Four long blocks west of the sprawling chain stores at New York City's Sixth Avenue and 21st Street lies a 700-square-foot literary outpost in a landmark brownstone deep in the Chelsea art district. A brightly colored banner, designed by seminal minimalist artist Sol Lewitt, flutters above the bookshop's façade: "192 Books" announces one side of the flag. "READ," commands the reverse.
Though this independent bookstore, so named for its address on 10th Avenue, is co-owned by trailblazing art dealer Paula Cooper and her husband, Jack Macrae, its primary focus isn't art titles. And gallery goers shouldn't look here for a copy of The Da Vinci Code—192 Books doesn't cater to popular tastes. Rather, its 3,600-book inventory is a very personal reflection of Cooper and Macrae's literary aesthetic. "They're our favorite books," Macrae told PW.
Certainly, 192 Books offers a rarefied atmosphere for browsing, with a selection handpicked by Macrae, former Dutton publisher and Henry Holt editor-in-chief who now edits the Holt imprint John Macrae, and Cooper, who opened the first SoHo gallery in 1968 and later helped pioneer the art scene in Chelsea in the mid- '90s. In addition to the draw of its titles—which range from art and architecture to children's, with an emphasis on biography, literature and narrative history—the bookstore also hosts a busy schedule of readings and devotes a full wall to exhibitions consigned by the Paula Cooper Gallery.
Since opening last May, while one New York indie after another shut its doors, 192 Books has stayed defiantly anti-commercial. The decline of the city's independent booksellers, was, in part, a motivating factor for the bookstore's opening, according to Cooper. Indeed, 192's manager, Julie Baranes, saw a message beyond the political in their very first exhibition, "Human Wrongs: Literature and Art of Protest," which highlighted books by authors from Tom Paine to Václav Havel and featured the work of artists including Claes Oldenburg and Hans Haacke. "It was sort of a way to say, we are surviving, and we want literature and history and all the titles we think matter to survive," said Baranes.
Carving a Niche
Now, nearing its one-year anniversary, 192 Books has begun to break even, according to Macrae, and to carve out a specific niche: world literature in translation. In keeping with their broader contrarian mission, the proprietors see a need in this category, where they didn't feel an imperative to focus on art titles. (Chelsea already boasts several other art bookstores, and 192's sales of art titles have been slow.) As a destination for new and classic world literature, the bookstore hopes to attract patrons beyond neighborhood residents and gallery goers. "Most publishers shy away from literature in translation, as do booksellers, leaving too small a selection," Macrae told PW. "But I think if you establish you can do something with such books, more and more people will come to this bookstore to get them."
The bookshelves, display table and reading schedule of 192 Books reflect its advocacy of a genre neglected in the United States. Baranes noted that she stocks all of the Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard's titles, for example, and pointed out the table of Latin American and Spanish literature, lined with volumes by authors ranging from turn-of-the century Brazilian novelist Machado De Assis to Spanish writer Javier Marias. Recently at 192 Books, Mexican author Ignacio Padilla read in Spanish from his book of short stories, Antipodes (FSG), along with his translator Alistair Reid, who read selections in English. In May, as host of further readings and panels, 192 Books will partner with PEN America for World in Translation Month.
"The bookstore definitely has a point of view," Cooper asserted. Beyond its evolving emphasis on high-quality international literature, 192 Books' mission is, of course, distinguished by exhibitions of eminent contemporary artists, many of whom are represented by the Paula Cooper Gallery. "My taste in literature is commensurate with my taste in art and my taste in how things should be presented. It's a matter of what feels right and is harmonious," she said.
After the "Human Wrongs" exhibit last year, the north wall of the bookstore displayed a 16×11—foot wall drawing conceived by Sol Lewitt specifically for the space. Later that fall, 192 Books showed photographs by Louise Lawler, taken during the installation and de-installation of a Paula Cooper Gallery exhibition of artists including Roy Lichtenstein and Diane Arbus. Other exhibits featured artists Andres Serrano, Dan Walsh and, most recently, the photographer Walker Evans. Measuring 6×8 feet, Evans's Main Street Block, Selma, Alabama, 1936, was one of 13 images he printed at this size for a 1971 Museum of Modern Art retrospective. 192's next exhibition, a series of artists' portraits taken in the late '70s by Annabelle D'Huart, begins in mid-April.
When an artist exhibits at 192 Books, he or she also provides a recommended reading list—from personal favorites to titles influential on his or her work—and a table display of these titles, along with art catalogues, complements the exhibit. This winter, Cooper cross-promoted a gallery exhibition of photographs by dancer and choreographer Arnie Zane with a display of titles at the bookstore—from Gertrude Stein's The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas to a Zen macrobiotic cookbook—suggested by Zane's partner, Bill T. Jones.
For the Walker Evans exhibit, with its image of Selma, Alabama, Baranes and the proprietors presented a selection of Southern literature, including works by William Faulkner, Erskine Caldwell and Eudora Welty. "We provide a context for the art, which is not something that galleries do," noted Baranes. 192 Books also makes explicit the cross-pollination of ideas between artists and writers, which is not something most bookstores do.
