Team
Catherine Levene
Co-Founder | CEO
Catherine Levene is the Co-Founder and CEO of Artspace. As a digital media innovator and entrepreneur with more than 15 years experience building successful online media companies, she is responsible for the joint vision of Artspace as well as the overall day-to-day management of the company. Most recently, Catherine held the position of COO and General Manager of DailyCandy, a leading daily e-mail and website targeted to women that focuses on the latest trends in fashion, food and culture.
Growing up in a family of art collectors and supporters, Catherine's passion for art started at a young age. Her grandmother sat on the board of the New York State Council on the Arts for over 14 years, and in 1974, founded SUNY Binghamton's MBA in the Arts program, one of the first of its kind in the country. In her early twenties, Catherine developed a strong desire to start her own art collection, but found it difficult to do so on a tight budget. Eventually she began purchasing limited edition pieces sold to benefit non-profit organizations. While slowly acquiring these and other original works, Catherine began to recognize the importance of making art available to a wider audience and encouraging collecting as a great way to support artists and benefit influential charities and cultural institutions. This was the foundation for her Artspace vision.
Prior to joining DailyCandy, Catherine was part of the executive team at start-up shopping search engine, TheFind.com, where she served as Senior Vice President of Product and General Manager of Content and Distribution. In addition, Catherine spent seven years at New York Times Digital (NYTD), building the online properties of the New York Times Company, including nytimes.com. Catherine currently advises early stage Internet companies in media and commerce, sits on the boards of TheFind.com and RenttheRunway.com and is an advisor to LearnVest.com.
Catherine received a BA in history from the University of Pennsylvania and, concurrently, a BS in economics from the Wharton School of Business in 1992. She earned her MBA from Harvard Business School in 1996.
Christopher E. Vroom
Co-Founder | Chairman | Executive Vice President, Artists and Institutions
Christopher Vroom, a well-known patron of the arts and an avid contemporary art collector, is the Co-Founder, Chairman and Executive Vice President of Artspace. Credited as the vision behind the business, Chris is responsible for initiating and managing relationships with artists and institutions that sell works on the Artspace platform. Chris grew up in New York City around the block from the prominent National Arts Club in Gramercy Park. He attended public school in the area and went on to receive his BA from The University of Chicago in 1987. After benefiting from a solid liberal arts education, Chris worked for nearly 20 years as a financial analyst specializing in consumer group and e-commerce equity research spaces, where he was a Managing Director and Global Group Head in the CSFB Technology Group.
While working as a research analyst, Chris became convinced of the vital role artists play in the foundation of creative culture; yet at the same time he was surprised to learn that there were few systems designed to help them succeed. In response to the elimination of NEA Artist Fellowships and after a year of research dedicated to identifying the greatest need, Chris founded Artadia: The Fund for Art and Dialogue, a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting artists directly through financial awards, public exposure and access to a national network of support. Since 1999, Artadia has provided nearly $3 million in total support to 250 artists living in San Francisco, Chicago, Houston, Boston, New York and Atlanta.
Through his non-profit activities, Chris recognized the challenges faced by artists and cultural institutions alike in reaching new audiences. At the same time, as a collector of art himself, he understood the difficulty in finding a broad selection of artworks based on personal preferences. Chris founded Artspace to address these challenges while simultaneously creating a powerful new distribution channel for artists, institutions and non-profits, in addition to offering collectors at all levels a curated selection of artworks from top contemporary artists.
Alex Chung
Vice President, Technology
Alex Chung is the Vice President of Technology for Artspace. A creative technology director and entrepreneur living in New York City, Alex has spent over 15 years building startups as well as designing future technologies for clients ranging from MTV, GE, Intel, Comcast, Sega, Nokia, and Vulcan Ventures to Bergdorf Goodman, Fendi, Neiman Marcus, and Kate Spade.
His past startups include investors such as YCombinator, Mitch Kapor as well as the CEOs of Delicious, Lala, Slide/Paypal, Yahoo, Yelp and others. He is also the creator and co-founder of The Fridge which led the popup social networking movement.
He has earned degrees in philosophy and computer engineering from UW, fine art from SFAI, and graphic design from Parsons the New School of Design. When not scheming or tinkering in his lab, he teaches MMA and Brazilian Jiujitsu and passes the time watching rom coms.
Samantha Saturn
Vice President, Marketing and Partnerships
With more than 15 years of digital marketing experience in e-commerce, media and entertainment, Samantha is a pioneer in digital consumer marketing.
Most recently, Samantha was the SVP of Digital Marketing at Columbia Records, a division of Sony Music Entertainment. In that role, she developed innovative digital marketing and direct-to-consumer business strategies for more than 100 recording artists including Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, John Mayer, Beyonce, MGMT and Adele. Her team was responsible for digital revenues and video programs with top-tier online music and entertainment portals including Facebook, YouTube, Google, iTunes, Amazon, AOL, Yahoo, MSN and MTV Networks. Prior to joining Sony, Samantha was the Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Vindigo, a leading mobile content and applications company in New York.
In 1999, Samantha founded Saturn Network, an online marketing and media-buying agency. Some of Saturn Network’s diverse clients over the years include Ecko Unlimited, Neiman Marcus, The New York Public Library, KOA Kampgrounds and Clear Channel Radio and Online. Prior to building Saturn Network, Samantha was the Director of Marketing at CDNOW, where she led the company's marketing efforts to establish it as one of the leading online music stores.
Samantha’s exposure to and passion for art started at a young age in Nashville, Tennessee, where she was born and raised. Samantha’s mother Nancy was the owner of The American Artisan Gallery for more than 40 years and Samantha grew up surrounded by artists. She loved learning about their work and helping out at the gallery where she worked first in sales, later as a buyer and more recently as a partner in the business. Today, Samantha is the Director of The American Artisan Festival, an annual contemporary handcrafts and fine arts festival of more than 165 artists held in Nashville, Tennessee every June, now in its 41st year. Through this curated retail event, Samantha also raises money for Gilda’s Club Nashville – demonstrating how artists and the community can come together to support an important cause. Samantha has a BA in East Asian Studies from the University of Michigan.
Adam Fields
Director of Artist and Institutional Development
As the Director of Artist and Institutional Development of Artspace, Adam’s role is to seek out and manage all of the great projects and relationships we have with our artists and partners, as well as overseeing the logistics.
Growing up in a family of contemporary art collectors, Adam has been in and around the arts from a young age. After learning to love and appreciate art, Adam noticed an age gap in the art world and became focused on ways that he could engage other young art enthusiasts, who shared his passion and thirst for knowledge but lacked an effective access point. Shortly after graduating college, Adam kick started junior events at various Chicago cultural institutions, including the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Art Institute and School of the Art Institute Chicago.
Prior to Artspace, Adam was the VP, Business Development of Art+Culture, an online portal for artistic knowledge and discovery, where he was instrumental in the development and formation of the site, as well as Art+Culture Editions, the precursor to Artspace.
Adam is also a founding member of the Artadia Junior Council – a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting artists directly through financial awards, public exposure and access to a national network of support – and a strong supporter of all things art and culture related.
Adam grew up in downtown Chicago, attending the Latin School of Chicago, and graduated with a BA in Political Science and International Business from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 2007.
Paul Laster
Blog Editor, A+
Paul Laster brings an impressive background in arts journalism and curation to his role as Editor-in-Chief of Artspace, where he is responsible for the site’s content and coverage. A former adjunct curator at MoMA PS1 in New York and the Founding Editor of Artkrush, a popular online newsletter with more than 50,000 subscribers, Paul is also a Contributing Editor at Flavorpill.com, ArtBahrain.org and ArtAsiaPacific magazine. Previously, Paul served as the Founding Editor of bkyn, an online journal of the arts, the first Art Editor of Flavorpill.com and the last Art Editor of Russell Simmons' OneWorld Magazine. Most recently, Laster has contributed articles to TheDailyBeast.com, Time Out New York, Art in America, Interview, New York Observer, Modern Painters, Tema Celeste, amNew York and Artnet.com.
Paul first became interested in art while traveling around Europe as a history student at the University of Houston in the 1970s. Moving to New York, he studied photography with Lisette Model and Conceptual Art with Ian Wilson, both at the New School. While working part-time in the Publications Department of the Museum of Modern Art, he started making art and soon was exhibiting in galleries and museums worldwide. Following a successful career as an artist, Laster returned to his interest in publishing at Tony Shafrazi Gallery, where he managed the production of exhibition catalogues – a pursuit that eventually led him to writing and editing, which he soon took on full-time. After paying his dues as a freelance writer and studying journalism at New York University, Paul quickly established himself as a championing voice in the international arts community.
Nessia Pope
Curatorial Advisor
Bringing 25 years of curatorial experience to the team, Curatorial Advisor Nessia Pope has organized major survey shows of Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Bruce Nauman, Keith Haring, Nan Goldin and Hiroshi Sugimoto, and has written the accompanying catalogue essays. Since 1990, the Brazilian-born New Yorker has produced more than 120 photography editions with an international mix of artists at affordable prices. A former curator and producer of the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival editions, Pope has also organized benefit art exhibitions for Housing Works, AIDS Community Research Initiative of America (ACRIA) and Don’t Bungle the Jungle!, an event co-founded by Madonna and Kenny Scharf to save the rainforest. Pope recently published a book in Brazil on the New York art world, titled Manhattan: Contemporary Art, and she is a contributing writer for several Brazilian publications, as well as Casa Vogue.
Elise Van Middelem
Curatorial Advisor - Europe
Elise Van Middelem is an Artspace Curatorial Advisor with a deep knowledge of the European art market. Over the past seven years, Elise has been the Europe Events Manager of Louis Vuitton, the premiere luxury goods company, where she’s overseen events in Europe, Russia, India and the Middle East.
Collecting and looking at great art has been a crucial element of her cultural education. Elise’s mother Griet has a contemporary art foundation, De 11 Lijnen, where one to two projects by groundbreaking artists are organized each year.
In 2008, Elise started her own independent art consultant company for luxury design houses and international companies. Her clients include Hotel Le Royal Monceau in Paris; Louis Vuitton in Munich, Dusseldorf, London, Brussels, Beirut and Dubai and Solidere in Beirut.
The search for essence and innovation in the approach to art has played a major role in her daily activities. Throughout her personal life and professional career, Elise has established a large and exclusive network of relationships with artists, curators, museum directors and collectors.
Caroline Huber
Content Producer
Caroline Huber is Artspace's Content Producer, responsible for the content—images, details, copy, links—on the website and part of the Editorial team. Caroline is a recent graduate of Wellesley College with a BA in Art History and an English minor. Caroline has always been passionate about reading and writing about contemporary culture and is thrilled to be starting her career in the artworld with Artspace.
Jennifer Ruocco
Intern
As Artspace's intern, Jenn is responsible for digital marketing and social media campaigns. After spending more than five years working in the travel industry in Boston, Jennifer recently switched gears in order to pursue her true passion: the arts. She is currently partaking in a dual Masters program at Pratt Institute, where she's studying History of Art and Library Science. Although Jennifer misses jet-setting, she is excited to see what art will come to her this year, whether it be by way of the NYC gallery scene or the emerging artists showcased on Artspace.