We’re all too busy during the week to do all the great things we plan and hope to do. So if you can only commit to one arty event this week, here’s what you should not miss!

WEDNESDAY April 15 

Brooklyn Museum’s Fifth Annual Brooklyn Artists Ball: Honoring Arnold Lehman

The Brooklyn Museum will host its fifth annual Brooklyn Artists Ball in honor of retiring museum director Arnold Lehman and contemporary artists Jean-Michel Basquiat, Takashi Murakami, and Kiki Smith. Including cocktails, a dinner and dance party, the affair features artists FAILE, Jen Catron + Paul Outlaw, Fernando Mastrangelo, Olek, Duke Riley, SITU Studio, Swoon, and Dustin Yellin, who will curate individual table environments at the event. In celebration of Brooklyn’s creative community, the artist-created table settings will boast larger scale installations than in years past.

Lehman will be presented with the Augustus Graham Medal in recognition of his leadership and contribution to Brooklyn’s art community. Artists Murakami, Smith, and Basquiat (posthumously) will be honored with the Asher B. Durand Award.

The exhibition “Diverse Works: Director’s Choice 1997-2015” will also open that evening, featuring 125 pieces collected throughout Lehman’s nearly 20-year tenure.

After cocktails in the museum lobby and dinner in the Beaux-Arts Court, guests move to the Glass Pavilion for a late night of dancing and desserts. Curated by Fool’s Gold, featuring an installation by Flour Shop, this promises to be a Willy Wonka-esque experience.

The Brooklyn Museum has partnered with Artspace to host a benefit auction at the gala as well as an online auction for the museum’s fundraiser, which launched on April 6. Featuring works by Smith, Yellin, Murakami, and Vik Muniz, proceeds of the sale will support the museum’s collection and programs.

Tickets to the ball start at $1,000. But those who want to swing by for the dance party alone can enter for $100 ($75 for Museum members). Dance Party tickets are available here.

Brooklyn Museum, 200 Eastern Parkway, Beaux-Arts Court, 3rd Floor, 6:30 PM. 

For the intrepid, here are a few other exciting happenings around town:

Art F City 10th Anniversary Benefit at Lightbox
Party with the independent art blog, Art F City, which turns ten this year. In celebration, experimental performance artist Laurie Anderson will speak, vaudevillian outfit the Elephant Room will perform magic, and CK Swett will auction off a host of great artwork by Michelle Grabner, Marilyn Minter, and Zoe Crosher, among many others, which you can check out here. Oh, and there will be cake. Tickets here.
Lightbox, 339 West 38 Street, Monday, April 13, 6:30—10 PM. 

“Natalie Frank: The Brothers Grimm” opening reception at the Drawing Center
Natalie Frank takes on the fairy-tales transcribed by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm. Twenty-five drawings in gouache and chalk pastel bring to life the age-old stories. (See Natalie Frank Explores Gruesome Side of the Grimm Fairy Tales in New Drawing Center Show.) Come celebrate the opening of the show, which runs through June 28.
The Drawing Center, 35 Wooster Street, Thursday, April 16, 6—8 PM. 

Discussion “The Theresa Duncan CD-ROMs” at the New Museum 
Theresa Duncan surprised the art world when she, and her boyfriend Jeremy Blake (both of whom were respected artists), committed suicide in 2007, a week apart. Duncan’s pioneering feminist video games of the mid-1990’s (“Chop Suey,” “Smarty,” and “Zero Zero”), for which the artist first rose to fame and that later fell into obscurity, are now being released to the public. Rhizome started a Kickstarter campaign to raise the funds to conserve Duncan’s games and make all three CD-ROMs free and playable for anyone with a web browser. At the discussion celebrating their release, in a coordinated effort with the New Museum, Rhizome’s artistic director Michael Connor will contextualize Duncan’s work within feminist gaming history.
The New Museum, 235 Bowery Street, Thursday, April 16, 7 PM.