was a Sunday or Monday.

In any event! Art Projects International was founded in Soho 1993 by Jung Lee Sanders, who has lived in Tribeca since 1996. She was born in Seoul, but also spent some of formative years in Hong Kong and the U.K.; when she moved to New York, she was surprised how closed the art world here was. “We were one of the first platforms for artists from Asia,” she says. “There was no other opportunity to be shown.” Over the years, API broadened its scope, representing artists from all over—Korea, Iran, China, Thailand, America, wherever.

"Navajo Route" by Myong Hi Kim (2004); courtesy Art Projects International (as is the photo at top)

The current show, up through February 25, is “Borrowed Landscape” by Myong Hi Kim—it’s her first solo show in the U.S. She spends half the year in Soho and the other half in South Korea, living in an old schoolhouse in a very remote area. The works are all oil pastels on chalkboards; the dark areas have no pigment on them. While API is fairly small, Sanders says that it may show any type of media—works on paper by Pouran Jinchi are next, and sculptures and installations aren’t out of the question.

Art Projects International is at 434 Greenwich (at Vestry), 212-343-2599; artprojects.com.

Recent New Kid on the Block/First Impressions articles:
• Annelore
• North End Grill
• Vintry Fine Wines
• Blue Smoke
• Damon Liss Design/Liss Real Estate Group
• French Kiss Boudoir Photography
• CrossFit 212
• Polarn O. Pyret
• Ristorante Aglio
• Kutsher’s Tribeca