Each week, we search New York City for the most exciting, and thought-provoking, shows, screenings, and events. In light of the global health crisis, we are currently highlighting events and exhibitions available digitally. See our picks from around the world below. (Times are all EST unless otherwise noted.)

Tuesday, April 28

Metropolitan Stories by Christine Coulson (2019). Courtesy of Other Press.

1. “A Conversation with Christine Coulson, Author of Metropolitan Stories” at the National Arts Club

Author Christine Coulson, a 25-year veteran of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art—she left to write full-time last year—will speak Glenn Raucher about her whimsical novel, Metropolitan Stories, inspired by behind-the-scenes goings on at the institution. It’s a beautiful little book that does justice to the museum’s encyclopedic collection in all sorts of unexpected ways.

Price: Free with registration
Time: 7 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Debroah Kass. Photo courtesy Grace Roselli, Pandora’s BoxX Project.

2. “ART MATTERS@home: A Conversation Between Deborah Kass and Arnold Lehman” at Phillips

Are you experiencing Zoom fatigue? The cure, I think, is limiting your video intake to conversations among people with a healthy dose of perspective. And that certainly applies to the inaugural episode of “ART MATTERS@home,” a digital adaptation of a discussion series helmed by Phillips senior advisor Arnold Lehman. The series kicks off Tuesday with a 30-minute interview with wise and outspoken artist Deborah Kass. The interviews will be available as podcasts on Phillips’s website (and wherever you get your podcasts) and as Zoom video interviews on Phillips’s Facebook. Future episodes will feature artists Ai Weiwei, Judy Chicago, and Lee Quiñones, as well as curator Eugenie Tsai.

Price: Free
Time: From 12 p.m. onward

—Julia Halperin

Paulo Bruscky (Recife, Brazil, 1949 – ), Arte Correio. Hoje, a arte é este comunicado [Mail Art. Today, Art is this Communiqué], 1985.

How do you continue to communicate and make art while under government censorship? Well, in the OG days of social distancing, artists in Latin America were able to circumvent authoritarian restrictions by using the postal service to keep in touch and share experimental art works on an international scale. From the 1960s through the 90’s artists were able to continue their practice in dire circumstances. As part of the “Curated Conversations” program at the Blanton, curators Vanessa Davidson and Florencia Bazzano will discuss how the medium helped transmit the message. As a special bonus, the museum has a suggested cocktail in keeping with the theme for viewers to enjoy (the recipe is on the website).

Price: Free with registration
Time: 5 p.m.

—Caroline Goldstein

Still from Death Cafe: Hot Pot Edition companion video, created by Brian Zegeer and Heidi Lau. Photo courtesy of BRIC and Green-Wood Cemetery.

4. “Death Cafe: Hot Pot Edition” at BRIC and Green-Wood Cemetery

Green-Wood Cemetery began holding Death Café gatherings, a global trend offering opportunities to partake in informal discussions about death and dying, in 2017. Now, the café has done virtual, taking the cemetery’s current art show, “Death Becomes Her,” curated with BRIC, as inspiration. Exhibition artist Heidi Lau will start things off by talking about her practice and the significance of hot pot in Chinese culture, where it is both a meal and a social activity. She’s also provided a selection of hot pot recipes, including a bootleg quarantine edition made from instant ramen seasoning, should you wish to dine in accordance with the evening’s theme.

Price: Free with registration
Time: 5:30 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Amy Sherald. Photo by Jordan Geiger, courtesy of the artist and Hauser & Wirth.

5. “To Be a Witness: Amy Sherald in Conversation With Massimiliano Gioni” at the New Museum

Since being selected to paint then-First Lady Michelle Obama’s official portrait just a few years ago, Amy Sherald has become known as one of the most important painters working in America today. Sherald will join New Museum artistic director Massimiliano Gioni online to discuss her portraiture as it relates to the act and responsibility of witnessing—a subject that feels increasingly relevant in the face of fake news, filter bubbles, and denied justice.

Price: Free with RSVP
Time: 7 p.m.

—Tim Schneider

The Artnet News Watercooler Chat.

6. “Artnet News Watercooler Chat: How Can Art Dealers Survive the COVID-19 Crisis?” at tk

The Artnet News Watercooler Chat is back for its second edition, which sees our executive editor Julia Halperin and our senior market Editor Eileen Kinsella chat with Heather Hubbs, executive director of the New Art Dealers Alliance. They’ll discuss the challenges galleries face as they look to rebound from the coronavirus, and how art dealers are looking to survive this difficult time.

Price: Free
Time: 4 p.m.–4:45 p.m.

—Tatiana Berg

Wednesday, April 29

Patton Hindle, head of arts at Kickstarter; Jennie Lamensdorf, of the Facebook art department; artist Steve Locke; and Holly Shen, deputy director of the San Jose Museum of Art. Photos courtesy of the Art Funders Forum.

7. “Remake the Model” at the Art Funders Forum

The mission of the Art Funders Forum, launched last December during Art Basel Miami Beach to create a more sustainable future when it comes to funding in the arts, is more timely then ever as institutions around the world face an uncertain financial future in light of extended coronavirus closures. This Zoom conversation with Patton Hindle, head of arts at Kickstarter; Jennie Lamensdorf, of the Facebook art department; artist Steve Locke; and Holly Shen, deputy director of the San Jose Museum of Art will consider the ways in which technology can help the cultural sector weather the current economic crisis.

Price: Free with registration
Time: 1 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Thursday, April 30

Art in Isolation. Courtesy Courtauld Institute of Art.

8. “Art in Isolation” at the Courtauld Institute of Art

The Courtauld Institute of Art has launched a month-long program of weekly talks called Open Courtauld Hour. The first event is called Art in Isolation, in which the Courtauld’s head of research Alixe Bovey will lead a discussion about why art matters in quarantine. She will speak with the Courtauld Gallery’s deputy head Barnaby Wright, the National Gallery’s curator of Italian painting, Caroline Campbell, and the cofounder of Underpinning, Lorraine Smith. It will also feature a poetic reinterpretation of Paul Cézanne’s “Montagne Sainte-Victoire with Large Pine” by the poet Shagufta K. Iqbal.

Price: Free with registration
Time: 8:05 p.m. GMT (3:05 p.m. EST)

—Naomi Rea

Paul Mpagi Sepuya and Julia Bryan-Wilson. Photo courtesy of the McEvoy Foundation for the Arts.

9. “In Conversation: Paul Mpagi Sepuya and Julia Bryan-Wilson” co-hosted by McEvoy Foundation for the Arts and University of California, Berkeley

Photographer Paul Mpagi Sepuya joins Julia Bryan-Wilson, professor of modern and contemporary art at University of California, Berkeley, for a conversation about his practice and his work on display in McEvoy Foundation for the Arts’ recent exhibition “Orlando.”

Price: Free with registration
Time: 6 p.m.–7 p.m. PST

—Eileen Kinsella

Andy Warhol, Park Avenue Tulips. Image courtesy Christie’s.

10. Christie’s Education Presents a Conversation on the Sale “Andy Warhol: Better Days” at Christie’s

Christie’s presents a conversation about “Andy Warhol: Better Days,” an online sale to support the Warhol Foundation for the Visual Art’s recently announced emergency relief fund for artists, artist-centered organizations, and the creation of new work and projects. Though Warhol is best known for his paintings, he was also a prolific photographer, and the sale aims to show a different side of his work. Participants include: Allison Immergut, a junior specialist in the auction house’s postwar and contemporary art department, and Michael Hermann, director of licensing at the Andy Warhol Foundation.

Price: Free with registration
Time: 5 p.m.

—Eileen Kinsella

Thursday, April 30–Sunday, May 3

The Rothko Chapel is a non-denominational chapel in Houston, Texas. Courtesy of the Rothko Chapel.

11. Common Field Convening

Common Field, which looks to support and advocate for artists by building a network, had to move its 2020 Convening Online. Programming kicked off last weekend, but you can still catch Zoom sessions like “Houston, We Have a Problem: Confronting Racism in the Arts” with the Center for the Healing of Racism and the Rothko Chapel, and “Towards a Fossil Free Future.”

Price: Free with registration
Time: Times vary

—Sarah Cascone

Friday, May 1 

Every Friday, the Frick is hosting “Cocktails with a Curator,” pairing a drink recipe with a work from the collection.

12. “Cocktails with a Curator” at the Frick Collection

In this delightful new series, the Frick pairs a fascinating cocktail with the work from the collection (the drink recipes are posted on their website in advance, with non-alcoholic options, too). Last week a Pink Gin met with Anthony Van Dyck’s Sir John Suckling, while this week Gin and Dubonnet is the suggested accompaniment to John Constable’s White Horse. While you sip on your concoction, a Frick curator dives deep into the fascinating stories behind that week’s work. The first three episodes were hosted by chief curator Xavier F. Salomon, and are very much worth streaming from YouTube if you missed them (Salomon has a voice made for a career in audio). This week, curator Aimee Ng takes the stage. By the end of this quarantine we might all be slightly soused experts on the collection. 

Price: Free
Time: 5 p.m.

– Katie White

Friday, May 1

13. “A Lone Wolf Recital Corps performance featuring Blanche Bruce” at Performa

Performa’s Radical Broadcast channel is hosting a live performance originally planned as part of the programming for “Terry Adkins: Resounding,” which was supposed to have opened at the Pulitzer Arts Foundation in St. Louis last month. A conceptual artist and musician, Adkins, who died in 2014, founded the Lone Wolf Recital Corps, a collective of multidisciplinary artists and musicians, in 1986. The rotating cast of participants have included Clifford Owens and Kamau Amu Patton, who will broadcast together from their respective homes in New York and Chicago. Blanche Bruce, Adkins’s Lone Wolf Recital Corps alter ego.

Price: Free
Time: 4 p.m.–4:50 p.m.

—Sarah Csacone

Friday, May 1–Saturday, May 30

Tim Youd retyping John Cheever’s Falconer for “100 Novels.” 211 pages typed on an Olivetti Lettera 32. With Vassar College at a decommissioned guard tower at Sing Sing Prison, Ossining, New York, June 2018. Photo by John Muggenborg, courtesy of the artist.

14. “Tim Youd: The Tunnel Retyped” at the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis

For Tim Youd’s ongoing “100 Novels” series, the artist retypes famous novels on a single sheet of paper, using the same type of typewriter that the author would have used to compose the original. The creation of each work is a performance art piece unto itself, most recently carried out at the Armory Show in New York (which was still only last month, believe it or not). Now, forced to shelter in place at home in Los Angeles, Youd is retyping his 67th novel, William Gass’s 650-page novel The Tunnel, from self-isolation in his garage, a process he expects will last the entire month. (Which is actually nothing compared to the 26 years it took Gass to write the original.) The artist’s gallery, Cristin Tierney, and the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, will livestream each and every keystroke as Youd attempts to metaphorically tunnel his way to freedom by completing this monumental task.

Price: Free
Time: 12 p.m.–5 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Saturday, May 2

Betty Woodman, Still Life #11 (1990). Photo courtesy of the Whitney Museum of American Art, gift of Julia Childs Augur, ©Charles Woodman.

15. “Artmaking From Home: DIY Pottery” at the Whitney Museum of American Art

If self-isolation has got you in a crafty mood, tune in for this pottery class hosted by the Whitney. Artist Stina Puotinen will teach you how to make clay from the everyday household materials of flour, cornstarch, salt, and water. She’ll then use works in the museum collection by Betty Woodman and Arlene Shechet as a jumping off point in making handmade sculptures.

Price: Free with registration
Time: 3 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone