The New York Observer discovers Gavin Brown and decides he might be a big deal in the art world someday, especially now that he’s expanding his gallery:

The expansion will increase the footprint, and the power, of an art dealer already influential, wealthy and under fire both for too-close ties to the New Museum and for operating something (depending upon which side of it you are on) of an exclusionary art-world clique. But another development in May is also poised to push Mr. Brown more into the spotlight: If that old adage is true—when one door closes, yet another opens wide—then someone stands to gain something in gallerist and Soho impresario Jeffrey Deitch’s pending exodus from New York. And a lot of people are betting the heir apparent is Gavin Brown.

On that Saturday, the casually dressed, heavily bearded dealer was holding court upstairs in the gallery loft where he sometimes presides over cozy, post-opening dinners. As he talked about his gallery and artists, he was demure and more than a little oblique. He became enlivened only when speaking about recent projects (such as Jeremy Deller’s Conversations About Iraq at the New Museum). And, he stressed, he is not such a fan of the sort of hierarchical terms and distinctions divvying up the art world today. “I don’t really know what a gallery is—it’s just a space for potential imagination.” His role sometimes, he explained to The Observer, is less gallerist than “lobbyist.”

The Heir Apparent (Observer)