Canal Street Research Association is a temporary center of operations for poetic research unit Shanzhai Lyric who repurpose the storefront as space for gathering ephemeral histories, mapping local lore, and tracing the flows and fissures of global capital. A microcosm of global trade routes, Canal Street has held allure for generations of artists to occupy this zone of exchange where high meets low, art meets commerce, and original meets copy. In the midst of the current retail apocalypse, Canal Street Research Association revisits projects both massive and minute that have transpired on the storied block, speculating new modes of inhabiting this complex interplay of hustles.

Visitors to the office are invited to consult the archive of shanzhai poetry-garments, peruse a growing collection of reference materials, enjoy a small collection of artworks in the office hamlet, and add their own stories and personal artifacts to the timeline that will become part of a living document of Canal Street accumulating throughout the space.

This project is organized by curators Constanza Valenzuela & Jack Radley with support from Wallplay, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and Foundation for Contemporary Arts.

Office designed in collaboration with common room.

TONIGHT NEED YORK, essay, Viscose Journal, 2020.