Feature

Harvey's Next Wave

H.L.: Not even spending it, but making it. I get the feeling that money has more significance to kids in college now. People are seeing how much can be made in a stock market that does nothing but go up, and maybe that has taken over the mentality of young people today. Money becomes the big thing, rather than ideas or passion or involvement or ideology or whatever.

Any advice for people trying to produce avant-garde art?

H.L.: You have to understand what's going on. Not just in one particular slot but generally. When I was coming into the art market, I was very interested in poetry. But I also got involved in dance, and I got to know Merce Cunningham. Also in New York in the fifties you had de Kooning and Pollock and Gottlieb and Franz Kline. Rauschenberg was beginning, and so was Jasper Johns, and I was into that. It's important for people who are in this business to get a sense of where the momentum is.

Do you have any regrets?

H.L.: Well, I made lots of mistakes. It would take all day to go through them all. The one thing that I really stubbed my toe on was the attempt to make a repertory theater company. We tried twice. Again, it was an attempt to establish something New York didn't have. That was a terrible disappointment for me and also resulted in a terrific financial crisis for BAM. We recouped very quickly, but it was really scary for us.

What's next?

H.L.: I'm staying in Brooklyn -- not in this building, but I'll be heading up a local development corporation, the BAM LDC. We're looking to create a cultural district; we're talking to urban planners, architects, designers, graphic people, artists -- we should have a plan before the end of this year. We want the activity in the district to have a point of view similar to BAM in the sense that it has a unique character -- to configure the area around us in a way that supports and supplements what we do. We need restaurants here. We need life in the evening; a jazz club would be great, something like the Knitting Factory. And even how the streets are lit -- not just the amount of light but the way they're lit.

The neighborhood has already been changing.

H.L.: The largest concentration of young artists is in Brooklyn today. Housing prices have stabilized and gone up in Fort Greene, creating a very strong residential community. Mark Morris is establishing a base for his company a block away from here. I think it's a really good time for us to do this cultural district around BAM, and it's got a really good chance of success.

Your wife once said she shuddered to think what you'd do if you ever retired from BAM. Are you going to take a vacation?

H.L.: Usually, I travel in the summer. But this year, I'm going to spend some time at our place up along the Hudson and really try and reflect and find out who the hell I am.