Meatpacking has quite a few art galleries where the wealthy can buy art on a day of luxury shopping. The galleries sell paintings and pieces for thousands of dollars, and seem to do very well.
My most interesting conversation about the area happened with Doug Heller, owner of the famed Heller Gallery, who was literally packing boxes in anticipation of an impending move out of the district to 10th Ave and 27th St. Heller had been in Meatpacking for 15 years, and the area had become “to commercialized for his business. As I learned with the Alexander McQueen lady, Heller doesn’t serve customers, he serves clients. Where he is has almost no impact on his sales; if people want the glass based art installations he sells, they’ll buy it whether he’s in Meatpacking or Missouri. His storefront is more about the image he wants to perpetuate. 
He moved to Meatpacking in 1998, when 95 percent of the storefronts were Meatpackers (I verified the statistics). He liked the area because it was “quriky and chic,” and his clients agreed. Meatpacking was an excellent home to the gallery, and he’s sad to see it move. In his mind, Meatpacking has become the latest victim of the “mallization of Manhattan.” As Katherine at McQueen said, Meatpacking is about serving the consumers who come from a day on the town, not the trendy socialites looking to spend their (not so) hard earned millions. He made a comment that “the rent was too high” as well, and it made me think that maybe he was feeding me a bunch of lines. It could be that art galleries and luxury botiques are moving out of Meatpacking in favor of less expensive (and thus cooler) areas because, well, their businesses aren’t very profitable. When I asked Heller if this was so he said no, that that I should think of it like Meatpacking’s famed nightclubs. When he moved in, the area was “the next big” place It slowly became, “the new” place and now, to his clients, it’s “that old place.” It’s a conveniant way to say that he can’t afford to be in an area where big brands like Lu Lu Lemon or Scoop are taking over. It’s true that Meatpacking is becoming a giant mall, and I guess the super rich don’t shop at malls.
There aren’t a ton of galleries in the area, but Heller’s feelings on the neighborhood were backed up by the findings in the Business section. Fancy stores, such as McQueen, are moving out in favor of upscale, contemporary retailers.
Kazino is a brand new venue on West 13th street that will host cabaret themed off Broadway shows. When I went, tickets were only by invitation, but the plan is to offer tickets to the public for only twenty dollars. The entire project is pretty hush-hush at the moment, but it should be a really cool new addition to the area.
There are no museums in the area, although the Rubin museum is not far away. The famous Whitney museum announced that it would be opening a second location in meatpacking, tentatively scheduled to open in 2015, and should be the final stop in the shop-eat-museum type of sunday that so many of the people that frequent meatpacking seem to partake in.
There are plenty of companies that are in the art business located in the area. There are a few consulting and marketing firms that specialize in modern graphic design, and some of the hippest minds in the industry are based out of meatpacking. The “worlds premier electronic dance music school” is also based in meatpacking. For the lovers of fine art looking to spend big money, meatpacking has plenty of options.
