AES provides strategic advice to artists and estates on the stewardship of their legacy through a creative integration of essential tools including inventory and database management, archival research, social media and web-based connectivity alongside good old-fashioned communication to seek new avenues of interest and promotion. AES has proven, over three decades of experience, that it is uniquely able to pair scholarly research with market success.
Photo © RossCollab
Jason Andrew
FOUNDING PARTNER
JASON ANDREW (Founding Partner) is an independent scholar, curator, and producer. Specializing in the field of Post War American Art, Mr. Andrew has over two decades of experience servicing the studios of artists and the estates of artists in the management, cataloguing, and promotion of their art and the stewardship of their legacies. Beginning with the management of the Estate of the Abstract Expressionist Jack Tworkov, Andrew has built a consultancy agency that recognizes the importance of promotion and preservation in an ever-changing artworld landscape dominated by taste and tastemakers.
Guarding against special interests in any particular style or genre, his curatorial projects bridge gaps left in art history and reflect the creative imagination through paintings, poetry, and performance. Curatorial projects have included historic retrospectives of the work of Jack Tworkov (1900-1982), Elizabeth Murray (1940-2007), Edith Schloss (1919-2011), and Gerald van de Wiele (b.1932) among others. These and others have been critically reviewed by Artforum, Art in America, Art News, Hyperallergic and The New York Times to name a few.
A prominent figure in the Brooklyn art scene since for over two decades, Mr. Andrew was featured in Brooklyn Magazine’s Top 100 Most Influential People in Brooklyn Culture (2014). His curatorial projects got him voted “Best Exhibitionist” by the Village Voice (2011), and his promotion of the cross disciplinary arts got him listed in L Magazine’s Who Made the New Brooklyn (2011). Mr. Andrew is a patron of young artists and consultant to collectors. He frequently lectures on the creative imagination and its relationship to collaboration within the various disciplines of art.
In 2004, Mr. Andrew along with choreographer Julia K. Gleich co-founded Norte Maar, a non-profit with a mission to encourage, promote and present collaborative projects in the arts.
Mr. Andrew currently lives in Cypress Hills, Brooklyn.
Photo © Travis Magee
JULIA K. GLEICH
FOUNDING PARTNER
JULIA K GLEICH (Founding Partner) is a choreographer, teacher, scholar and mathematics aficionado with an MA from the Bolz Center for Arts Administration at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. In 2004, Ms. Gleich, in partnership with Jason Andrew, founded Norte Maar for Collaborative Projects in the Arts with a mission to renew and refresh the exchange within the interdisciplinary arts. Following on from this success, she has joined forces with Jason to become a partner in Artist Estate Studio, LLC.
Ms. Gleich, who also has an MFA from the University of Utah, is the founder and Artistic Director of Gleich Dances which has received critical notice in The New York Times, DanceInforma, DanceInsider, Village Voice, The New Criterion, The Brooklyn Rail, among others.
In addition to her choreographic work, Ms. Gleich’s practiced-based research been published in The Oxford Handbook of Contemporary Ballet (Oxford University Press), (Re:)Claiming Ballet (Intellect Books), DanceUK, The Dynamic Body in Space (Dancebooks, Ltd), and Ballet Review to name a few.
Specializing in facilitating collaborations in dance and art/design, Ms. Gleich has held positions as Head of Choreography at London Studio Centre and faculty member at Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, and led dance and art collaborations at Central St. Martin’s College of Art and Design. She was given the Distinguished Alumna Award from the University of Utah College of Fine Arts in 2014.
As an Administrator/Arts Manager, Julia has worked for the Wisconsin Arts Board, Roberson Ballet Theater, and PAMAR: Celebrating the Cultures of the Americas. Her first entry-level post was at Schott-Zwiesel Glass, Inc. in 1984 where she was hired to archive and reorganize files, which ultimately led to taking orders and managing computer systems.
Greg Wall
ASSOCIATE
GREG WALL (Associate) joined the AES team in 2022. He completed his MFA at Hunter College in May 2022, and prior to that worked for Marianne Boesky Gallery, Christie’s Post-War and Contemporary Department, and Sotheby’s. He is particularly interested in abstract painting, assemblage, and collage-based work.
Jillian Cheney
Design Director
JILLIAN CHENEY (Design Director) is a writer, editor, and designer who’s designed award-winning work for both web and print. She loves helping artists tell their stories and display their work in a variety of ways. Her written work has appeared in Glass Quarterly, the Washington Post, the New York Daily News, Religion News Service and more. She loves film and television, glass sculpture, surrealism, expressive color, and text-based art.
Peter Freeby
DESIGN DIRECTOR
PETER J FREEBY (Design Director) designs books and periodicals including academic publications that have been with award winning journalists from ProPublica, The Wall Street Journal, New Yorker, American Public Media. He creates websites and digital development for a range of artists, non profits and educational programs including Diane Von Furstenberg, Jordan Eagles, The Generations Project, Mu Theater, The Koch Institute, The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute, and the Dow Jones News Fund. Mr. Freeby currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.
ADVISORS
Photo © Elfie Semotan
Ursula Davila-Villa
Legacy Specialist
URSULA DAVILA-VILLA is an independent art historian and advisor working with artists and their families on legacy planning and management. She co-manages the Kurt Kocherscheidt Estate, and has worked on an advisory role with artists such as Luis Camnitzer, Lorraine O’Grady, Carolee Schneemann, Elfie Semotan, and the Estate of Serge Spitzer. From 2012 to 2017 she was a Partner at Alexander Gray Associates where she managed the artistic and operational areas of the gallery including: strategic business development, artists liaison and career development, legacy planning, exhibitions, publications, institutional acquisitions, curatorial and research projects, budgets, human resources, and supervision of all staff members. She was Associate Curator of Latin American Art at The Blanton Museum of Art at The University of Texas at Austin from 2005 to 2012, where she directed and supervised exhibitions, permanent collection, acquisitions, publications, ongoing research, and established the first international artist-in-residence program.
Varvara Mikushkina
Image Archivist
VARVARA MIKUSHKINA is a New York based artist. Originally from Russia, she is currently freelancing as a Retoucher and Archivist. Her personal photographic work revolves around the romanticization of light and the decontextualization of experiencing illuminated moments. These moments are seen in mysterious settings or makeshift studios that construct an ancillary aesthetic around light. She received her BFA in Fine Art Photography from Syracuse University and an MFA in Photography from Parsons The New School for Design. Mikushkina has exhibited at institutions such as the Hermitage Museum of Art, Russia; Everson Museum of Art, NY; Aperture Foundation, NY and Center for Photography at Woodstock, NY.
Jen Hitchings
Consultant
JEN HITCHINGS is the founder of Studio Associate, an art consulting agency specializing in promotion and sales of contemporary art and professional development for emerging artists. She holds a certificate in Small Business & Entrepreneurship from Hunter College, and a BFA in Painting & Drawing from SUNY Purchase College. Her interminable, decade-long involvement with the Brooklyn art community has defined her compassionate and unique approach to working directly with artists.
Prior to founding her business in 2019, Ms. Hitchings worked as gallery manager for Century Pictures/Leo Koenig, Inc. (2018–2020), co-director of the artist-run gallery Transmitter (2015–2020), manager of Pierogi Gallery (2012–2016), co-director of Associated Gallery (2013–2014), founder of WEEKNIGHTS (2012-2013), and has freelanced as an art handler and studio assistant for a dozen artists and arts organizations. Since 2019, she has been an archivist/studio assistant for the Stephen Antonakos estate in SoHo. Exhibitions she has curated have been reviewed in Art in America, The New Yorker, The New York Times, and Artforum. All the while, Ms. Hitchings has maintained a studio practice as a painter, and is represented by Proto Gomez in New York.