STORY Teams Up With Art.com To Present "ART"

NEW YORK, March 18, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- STORY, the ever-changing and award-winning retail concept, introduces ART, its ninth story.  Presented in partnership with Art.com, the world's largest online specialty retailer of high-quality wall art, it will run from now through Tuesday, April 16^th.  ART offers a unique retail experience and series of events featuring access to art, previously only available online. Further, select artwork from Art.com will be represented on custom-designed dresses from the first open source fashion label, Constrvct. STORY also brings Art to life through a tightly edited selection of additional merchandise - from artful jewelry by Avindy, Beth Macri and I. Roni Kappos to Rex Ray lacquer boxes and accessories from Poketo, design-driven wares that take art off the gallery walls and into people's lives. To create a true in-store experience, STORY has invited students from the Exhibition Design Intensive Program at Pratt to design the space.  Store images available through dropbox:  https://www.dropbox.com/sh/dxbiexdaaooxt3g/riW3uUkLuI

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20091208/ART-COMLOGO)

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20130318/LA78842LOGO)

"Through STORY, Art.com has created the opportunity for consumers to experience our products offline in a dynamic physical space," said Ivy Ross, CMO, Art.com. "Over the next four weeks, some of our most unique and exciting selections will come to life through technology, fashion and interactive exhibits and we couldn't be more excited to showcase them."

Art.com Exhibition Highlights include:

Inspiring Insiders: Experience art curated by Art.com's Inspiring Insiders, including designers The Novogratz, Jaime Derringer of Design-Milk.com, Art Production Fund, and Jason Oliver Nixon and John Loecke of Madcap Cottage.
Art Spaces: Explore art that represents your personality and style from Modern Man Cave to Warm & Witty to a special kids area featuring Wee Society.  
Meet the Artists: Revel in Art.com's new and exclusive artworks from contemporary artists, ranging from Evan Morris Cohen to Jennifer Sanchez.
Photos to Art: Learn how to print photos directly from your Instagram or camera roll and turn them into art with Art.com's innovative iPhone app, Photos to Art.
artCircles: Dive into a self-guided experience to navigate pieces of art through the artCircles iPad app, a top 10 lifestyle app in the iTunes store.

Unique Merchandise Assortment and Installations:

Make your iPhone Art with Quirky
Be a Quirky Crossover artist:  Jazz up your iPhone 5 in a snap with a case that gives you creative license. Mix, match and make yours pop with a menu of 13 unique colors, for the first time at retail and exclusively at STORY. 

Oscar Dotter Previews Arctic pop
We're lucky enough to share our stretch of Chelsea with the likes of our neighbor Oscar Dotter, the artist behind the Huh What studio. Now he's shared curated coolness from his upcoming "Nordic Pop" exhibition before it opens March 28 around the corner at Gallery 151.

Perch Interactive Artist table
Let your fingers do the painting with the latest interactive installation from Perch Interactive, the leading retail projection company; doodle or sketch in an instant and tweet for the world to see.

Tattly + Wee Society Collaboration
To bring art off the walls and onto your body, STORY debuts the Tattly Randomizer, a $ .25 vending machine where you don't know what tattoo you will get!  The Randomizer offers 3 designs produced by featured artists Wee Society and only available at STORY.

Events: 

Art Story becomes a complete experience with a series of events designed to encourage creative participation including:

April 4 – Juxtapoz + Wooster Collective:  Evan Pricco, Editor-in-Chief of Juxtapoz Magazine, and Marc + Sara Schiller, Co-Founders of Wooster Collective, riff on contemporary art.  6 – 8pm

April 9 – Little Fingers Draw: Robotics meet coloring with a return appearance and class from Makers Toolbox. Sips, snacks, and stuff for big kids too.  4 - 6pm 

April 10 – Get the Picture with Evan Morris Cohen:  Meet photographer Evan Morris Cohen, an old-school lensman who uses vintage cameras and film to capture images of NYC. Give your Instagram feed a vintage vibe with Art.com's Photos to Art mobile app. 6 – 8pm

April 16 – Masterpieces of Cake:  Join author and pastry chef at Blue Bottle Coffee, Caitlin Freeman, as she launches her latest masterpiece, Modern Art Desserts, a cookbook inspired by art.  6 – 9pm

LOCATION & DETAILS:
144 Tenth Avenue on the southeast corner at 19th Street
Phone:  (212) 242.4853
Dates: Tuesday, March 19 – Tuesday, April 16
Tuesday-Wednesday, Friday-Saturday: 11am – 7pm, Thursday: 11am – 8pm, Sunday: 11am - 6pm

ABOUT STORY:
STORY is disrupting the retail world with a convergent model known as retail media, pioneered in a 2000-square foot space in Manhattan's burgeoning 10th Ave. retail corridor. Editorial and ever-changing, STORY's curated concept shop takes the point of view of a magazine, changes like a gallery, and sells things like a store. Every four to eight weeks, "STORY" changes out all merchandise and interior design to reinvent the store around a different plot line. STORY follows the successful soft launch of Rachel Shechtman's widely lauded beta exhibit "A Startup Store" in December 2011 and since opening has presented nine full stories, highlighted by Project Pop Up NYC, part of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's Fashion 2020 initiative, Making Things, a do-it-yourself experience presented with GE Garages, and Home for the Holidays, an editorial gift-guide come to life. Shechtman was also included in the June 2012 issue of "Fast Company's 100 Most Creative People in Business" on behalf of STORY and its new, inventive retail model.

ABOUT ART.COM:
With more than 12 million customers in 120 countries worldwide, Art.com Inc. is the world's largest online specialty retailer of high-quality wall art. The company was founded in 1998 with one goal—to help people find the art they love so they can love their spaces more.  Art.com Inc. runs four sites in the USA—Art.com, AllPosters.com, ArtistRising.com and Zenfolio.com —and has a strong international presence with 25 local sites in Europe, Japan, Canada, Australia, Mexico, and South America.  The company offers custom framing and specialty printing, interactive visualization tools to help people find the perfect piece of art for their space and an app for iPad called artCircles, that lets users explore art from a hand-picked selection of curated collections. Art.com Inc. is a privately held company headquartered in Emeryville, CA, with other facilities in Ohio, North Carolina and the Netherlands.

SOURCE Art.com