A review, sorta, of an exhibit currently at Mana:

http://new-savanna.blogspot.com/2013/ ... at-mana-contemporary.html

For example, Mana Contemporary is running residency program in conjunction with the Eileen S. Kaminsky Family Foundation:

http://eskff.com/residency/

Selected artists get studio space at Mana for two or three months.

A friend and I visited there this morning. It's an impressive facility. You get the sense that the folks running it have a strong vision. It's not yet set up to receive visitors in quantity and on a routine basis. You show up at the gate, sign in, and someone comes down and guides you through the facility (our guide was very good ? Thanks, Amanda!). Meanwhile, business goes on, with art work being moved in and around storage facilities, which are in the building along with the more or less public galleries. This is going to be a VERY impressive facility when it's fully developed.

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What makes you say that?

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I don't think so, they are doing great on their own. Besides the places you mention are awful. They are destroying JC's art community what is left of it. IMO.

Wow, had heard the name but had no idea about the scale of the operation. They need to partner with some of the other arts orgs (Art House, 4th St. Arts, etc.) to garner more attention. Usually my ear starts ringing if someone does an opening in like a basement somewhere so for this to be out of my awareness is surprising.

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Yes, it's near India Square. I've been to a few of their openings. It's an incredible place! The space is enormous and you can spend a whole afternoon there without seeing everything. At a typical opening, they have had several different shows in their large galleries, but you can also watch dance rehearsals, visit artist studios, and listen to live music in the cafe.

In terms of the art, some of the art has been really high-level (although not all), including some big names (e.g., a Keith Haring show, pieces by Carsten Holler). The Middle Eastern Center for the Arts (MECA), which is part of Mana, has had intellectually interesting shows, too, including one by Israeli artists from five or six different religious backgrounds that explored Middle Eastern politics.

It's also really professionally done. They have complimentary wine in the main gallery, food for sale in the cafe, professional catalogs/newsletters, and a space for children (which was great when I brought my young nephews).

I plan to be a regular at their openings, and also to bring out-of-town guests there on Saturdays. It didn't used to be open on the weekends at all except for openings, so I'm excited that that's changing. Mana is a huge boon for JC.

It's a great art venue - gallery spaces and artist studios.
www.artmanafest.com

Also dance - http://www.armitagegonedance.org/

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Didn't this place have a well known exhibit a few years back. I remember seeing a bunch of people walking around there and reading about something happening around there.

Saw this article in the Times and was thoroughly surprised. Has anyone been here? What's it like? At first I thought they were talking about one of the warehouses in the PAD but it's up past India Square, right?

By ALLAN KOZINN
Published: May 16, 2013
New York Times

JERSEY CITY ? MANA Contemporary might be one of the art world?s best-kept secrets. From the outside, at the moment, it looks like what its shell actually is: a cluster of warehouse and factory buildings left over from a grimy industrial age, tucked into the heart of this city.

But if Eugene Lemay has his way ? and as both a businessman and an artist, he has a combination of financial backing and single-mindedness that makes it seem possible ? Mana will be an irresistible arts destination within a couple of years.

?It?s not a dream,? Mr. Lemay, Mana?s chief executive, said matter-of-factly. ?It?s going to happen.?

So far one building in the complex has been mostly rebuilt to house dozens of light, high-ceilinged artists? studios, as well as all the ancillary services an artist could want, including a supply shop and framing, packing, conservation, restoration and storage. There are also music rehearsal rooms, and a dance rehearsal space, shared by Karole Armitage?s and Shen Wei?s troupes, with a glass wall so visitors can watch dancers at work.

A boiler room also serves as an exhibition space, with an avant-garde sound installation, ?Tick Talk,? featuring an electronic score by Ziv Yonatan and visual pieces by Lily Rattok. New shows in four other galleries opened recently. A first-floor space has about 150 prints and 500 Polaroids by the Japanese photographer Nobuyoshi Araki; ?Obsession,? a group show drawn from the holdings of five collectors (and meant to illuminate the passions that drive them), take up two galleries on the first and sixth floors. And Mana?s Middle East Center for the Arts (yes, they call it Meca) is showing ?Voices From the Interior,? an exhibition of video art by Palestinian women living in Israel.

A gallery for Far Eastern art is under construction, as is a chamber music hall with high-tech recording facilities. (A deal to sell concerts from Mana on iTunes is already in place.) By September, Mr. Lemay said, Mana will have a foundry for sculptors, and much of the paved space between the buildings will be a sculpture garden. Beyond that, Mana?s plans call for a 1,400-seat theater, four restaurants, several more art exhibition spaces and studios for 250 artists, as well as studios for architects and interior designers.

Mr. Lemay is so sure that Mana will become a magnet for artists and art aficionados that he is planning to convert one of his buildings into a hotel, for people who went to spend several days exploring the center.

All this began with a moving truck in 1983, when Moishe Mana, a 25-year-old Israeli who, after dropping out of law school in Tel Aviv and working odd jobs in New York, acquired a van and advertised himself as a mover. He soon met Mr. Lemay, an Israeli artist and photographer with an unusual back story: born to a Lebanese Christian family in Grand Rapids, Mich., he moved to Israel in 1969 after his family converted to Judaism, and he fought in the Lebanon war of 1982. Mr. Mana hired Mr. Lemay to drive his van, and soon Mr. Lemay was his right-hand man.

The company, Moishe?s Moving and Storage, expanded quickly, opening branches across the country (it is now in nine cities, including Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco) and opening a handful of subsidiary storage businesses, including companies that specialize in storage for documents, video, wine, clothing (for the fashion industry) and art.

?With Moishe?s Moving,? Mr. Lemay said, ?we were a success overnight because at the time movers in New York were working from 9 to 5, and I promised 24-7. With document storage, we were the first to use a bar code system, so if you needed something, I could promise you delivery in two hours, when other companies promised two days.?

Mr. Lemay would not discuss the value of Mana Contemporary, which is privately held and is part of the Moishe?s empire, nor would he say how much the company is spending on the center, which includes a handful of nonprofit foundations but is mostly, as Mr. Lemay puts it, ?a business,? meant to turn a profit. His current reticence notwithstanding, he told The Wall Street Journal in 2011 that Mr. Mana?s company had put $4 million to $6 million into renovating the first 500,000 square feet. Today, the space is 1.5 million square feet on 35 acres, of which about 150,000 square feet are devoted to the foundations, including galleries and public areas. Mr. Lemay said that Mr. Mana had given him a completely free hand in running the center.

?This is the heart of Mana? Shai Baitel, Mana?s vice president for strategy, said of the nonprofit part of the business. ?And even the parts of the property that are for-profit, like the artist studios, are open to the public to come in and see ? to watch the artists at work, to get inspired and to learn.?

It was a chance encounter with the Israeli photo-realist painter Yigal Ozeri that led Mr. Lemay to build Mana. As Mr. Ozeri remembers it, his first conversation with Mr. Lemay was about creating a museum of graffiti. But they quickly saw that bigger things were possible. The art storage business was the key: some of Moishe?s clients were major collectors, so why not build a space where they could show their collections instead of keeping them crated? Several jumped at the chance.

?Of course they did,? Mr. Lemay said. ?Storage is a graveyard. If you have a collection of, say, 4,000 pieces, you want people to see them.?

From there, the idea mushroomed. In 2011 Mr. Lemay built studios for himself and Mr. Ozeri, and Mr. Ozeri used his contacts in the art world to attract other artists to the space. About 120 painters, sculptors and photographers now have studios at Mana. Mr. Baitel said that there would be 200 by the end of the year, and 250 by early 2014.

Having a show at Mana is a potential perquisite. Michael Zansky ? whose ?Giants and Dwarfs? show is in a 5,000-square-foot-gallery that will do double duty as a beer garden and includes nearly 200 4-foot-by-8-foot plywood panels ? said he was astonished by the space Mana provided him.

?These panels encompass the history of what I?m involved with,? Mr. Zansky said. ?Few institutions can handle something on this scale.?

For some artists, like Ray Smith, whose ?Here/Now? retrospective filled a large gallery on Mana?s sixth floor in March and April, Mana became a life raft after Hurricane Sandy. Mr. Lemay called to ask how Mr. Smith?s studio had fared. When Mr. Smith told him that the studio was flooded and that large pieces were floating in river water, Mr. Lemay had his moving and restoration crews snap into action.

?They picked up a collection of works I?d done over the last 28 years, and saved,? said Mr. Smith, who has been working mostly at Mana since the hurricane. ?And seeing everything cleaned up, put together and hanging was very emotional. It?s actually the best show I?ve ever had.?

Mr. Lemay installed a restaurant partly because he knew that the artists who worked at Mana needed to eat, but also because he believed that when artists meet, ideas are born.

?Artists usually go into their studios, and you don?t find them,? he said. ?But here we get them out of their rooms. They go to the restaurant, they meet each other and they talk, and they think about collaborating.?

In addition to viewing the galleries, visitors to Mana are free to roam the halls, watching artists, dancers and musicians at work. They need only present themselves at the front desk, Mondays through Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., and they will be shown around.

So far the traffic has been modest. Exhibition openings have been well attended, but the center as a whole has not had a grand opening. Mr. Baitel said that would probably happen at the end of this year, when the sculpture garden and other elements are completed.

But as Mr. Lemay sees it, wandering viewers are a crucial part of the equation. He has made it clear to the artists on site that visitors are likely to stop in and watch them at work, he said, and they were fine with that.

?Process is the key,? Mr. Lemay said, speaking in his own studio, which is dominated by a series of huge paintings made of fragments from condolence letters to Israeli and Arab parents who lost sons in war, for a show that opened in Tel Aviv in April. ?People walk into my studio and I show them what I?m working on. As an artist, I admit, sometimes that?s uncomfortable. But it?s also interesting. It?s what it?s about. Because what is art? Is it the final, polished product? That?s part of it. But it?s much more interesting to see the work take shape.?

IF YOU GO

WHERE 888 Newark Avenue, Jersey City; (201) 604-2702; manafinearts.com.

WHEN Open Monday to Saturday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

GETTING THERE From Manhattan, take the PATH train to Journal Square. Mana is a 10-minute walk from the station north along John F. Kennedy Boulevard, and west onto Newark Avenue.

WHERE TO EAT Cafe on the fourth floor.