BY DAVID FREEDLANDER
Originally Published on Newsday.com
Hundreds of butterfly wings made out of grapefruit skin hang above the entranceway to ABC No Rio, the famed art collective on the Lower East Side.
The wings, which have been there since the "Ides of March" exhibit in the spring, soon must come down - and the rest of the Rivington Street building with them. ABC No Rio announced last month that it is unable to salvage the 19th century building.
Instead, the group has embarked on an ambitious effort to raise $2 million to break ground on a new building at the same location.
"We originally thought we would only have to raise $100,000, but as time passes things have become more costly," said Steve Englander, the group's executive director. "We originally planned to do a renovation, but it became obvious it just makes more sense to do a reconstruction."
ABC No Rio's tenement-style building was constructed sometime between 1820 and 1860. The original two-story wood structure was expanded several times over the decades, creating the present sagging, warren-like building.
Architect Paul Castrucci, who is designing the new building, said he sees a certain virtue in the original building's decrepitude.
"I wish there was some substance of it left to keep, but I have to believe there is such a thing as progress," Castrucci said.
He envisions the new building as a series of less cramped, more intimate spaces, better suited to ABC No Rio's galleries, art classes and famous Saturday matinee all-ages punk-rock shows.