Mary Boone, the legendary New York art dealer, has returned to the gallery world with a new curatorial project titled 'Downtown/Uptown: New York in the Eighties' at Lévy Gorvy Dayan on the Upper East Side. The exhibition, co-curated with Brett Gorvy, features over 60 works by iconic artists of the 1980s including Jeff Koons, Barbara Kruger, Julian Schnabel, Cindy Sherman, Keith Haring, Richard Prince, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. It marks Boone's first major project in more than five years, following the closure of her namesake gallery and her 2019 tax-evasion conviction, for which she served 13 months in prison.
The exhibition matters because it represents both a personal and professional comeback for one of the most influential dealers in contemporary art history. Boone, now 73, helped define the New York art scene of the 1980s and 1990s, launching the careers of numerous major artists. Her return to curating, alongside her reflections on mentorship and gender in the art world, offers a rare look at the evolution of the art market and the enduring impact of a dealer who shaped a generation. The show also revisits a pivotal era that transformed downtown New York from gritty to glossy, making it a significant historical and cultural document.