Creative Time Crashes Chinatown: Peking Duck, Karaoke Fete Andrea and Marc Glimcher

It took repeated bangs on the gong -- not a fancy-pants hand-held xylophone, but a big brass clunker -- to get people to their seats at the Creative Time benefit last night. Then Anne Pasternak, Creative Time's President, gave an official welcome to a several-course Chinese banquet at Jing Fong in Chinatown.

Liz Swig toasted the honorees, Marc and Andrea Glimcher of Pace Gallery, with a tale from her and Marc's childhood: something about being left on his parent's boat together, exploding soda cans by putting knives in them, cleaning up with towels and then throwing the towels overboard, hoping they would sink fast enough, so as not to be discovered by the parents. Mr. Glimcher said he was glad she had told the story with his mother in the room, while her parents weren't present.

A present-day token of affection came from artists Tara Donovan and Robbie Crawford, who presented the Glimchers with a Lego replica of Beijing Pace. The Lego people out front are Glimcher look-alikes.

After peking duck but before the fortune cookie and ice cream bar opened, the Glimchers took the stage to perform. Mrs. Glimcher said it was her first time singing karaoke. The tunes: Captain & Tennille's "Love will keep us together" and "Do it to me one more time." Mr. Glimcher played the keyboard. (Honoree performances are a nascent Creative Time tradition: last year, Ray Learsy and Melva Bucksbaum performed a number from "Guys and Dolls," and the year prior, honoree Beth Rudin DeWoody was serenaded with the help of male strippers.) The event drew 400 people and raised about $1 million for the organization.