Blank Forms Quadruples Its Space in Move from Brooklyn to SoHo
Blank Forms, a Brooklyn nonprofit devoted to experimental music and art, is moving to Manhattan this autumn. The organisation has signed a lease for roughly 8,000 square feet on the sixth floor of 151 Lafayette Street in SoHo — quadruple the footprint of its current Brooklyn location, which has occupied a residential building since 2016. Artnet News
The new space will house artist archives, an expanded bookstore, a performance area fitted with Onken speakers, and a cafe. The building at 151 Lafayette already hosts other nonprofit galleries — Times and Carriage Trade — as well as Montez Free Radio, making the address a small hub for independent art in the neighbourhood.
Blank Forms was founded by Lawrence Kumpf, who told Artnet News the organisation "started out from nothing." Before launching Blank Forms, Kumpf spent a decade leading Issue Project Room, a Brooklyn performance centre founded by Suzanne Fiol in 2003. Under Kumpf's direction, Blank Forms has produced 65 books, staged more than 300 public programmes, and organised 20 exhibitions.
The move comes with a price tag. Kumpf signed the SoHo lease in May and launched a US$1 million capital campaign to fund the relocation. Of that total, $600,000 has already been raised, according to Artnet News. A capital campaign — a targeted fundraising drive for a specific project, as distinct from general operating funds — will need to close the remaining $400,000 gap as the organisation settles into its new home.
For a sense of scale, quadrupling a space is not a routine upgrade for a small nonprofit. Blank Forms has built its reputation on a particular niche: experimental music that sits at the edge of visual art and performance, with a publishing programme that documents artists who often fall outside commercial gallery circuits. More floor space means room for deeper archives, a proper bookstore, and a performance venue built for sound — not a converted living room.
The organisation has also been marked by loss. The artist Dean Roberts died unexpectedly in August 2024. Blank Forms published reflections by Charles Curtis and Alan Licht on their work with Roberts, according to the organisation's website. The move to SoHo will carry that legacy into a larger setting.
Blank Forms expects to open its doors at 151 Lafayette Street in autumn 2026.
