Each week, we search New York City for the most exciting, and thought-provoking, shows, screenings, and events. See them below.
Tuesday, January 17–Thursday, February 23
Porky Hefer, Caterpillar Seat (2016). Courtesy of R & Company.
1. “Porky Hefer: Heart of Lightness” at R & Company
Porky Hefer’s playful sculptural swinging chairs, crafted in the shapes of giant animals such as a piranha, were a highlight of the most recent edition of Design Miami. Now, the South African designer’s Cape Town- and Johannesburg-based gallery, Southern Guild, is teaming up with R & company to present his work in New York.
The exhibition, which takes its title from Joseph Conrad’s classic book Heart of Darkness, deals with issues of colonialism and the related stereotypes that still color perceptions of Africa in the 21st century. Hefer encourages visitors to curl up for a nap—or an Instagram photo op— inside his works, noting in a statement that “each piece is meant to be inhabited like a hermit inhabits shells.”
Location: R & Company, 82 Franklin Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening Tuesday, January 17, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Monday–Friday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m.; Saturday, 12 p.m.–6 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Wednesday, January 18–Sunday, April 23
A.K. Burns, Living Room (production still), 2017–ongoing. Courtesy the artist and Callicoon Fine Arts. Photo Eden Batki.
2. A.K. Burns, “Shabby but Thriving” at the New Museum
The artist, a self-described “compulsive collaborator” and founding member of advocacy group W.A.G.E (Working Artists in the Great Economy), kicks off her residency at the museum with a new video work within an installation centering on “subjugation and agency”.
Location: The New Museum, 235 Bowery
Price: $18 for adults
Time: Opening Wednesday, January 17, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Tuesday–Wednesday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m.; Thursday 11 a.m.–9 p.m.; Friday–Sunday 11 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Kathleen Massara
Thursday, January 19–Saturday, February 18
Adrian Ghenie Charles Darwin at the Age of 75 (2014). Photo: courtesy of Pace Gallery.
3. Adrian Ghenie: Recent Paintings at Pace Gallery
Showcasing new works by the uber-hot Romanian painter, Pace presents 12 paintings and five collages by Adrian Ghenie. It is the the first solo show in New York in almost four years for the artist who is hailed as one of the leading painters of his generation. Whilst his oil paintings have occupied the space between figuration and abstraction in the past, with Ghenie’s highly anticipated new work progresses increasingly towards abstraction and build upon his previous exhibitions at Pace in 2013 and 2014.
Location: 510 West 25th Street
Price: Free
Time: 6 p.m.–8 p.m.
—Henri Neuendorf
Thursday, January 19–Sunday, March 5
Natalie Frank, The Lettuce Donkey. Courtesy of the artist and the New York Academy of Art.
4. Piss and Vinegar at the New York Academy of Art
Curated by dean Peter Drake, and gallerist George Adams, Piss and Vinegar combines two generations of artistic “provocateurs”: five men who came of age in the 1960s and five contemporary female artists.The list includes: Robert Arneson, Robert Colescott, R. Crumb, Peter Saul, and Robert Williams, alongside Nina Chanel Abney, Sue Coe, Nicole Eisenman, Natalie Frank, and Hilary Harkness. The show highlights the artists’ focus on uncomfortable—often taboo—themes, and willingness to risk having their work called vulgar or grotesque. A day prior to the opening reception on January 19 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m., Robert Mankoff and Ken Johnson will host a talk on the topic of “Visual Art and Humor.”
Location: New York Academy of Art, 111 Franklin Street
Price: Free
Time: Talk, January 18 at 6:30. Opening reception, January 19, 6:00 p.m.—8:00 p.m.
—Eileen Kinsella
Thursday, January 19–Saturday, March 11
Katharina Grosse, Untitled (2016). © Katharina Grosse und VG Bild-Kunst Bonn, 2017. Photo by Jens Ziehe.
5. Katharina Grosse at Gagosian
The German artist, who made a splash at MoMA PS1’s Rockaway! exhibition last year, with her boldly colored building project, is back with a solo show at her new gallery. The artist signed on with Gagosian last summer, and her new acrylic on canvases drip and dive with each turn of her spray gun.
Location: Gagosian, 555 West 24th Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening, Thursday, January 19, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.
—Kathleen Massara
Thursday, January 20–Sunday, March 19
Amy Sillman, After Metamorphoses (2015–16), film still. Courtesy of the artist.
6. “Mateo López: Undo List,” “Jackson Mac Low: Lines–Letters–Words,” and “Amy Sillman:
After Metamorphoses” at the Drawing Center
A trio of exhibitions kicks off the Drawing Center‘s 2017 season with animated video drawings by Amy Sillman, a retrospective of gestural works by Jackson Mac Low, and the first solo museum exhibition for Colombian artist Mateo López, whose training as an architect comes through in his works on paper, sculpture, performance, and film.
Location: The Drawing Center, 35 Wooster Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening Thursday, January 17, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, January 19–Sunday, April 2
Nobuyoshi Araki Untitled from “101 Works for Robert Frank (Private Diary)” 1993. Photo: The Walther Collection.
7. “Nobuyoshi Araki, Daido Moriyama, and Kohei Yoshiyuki: Acts of Intimacy: The Erotic Gaze in Japanese Photography” at the Walther Collection Project Space
Inaugurating a year-long exhibition series devoted to Asian contemporary photography and video art, the Walther Collection presents a three person exhibition focusing on eroticism in Japanese photography featuring seminal Japanese photo artists Nobuyoshi Arkai, Daido Moriyama, and Kohei Yoshiyuki. The exhibition explores each artist’s unique perspective on capturing the themes of sexuality, and identity in the context of Japanese culture.
Location: The Walther Collection Project Space, 526 West 26th Street, Suite 718
Price: Free
Time: 6:00 p.m.
—Henri Neuendorf
Thursday, January 19–Saturday, May 13
Installation view of “Cynthia Daignault: There is nothing I could say that I haven’t thought before” (2016). Courtesy of the artist.
8. “Cynthia Daignault: There Is Nothing I Could Say that I Haven’t Thought Before” at FLAG Art Foundation
In an unusual twist on a group show, Cynthia Daignault has tapped 36 artists whose work deals with appropriation and readymades to collaborate with her. Instead of exhibiting their work, however, Daignault has recreated her own versions of their paintings, based only on JPEGs of the originals.
“To make any copy,” said the artist in a statement, “is to perform a shadow dance where the artist mimics and mirrors their subject.”
Location: FLAG Art Foundation, 545 West 25th Street, 9th Floor
Price: Free
Time: Wednesday–Saturday, 11 a.m.–5 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
William Kentridge, What Will Come, (2007). Anamorphic projection; 35mm film transferred to DVD, 8-minute loop, with cold-rolled steel table and cylinder. Museum Purchase 2016 ©2007 William Kentridge. All rights reserved
9. William Kentridge at the Newark Museum of Art
Ahead of the relocation and reinstallation of its Arts of Global Africa collection in November 2017, the Newark Museum just debuted (Saturday January 15) a newly acquired video installation by South African artist William Kentridge. What Will Come (2007) will be on view in the Arts of Global Africa’s dedicated space for video art through May 2017. The title is inspired by a Ghanaian proverb, “What will come, has already come,” a reference to the cyclical and repetitive nature of history. What Will Come focuses on Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia in 1935, in which 275,000 Ethiopians lost their lives. Many civilians were gassed, a fact the Italian government denied until 1995.
Location: Newark Museum of Art, 49 Washington St, Newark, NJ
Price: Adults $15; US and Canadian veterans and their families $8; children, seniors and students $8; children 2 years and younger, members, Newark residents, Newark college and university students free
Time: Wednesday–Sunday, 12 p.m.–5 p.m.
—Eileen Kinsella
Through Saturday, January 21
Zaha Hadid, Seoul Desk (2008). Courtesy Leila Hellery Gallery.
10. Zaha Hadid at Leila Heller Gallery
It’s your last chance (through January 21) to catch this wide-ranging show of the late architect’s iconic work, before it is sent off to Leila Heller’s space in Dubai. On view here are works exemplifying Hadid’s transition after the 1990s from an “early semi-tectonic” phase to a later “semi-liquid” phase as reflected in pieces such as her angular Seoul desk (2008) made with high gloss fiberglass, and the Volu table (2015) conceived as a dining pavilion with curved components. The innovative hallmarks of Hadid’s large-scale building projects and sweeping architecture are on full display here with a wide range of styles and myriad materials.
Location: Leila Heller Gallery, 568 West 25th Street
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Eileen Kinsella