Alanna Heiss - Up Close - NYTimes.com NOT long ago Alanna Heiss, the renowned curator and self-described art radical, brandished two guns at the Clocktower Gallery, the nonprofit art space she runs in Lower Manhattan. "They're props," she said with a grin, adding, "but they're also for critics." Never mind how she got them past the heavy security in the lobby of this city-owned building on Leonard Street, which has housed her wild installations since 1972 and, more recently, Art International Radio. She had other things in mind, most urgently to give a tour of her space. Ready? "This is by Margot Farrington and Tony Martin, who did lights for the Grateful Dead's concerts," she said as she darted in and out of a room of shifting colors. Lights flashed overhead with strange sounds. "That's by Tony Oursler," she said. Isn't it wonderful? Probably, but there wasn't a moment to think about it because Ms. Heiss, like the rabbit in Alice's Wonderland, had already gone down the hall and into a retro-looking lounge with an old turntable and radio, installed by Sabina Streeter. A waltz was playing. "This piece is about the Nazi use of radio propaganda," she said. In the Art International Radio studio next door, which broadcasts innovative programs on the Internet, she reflected on radio's ability to occupy mental, rather than physical, space, something she once had plenty of between 1976 and 2008 as the director of P.S. 1, the massive contemporary art institution she founded in Long Island City in an abandoned school building. "But that's past, and I'm always thinking about the next thing," she said. She pointed to an old phone booth installation by the art team Japanther. "Pick it up and listen," she commanded. Who would dare say no? At the main exhibit, called "Candy Canyon," a cinemascopic installation by Mike Anderson and the sonic duo Javelin, she scurried through a realistic-looking cabin and cavern, and past cactuses while a soundtrack of trippy cowboy music filled the darkness. At the end, she stepped into a Western-saloon-style room and sat down on a bale of hay while a mock cowboy music video played on a big screen. She was beaming. "When people see this show, they tell me, "Alanna, you're really back," " she said. Actually, she never went away. But after the Museum of Modern Art, which oversees P.S. 1, asked her to retire, some assumed she would vanish. She was, after all, in her mid-60s and to be replaced by Klaus Biesenbach, a young curator she had trained. "I have the fortune to know someone I trust is carrying on what I started," she said. And I get to continue working here with younger artists, which is what I love. Indeed, Ms. Heiss, who organized a show called "Arctic Hysteria" now traveling around the world, and has received numerous awards, including the French Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres, is not only without regret but also without brakes. Instead of being bitter and nostalgic, she is on fire, it seems, spitting in the face of anything having to do with retirement, and hopping up the stairs of her gallery with the agility of a mountain goat. She has no interest in looking back, despite the giant clock that looms over her domain. "The passing of time isn't about memories for me," she said, as she stood in an upper gallery of the tower designed by Stanford White. It's about layers of good art. In her decades of running the Clocktower Gallery, many of which overlapped with running P.S. 1, Dennis Oppenheim performed and Nam June Paik presented his chocolate-covered woman playing video cello. And outside, under the illuminated clock face surrounded by federal justice buildings and peering employees in offices, Gordon Matta-Clark once got naked, lathered up and hosed himself down. "To me, one of the most important things in life is to have fun," she said. Up on the roof of the building, under a white fur hat and wrapped in a white fur coat, the Kentucky-born Ms. Heiss, who learned about encouraging artists from her days as a piano accompanist in high school, looked east over the city that drew her years ago. She could see Long Island City, an art mecca many would say she was responsible for creating. She could also see the Brooklyn Bridge, where, as an example of the kind of projects she would be doing as the founder of P.S. 1 and the Institute for Art and Urban Resources, she curated an avant-garde celebration in 1971 that featured work by Philip Glass, Sol LeWitt and Carl Andre. "New York was a different place then," said Ms. Heiss, who still finds it hard to accept the commercialism that has taken hold of younger artists. It was a time when artists were open to all kinds of collaboration. That's what I want to create again. By all accounts, she is succeeding. Although some critics had issues with the chaotic installation by James Franco she presented last year (none had to face the guns in her office), people are flocking to the concerts and events that she and her staff are presenting. "No regrets," she said, while looking at the giant clock tower above. Just then, a man appeared on the roof from under the clock: Michael Stipe, one of her many well-known supporters. Last year, he showed innovative videos in her space. "Have you seen "Candy Canyon" yet?" she asked. "Not yet, I wanted to see you first," he said. "Well," she said, taking his hand, "let's go."