A much-loved New York institution, New York Theatre Ballet, and its related school—not to mention the Dokoudovsky conservatory of ballet downstairs—are facing an uncertain future as their landlord, a church, sells off the parish house in which they have been housed for over thirty years. If they go, another little bit of New York’s character goes with them.  Last week I trudged up the five floors of the run-down but still beautiful building and watched a class for 8 and 9 year-olds. I wrote a little piece about it for the New Yorker’s culture blog.