[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/01_Jane-Cohan-James-Cohan-and-David-Norr-courtesy-of-NORR-COHAN.-Photo-by-Jordan-Tiberio.jpg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
Editor\u2019s Note:<\/strong>\u00a0This story originally appeared in\u00a0On Balance,\u00a0<\/em>the ARTnews\u00a0newsletter about the art market and beyond.\u00a0Sign up here<\/em>\u00a0to receive it every Wednesday.<\/em><\/p>\n \n\tIn 2020, after over 20 years in business, James and Jane Cohan started thinking about the future of their gallery, and made a decision: they wanted it to have a future beyond them. This week, those plans come to fruition as James Cohan Gallery takes on a new identity as Norr Cohan, with gallery partner David Norr assuming sole ownership and leadership. Jane Cohan is retiring, while James will remain involved, though in a reduced capacity.<\/p>\n \n\t\u00a0\u201cWe\u2019ve created something,\u201d James Cohan told ARTnews<\/em> over Zoom. \u201cThere\u2019s a community there, and it\u2019s thriving. How do we maintain that and continue on? It was very freeing and really energizing [to make that decision]. It gave me an opportunity to do other projects that I probably wouldn\u2019t have done. And it gave David great latitude.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThe Cohans opened the gallery in 1999. James had spent 17 years working for two esteemed galleries\u2014Anthony D\u2019Offay, in London and Paula Cooper in New York\u2014before striking out on his own, with his wife as partner. Over the years, the gallery has cultivated long-lasting relationships with artists like Fred Tomaselli and Yinka Shonibare and taken on new ones like Tuan Andrew Nguyen. It also moved twice, from 57th Street to Chelsea, and then from Chelsea to Tribeca.<\/p>\n \n\tIn 2015, they hired David Norr, formerly a curator at the Wexner Center for the Arts and the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, to be senior director at the gallery. Cohan met Norr in the early 2000s, just after Norr received his MFA from the Tyler School of Art at Philadelphia\u2019s Temple University. The two connected over the importance they placed on museums. \u201cI grew up in the art world with this idea from Paula Cooper and from D\u2019Offay, that museums are super important, and are your key customers,\u201d Cohan said. \u201cThey are the feeders to the world.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tWhile Norr\u2019s institutional experience was an immediate boon to the gallery, his curatorial experience was another advantage. \u201cWhen you\u2019re a sole proprietor, and I say that with me and Jane as you know a single entity, it gets lonely. Having someone who\u2019s come from the curatorial world was really meaningful and has proven to be incredibly successful. It was one of the better decisions I\u2019ve made in my professional career.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tNorr told ARTnews<\/em> that the transition to a gallery felt organic. \u201cMy focus [at museums] was always thinking about artists first, and thinking about the perspective of the studio outward, and this transitioned into the gallery space,\u201d Norr explained. \u201cAt a gallery, you have the opportunity to think about an artist\u2019s career in decades. Jim is a remarkable strategist and actualizer of that purpose of the gallery.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tIn 2018, the Cohans made Norr a partner and, in 2020, they formalized the arrangement with a focus on the gallery\u2019s longevity. In 2021, Norr was made co-owner. The gallery now represents 40 artists; in an interview, Norr stressed its diversity: 20 men and 19 women artists. The goal, he said, is to protect those artists\u2019 legacies and maintain the gallery\u2019s core values, emphasizing community and long-term sustainability.<\/p>\n \n\tThe artists ARTnews<\/em> spoke with are fully on board with the shift. Yinka Shonibare has been with the gallery since 2004. He praised the work that Norr did with him on his project for the Nigerian Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2024; titled \u201cNigeria Imaginary,\u201d the exhibition was one of the highlights of that year\u2019s edition.<\/p>\n \n\t\u00a0\u201cI did a monumental piece [for the Venice Biennale] that was acquired by the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. David played a major role in that acquisition. I have full confidence in him,\u201d Shonibare said. \u201cThat\u2019s what I\u2019ve always liked about the gallery. The long-term planning. They have very strong relationships with institutions, and David does as well.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tTomaselli, who has been with the gallery for 25 years, shared that he knew Norr before he was hired. \u201cI first met David at a graphic art studio in Tampa, so we go way back. He\u2019s brought a lot of great energy into the gallery. If there\u2019s anybody who\u2019s going to transition the gallery, I can\u2019t think of a better person.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tNguyen joined the gallery as a member of the collective Propeller Group in 2016 before doing his first solo with the gallery in 2020. In an email, he described the Cohans as creators of \u201ca space that nurtures artists and their practices\u201d and said that Norr\u2019s strength lies in his ability to approach artists and their practices from the vantage points of an artist, a curator, and as a gallerist. That empathy, he continued, is why \u201cthis transition feels less like a change in direction and more like the continuation of a relationship built on understanding, generosity, and shared belief.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cWe have excellent artists,\u201d Norr said, \u201cand it\u2019s just been a wonderful exercise to think about growth and also to think about positionality, to think about the importance of the scale of our gallery, and to be precise about that, which is also part of our success.\u201d He said future plans include the renovation of both gallery spaces in New York.<\/p>\n \n\tCohan and Norr emphasized the importance, longevity, and growth of the entire staff. \u201cIt\u2019s super thrilling to the intern who became the front desk person, who became my assistant, who became a serious salesperson and artist liaison,\u201d said Cohan. \u201cThat is as gratifying as it gets.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cThere\u2019s a generative community around us,\u201d said Norr. \u201cAnd community is a very key part of what has made the gallery successful. It starts with artists, but it definitely continues with our team, who are a huge part of our success.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tEven as he looks to the future, Tomaselli said seeing the Cohans taking a step back has been \u201cbittersweet,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019re like family to me. I just feel really lucky to have them in my life.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/market\/james-cohan-gallery-norr-cohan-transition-1234792185\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/01_Jane-Cohan-James-Cohan-and-David-Norr-courtesy-of-NORR-COHAN.-Photo-by-Jordan-Tiberio.jpg?w=1024″] Editor\u2019s Note:\u00a0This story originally appeared in\u00a0On Balance,\u00a0the ARTnews\u00a0newsletter about the art market and beyond.\u00a0Sign up here\u00a0to receive it every Wednesday. In 2020, after over 20 years in business, James and Jane Cohan started thinking about the future of their gallery, and made a decision: they wanted it to have a future beyond […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-2046153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2046153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2046153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2046153\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2046153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2046153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2046153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}