The summer is over and the new art season is officially open, with a host of great exhibitions across Europe coming up to combat your post-vacation blues. The editors at artnet News have sourced the most exciting, challenging, and thought-provoking shows this fall from galleries in Europe’s vibrant art cities.

1. Rachel Rose, “Lake Valley” at Pilar Corrias, London, September 2 – September 30.
This is the debut solo show of American sensation Rachel Rose at Pilar Corrias gallery, fresh from a tour of successful solo exhibitions at New York’s Whitney Museum of American Art, London’s Serpentine Gallery, and Turin’s Castello di Rivoli.

Lake Valley (2016) is a new animated video where each frame is a composite of elements from 19th and 20th century illustrations of children’s books, painstakingly pieced together. The video, which explores the subject of abandonment and loneliness—a key subject in children’s stories—tells the story of a pet that leaves the family home in search of attention. Find out what happens next at the gallery. (Lorena Muñoz-Alonso)

2. David Maljković, “AAASSEMBLAGE” at Dvir Gallery, Brussels, from September 8.
Dvir Gallery is presenting a new show by celebrated Croatian artist David Maljković. In an exhibition of works in various media, from film and video to drawing and installation, AAASSEMBLAGES promises to continue Maljković’s lifelong exploration of narrative and semiotics.

Over the last 13 years, Maljković has repeatedly problematized the status of the studio as a symbolic realm of production and experimentation. In a series of works that forge a pictorial dialogue with the studio, he interrupts the preconceived idea of the studio, dissolving it in order to create a new whole. In this exhibition, the space of the studio becomes somewhat of an assemblage, its fragmented quality meant to echo the broken reality of the artist’s every day space. (Naomi Rea)

3. Taryn Simon, “Paperwork and the Will of Capital” at Almine Rech Gallery, Brussels, September 8 – November 12.
In this solo exhibition, Simon will present her series Paperwork and the Will of Capital for the first time in Belgium, as well as a selection of sculptures that debuted at the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015.

From examining historical photos of the ratification of accords between leaders at the 1944 UN Monetary and Financial Conference, Simon noticed that signings were decorated with floral arrangements whose size and intricacies reflected the signatories’ relative importance. Using George Sinclair’s 19th century horticultural study—the same one that inspired Darwin’s theory of evolution—and the help of a botanist, she identified and recreated these bouquets, which she then photographed and placed in bespoke mahogany frames reminiscent of boardroom furnishings.

The flowers were later dried and pressed and will be displayed alongside the photographs as sort of sculptural still lifes. Together, Simon’s work in this collection invites the viewer to reflect on the stagecraft behind the performance of power. (Naomi Rea)

4. Guiseppe Penone, “Ebbi, Avrò, Non Ho” and “Fui, Sarò, Non Sono” at Marian Goodman, Paris and London. September 8 – October 22, 2016.
Two simultaneous exhibitions of works by Italian sculptor and conceptual artist Guiseppe Penone will take place at Marian Goodman’s London and Paris galleries from September. Both shows’ titles refer to past, future, and present and will bring together a selection of works that explore the sense of touch.

Both also take specific gestures made by the artist’s hand as their starting point, because human gestures and tactile perceptions are central to Penone’s understanding of individuality and time. The Paris gallery will explore the human body’s relationship to the natural world in works conceived around the artist’s hand prints, and the show in the London gallery will develop Penone’s interest in the metaphysical relationship of his body to the living ecosystem. (Naomi Rea)

5. Gregory Crewdson, “Cathedral of the Pines” at Galerie Daniel Templon, Brussels and Paris, September 8 – October 29.
Gregory Crewdson will exhibit his most recent body of work, “Cathedral of the Pines,” for the first time in Europe this September.

In an attempt to reconnect with the artistic process and gain new inspiration, Crewdson’s latest photographic series explores the social and physical landscape of the forests in Becket, Massachusetts. In a style reminiscent of the elaborate staging behind 19th century paintings, Crewdson has shot figures in Becket’s natural environment as well as its domestic interiors. His subjects are placed in familiar-seeming surroundings imbued with a sense of the uncanny: a girl gets her hair cut on the edge of a wood; a woman with muddied hands stands in front of a shed; two naked figures are frozen in the flatbed of a pickup truck in the middle of the forest.

The much awaited series of 31 photographs will be shown concurrently in Paris and Brussels at Galerie Daniel Templon, with openings on September 8 in Brussels and September 10 in Paris. (Naomi Rea)

6. Jan Groover, “The Virtue of Balance” at Klemm’s, Berlin, September 9 – October 22
This first exhibition in Germany featuring the work of American photographer Jan Groover spans three decades of her versatile, abstract work, tinged with a clear feminist message. Capturing meticulously arranged compositions, often staged using mundane objects in such domestic sites as her kitchen sink, Groover’s oeuvre has a visual richness that reflects the artist’s life-long formal experimentation with the photographic medium. It is hardly surprising that before picking up the camera, Groover was a painter.

With color and form dominating the scenes, her photography was considered “post-modern” for its negation of a clear vantage point or fixed perspective. “I had some wild concept that you could change space—which you can,” Groover said in a 1994 documentary about her work, Jan Groover: Tilting at Space. From her earlier conceptual photography to the later, large-scale studies of movement, this exhibition will offer some discoveries to an audience not necessarily familiar with her legacy, but who will surely recognize her influence on a younger generation of artists. (Hili Perlson)

7. Daniel Jacoby, “Sydney” at MaisterraValbuena, Madrid, September 15 – November 12.
MaisterraValbuena is opening the season—coinciding with Madrid’s gallery weekend, “Apertura“—with one of the most exciting young artists in its program: Peruvian-born, Netherlands-based Daniel Jacoby, who also impressed at the gallery’s booth at Art Basel’s Statements in June this year.

Jacoby takes everyday objects such as display devices, climbing apparel, or domestic items and turns them into riveting formal explorations beautifully choreographed in space. For his second show at the gallery, Jacoby has created a series of new anthropomorphic sculptures, inspired by the clothing displays of market vendors, in which body parts evolve into abstract sculptures. The exhibition’s title, “Sydney,” takes its name from a shop in Lima that has become a source of inspiration for Jacoby. Oblique yet humorous and beguiling, Jacoby’s work is one to keep an eye on. (Lorena Muñoz-Alonso)

8. Sterling Ruby, “THE JUNGLE” at Sprüth Magers, Berlin. September 17 – October 29.
This fall, Sterling Ruby is set to present new works from his SCALES series of mobile sculptures for the first time as a single installation, titled “THE JUNGLE.”

In this latest show, Ruby will showcase new mobiles, three-dimensional versions of recent collages, which he will suspend from the ceiling in a manner suggestive of the dense canopy of a jungle. Balancing order and chaos against each other, Ruby’s work juxtaposes monochrome cutout shapes with miscellaneous artifacts from his studio including leftover fragments from previous works as well as detritus lifted by chance from his studio floor.

In a display that seems to fuse modernism with the contemporary, Ruby unpacks his own artistic history while at the same time explicitly referencing modernist, Bauhaus, and Suprematist aesthetics. As his epic mobile sculptures wobble and swing according to conditions in the gallery, they offer a fresh perspective to the viewer with each and every second. (Naomi Rea)

9. “Five / Fifty / Five Hundred” at Lisson Gallery, Milan, September 22 – October 28.
Lisson’s  Milan space it turning five, and it is celebrating the anniversary with “Five / Fifty / Five Hundred,” a group show inspired by the gallery’s inaugural exhibition, curated by Ryan Gander in September 2011. The show will also include a large-scale, wooden structure by Ai Weiwei assembled in the shape of an icosahedron, a form first illustrated by Leonardo da Vinci for the mathematician Luca Pacioli’s 1509 treaty The Divine Proportion.

And the da Vinci references don’t stop there, as the gallery shares its garden with the polymath’s own vineyard. In 2015, 500 years after da Vinci’s death and following a decade of thorough research, da Vinci’s original vineyard has been recreated using the exact type of vine grown in the 1500s at the bottom of Casa degli Attelani’s garden. Next year, the gallery’s original London space will mark its 50th year, a true landmark worthy of celebrating. (Lorena Muñoz-Alonso)

10. Mike Kelley, “Framed and Frame” at Hauser & Wirth, London, September 23 – November 19.
Hauser & Wirth is opening the gallery’s first UK exhibition devoted to Mike Kelley, featuring Framed and Frame, a single monumental installation created in 1999. The large-scale piece was Kelley’s homage to LA’s Chinatown, a part of town that the artist frequented as a young man as it became one of the hotspots of the city’s punk scene, but that also fascinated him as a meeting point of different cultures.

The show, a recreations of a local landmark in Chinatown, is formed by two parts: the first is a pagoda-like architectural folly, sitting in the gallery like an empty stage. The second is a Gaudi-like grotto, covered in spray-paint, and housing religious images and even a secret cave containing a mattress, candles, and condoms. And if that wasn’t enough to tickle your fancy, the gallery is also hosting a concurrent solo show of the Brazilian Neo-concretism legend Lygia Pape in its second space. Definitely worth a visit. (Lorena Muñoz-Alonso)

11. Mike Nelson, “tools that see (the possessions of a thief) 1986-2005” at neugerriemschneider, Berlin, September 17 – October 29.
For this intriguingly titled exhibition, Mike Nelson will show a selection of tools he had used in creating large-scale installations from the years 1986 to 2005. The exhibition is, in a way, a continuation of Nelson’s 2012 show with neugerreimschneider, “space that saw (platform for a performance in two parts).” Back then, the artist installed a platform and stage in an abandoned building in Berlin. Now, the materials used to construct the stage will be repurposed into platforms on which toolboxes and their contents will be displayed.

Interested in activating his audience, Nelson once put the viewer center stage. But now, as the artist publicly introspects on his own work process, he asks his viewer to examine the way his works come into being. “tools that see” also questions the criteria of an art object, elevating the items that once aided in the creation process to objects of contemplation themselves. (Alyssa Buffenstein)

12. Antony Gormley, “Fit” at White Cube Bermondsey, London, September 29 – November 6.
Transforming White Cube’s massive Bermondsey space into a labyrinth, Antony Gormley’s upcoming show promises a memorable experience. In an exciting new diversion from his past work—which focuses primarily on abstract figurative sculpture—the artist will configure the space into 15 unique chambers, inviting visitors to enter and experience each immersive setup of artworks.

Gormley’s new work explores both singular monumental pieces as well as collections of multiple separate artworks that become one when combined. Despite exploring a new direction, Gormley’s omnipresent investigation of themes such as perception, subjective experience, and testing the limitations and expectation of contemporary sculpture remains a core concern in his new work. (Henri Neuendorf)

13. Njideka Akunyili Crosby “Portals” at Victoria Miro, October 4 – November 5.
Portals is the first European presentation for Nigerian-born, Los Angeles-based Crosby whose works are created through a mixture of collage, photo transfer techniques, and painting.

Crosby’s subjects, existing in their everyday scenarios such as dancing at a party, embracing in sleep, or resting at home, are not only precisely and appealingly depicted but also strangely emotive. Dealing with trans-cultural issues (the artist moved from Nigeria to LA aged 16), her work often contains multiple narratives that might initially escape the viewer. Lingering to take a closer look is well worth it. (Amah-Rose Abrams)

14. Marcel Dzama and Raymond Pettibon, “Let us compare mythologies” at David Zwirner October 4 – November 12.
Following their show “Forgetting the Hand” at Zwirner’s New York gallery, Dzama and Pettibon have joined forces again for “Let us compare mythologies,” an exhibition of drawings and a large-scale work on paper that combines Pettibon’s surfers and Dzama’s costumed characters.

Pettibon and Dzama’s collaboration was born out of game of “exquisite corpse,” where each artist would draw a section of drawing, fold it over or hide it, and then send it back for the next section to be drawn, written, or collaged by the other.

The resulting works are a collaboration in the truest sense of the word with veteran artist Pettibon, and younger artist Dzama creating works where it’s sometimes hard to tell what was added by whom. (Amah-Rose Abrams)

15. Chantal Joffe at Galerie Forsblom, Helsinki, October 28 – November 20
Chantal Joffe’s large-scale oil paintings famously center on depicting women, sometimes with children, set in tranquil environments. But there is nothing inane about her canvases, which spring from the singularity of experience: Often portraying subjects from her immediate surroundings, the painter’s soulful images are characterized by an emotional intensity that makes each portrait a psychologically charged tribute.

For her second show with Galerie Forsblom, Joffe is showing a series of new works in pastels, as well as oil paintings in which celebrated writers join the artist’s friends and family on the vibrantly painted canvases. Melding those encountered in the flesh and on the page, Joffe once again questions notions of self-disclosure and intimacy in the work of the (female) artist. (Hili Perlson)