H ypothesis: For the better part of the twentieth century, the Automat was a totem of possibility. In vast spaces tricked out with Carrara marble and Beaux-Arts trimmings, a regular Joe or Jane could rub shoulders with V.I.P.s while eating on the cheap—or, depending on one’s tolerance for ketchup-and-hot-water soup, for free. Neil Simon called Automats the “Maxims of the disenfranchised.” But it is the Automat’s other defining attribute—being a locker-based food-distribution system that obviates contact between customer and employee—that makes it of special interest during a pandemic. Stratis Morfogen MATERIALS: One thousand-square-foot space on St. Mark’s Place and First Avenue, to be open twenty-four hours.