Skip to main content

Uprise Art: Making the Gallery World Manageable

Tze Chun graduated from Columbia University in 2006 with a background in art history. After school, she watched as friends and acquaintances from college entered the working world, obtaining high salaried, New York “dream jobs” in finance and law. Everything looked good from the outside, but there was a snag.

“A lot of my friends had these great jobs, lived in nice apartments and had this disposable income that they didn’t know how to use. They worked long hours and then came home to a bare, white box,” Chun explained. “One person I knew worked for a law firm that gave its employees a free membership to the MOMA, but she knew that she was never going to use it.”

That’s when Chun first had the idea for a service that would help hardworking professionals connect with New York’s abundant gallery world; as well as provide a general art education. After working in the non-profit art arena for five years, she observed a variety of galleries embracing a more online existence. So, in 2011 Uprise Art, the online gallery that allows art lovers or curious city dwellers to purchase pieces of art either outright or on a monthly installment plan, was born.

The majority of Chun’s clients choose to purchase their pieces on an installment plan. “That’s really how we’ve been able to expand our market and reach and connect with different types of professionals who have an interest in art, but just don’t know where to start at being an art collector,” Chun explained.

One of the most important services that Uprise Art offers is its free client consultation. Chun believes that it is important to give a “white glove, concierge” service to anyone that is interested in the gallery. Chun or another Uprise employee will go to a client’s home, look at the existing décor and help decide what kind of art would or would not work. The main purpose of this facet of the gallery is to help educate newcomers to art collecting as well as create an environment where no question is a bad question.

“It’s hard to just walk into a gallery and ask questions,” Chun said. “So we try to make art collecting, easier, more enjoyable and more affordable.”

Because the gallery is strictly online, Chun and Uprise Art are constantly partnering with different schools and business around the city to set up lessons in art collecting, studio visits and other parties and events in order to maintain a real world presence. “Basically, we’ll find plenty of excuses to party,” Chun joked.

However, what Chun stresses the most is educating and connecting people through art. So, whether you know what makes Jeff Koons great or don’t have a clue about cubism, give Uprise Art a holler and start rolling up those sports posters for posterity.

Matt Domino
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Matt Domino is a writer living in Brooklyn. His fiction has appeared in Slice and The Montreal Review, while his non-fiction…
Everything points to Apple TV+ making a change you’re not going to like
Is an ad-supported tier coming to Apple TV+?
The Apple TV Plus Logo

It turns out that TV worked pretty well under its old model. According to a new report from Business Insider, Apple TV+ may be the latest streaming service that's set to introduce an ad-supported tier and charge those who don't stream with ads a premium fee to access their great shows and movies.

At this point, the report is still speculation, but Apple has made several recent hires in the advertising space that seem to suggest the direction they're planning to take. The company recently hired former NBCUniversal ad executive Joseph Cady to serve as executive vice president of advanced advertising and partnerships, a move that comes following the company's hiring of another former NBCUniversal executive, Jason Frum, who joined Apple's video ad sales team.

Read more
From Gilda Radner to Ali Wong, these are the best female comedians of all time
These women from all generations will make you laugh out loud
Ai Wong comedian 2017 Moontower comedy festival

Hot take: I don’t care for straight male comedians. It’s not that they’re not funny, they’re just … I don’t know, boring? Maybe that’s reductive of me, but I never seem to leave a straight male comedian’s set feeling particularly inspired. And though some may argue that it’s not important for a set to "inspire" its audience, I’d actually argue that the opposite is true. For me, I want to see a comedian use humor to address real issues and say real things about the world, even if they do it in a completely goofy way.

Therefore, I tend to prefer female and female-identified comedians. They’re sharp, tough, and have often seen shit that makes their comedy feel raw and true. Undoubtedly there are male comedians who do this, too, but to a much lesser degree, in my very humble and very personal opinion.

Read more
12 classic sci-fi books everyone should read
If you love science fiction and reading, these classic sci-fi novels are a must
Man reading a book and drinking coffee

It may feel like we were recently living in a science-fiction dystopia life -- and in some ways, we were -- but that doesn't mean that we should simply avoid an entire genre of writing. Hardly. In fact, this is probably the perfect time to explore classic sci-fi books, to see what the masters have written, and maybe even see if someone predicted anything like this. Many, though, simply ignore sci-fi wholly and completely because of an association with robots, aliens, and the like.

Long story short, if you think you don't like sci-fi, you have never read great books from the genre. But indeed, many such books abound, including a number that has delighted generations of readers going back well over 150 years. In fact, one of the best things about so many sci-fi books is their very timelessness. As by definition, this type of fiction breaks away from the norms of the everyday world -- whether slightly twisting things or taking place on entire other worlds -- the stories often feel as fresh and relevant today as when they were published decades ago.

Read more