‘Committedness and Tenacity’: Artists Space Director Jay Sanders on a New Era for Downtown New York

To enter the new home of Artists Space, a decades-old incubator for upstart art in downtown New York, you amble into an alleyway and step through a door beyond which there are four options for directions to go: up, down, left, or right. The effect can enthrall you, if you’re the type to thrill over architectural details, and it’s compounded by the fact that the doorway in the alley didn’t even exist before—and, in fact, required civic approval from the New York City Landm