Let’s face it: we’re all pressed for time. One way we economize on our use of that precious resource is acronyms, those handy abbreviations that use the first letters of a multi-word name or phrase. In everyday conversation, for example, when your car breaks down and you need a tow, you call AAA (pronounced triple A), not the American Automobile Association, and it’s NASA, not the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, that sends astronauts into space.
The art world is no exception, with nonprofit organizations, galleries, advisories, museums, and even individuals being known by acronyms that have become so much part of the way art worlders talk that we may not even think about it.
Here’s a list of many of the most important art world acronyms you need to know so that you stay in the loop and don’t get caught not knowing an art world abbreviation.
PPOW
This New York gallery based its name (which it styles as P·P·O·W, with dots, not periods) on the initials of the co-founders, Penny Pilkington and Wendy Olsoff (with the latter’s initials reversed, of course). In the East Village, other dealers were starting galleries with unconventional names like Gracie Mansion (winkingly named for the New York mayor’s residence), and Olsoff and Pilkington likewise wanted to stand out.