Each week, we search New York City for the most exciting and thought-provoking shows, screenings, and events. See them below.
Tuesday, January 28–Sunday, March 8
Peter Saul, Self Portrait As a Woman from the private collection of KAWS & Julia Chiang.
1. “Collectouples: Works from the Private Collections of Julia Chiang & KAWS, Rachel Feinstein & John Currin, April Gornik & Eric Fischl, and Mickalene Thomas & Racquel Chevremont” at the New York Academy of Art
What’s better than one artist collector? How about two. The New York Academy of Art is highlighting the impressive private collections of some of the art world’s hottest power pairs, so even if you’re never invited over to their houses, you can still see what would be hanging up in them. KAWS and Julia Chiang are unabashed fans of Peter Saul, while Eric Fischl and April Gornik enjoy the stylings of Alice Neel and Auguste Rodin; Mickalene Thomas and Racquel Chevremont show off work by their friend Derrick Adams.
Location: New York Academy of Art, 111 Franklin Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; open daily, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Caroline Goldstein
Tuesday, January 28–Saturday, April 4
Jack Whitten left Space Flower #9 ( 2006) right Transitional Space 10 (1969). © Jack Whitten Estate. Photo: Genevieve Hanson, courtesy of the Jack Whitten Estate and Hauser & Wirth.
2. “Jack Whitten. Transitional Space. A Drawing Survey” at Hauser & Wirth
This show marks the first major survey of the artist’s works on paper, spanning his six-decade career. The show highlights Whitten’s playfulness and improvisational skill in searching for his own unique visual language. Working on paper was akin to scientific research for the artist, according to a statement from the gallery. He worked tirelessly on paper to both subvert and elevate the history of art and express his own imagination.
Location: Hauser & Wirth, 33 East 69th Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Eileen Kinsella
Tuesday, January 28–Wednesday, February 4
Leo Gabin, Mother’s Day Rumble. Image courtesy of Christie’s.
3. “Christie’s 100″ Online Auction
The auction house is calling this year’s “Christie’s 100” its most accessible to date. It includes nearly 100 lots, most of which have starting bids of $100. The sale was assembled with a wide range of works that are meant to attract new collectors who are green to the auction world. The sale is the brainchild of Christie’s specialist Noah Davis, himself an artist, who chose works that he thinks will appeal to collectors who are still figuring out what their tastes are.
Location: christies.com
Price: Free to register
—Eileen Kinsella
Thursday, January 30
Dara Birnbaum, Technology/Transformation: Wonder Woman (1978-79). Courtesy of the artist.
4. “Art x Internet” panel discussion at Phillips
On the heels of the ICA Boston’s 2018 exhibition “Art in the Age of the Internet,” the auction house’s senior adviser Arnold Lehman is moderating a panel between the museum’s chief curator, Eva Respini, with artists Dara Birnbaum, Ryan McNamara, and Paul Pfeiffer. The show, which likely resonated with many viewers (even more so with those of us who have never known a life without the wonders of Google and Amazon) touches on themes of privacy, interconnection, and of course, art, as it is influenced by the past and future of technology.
Location: Phillips, 450 Park Avenue
Price: Free, registration is required, artmatters@phillips.com
Time: 6 p.m. (talk begins at 6:30)
—Caroline Goldstein
Friday, January 31–Saturday, March 14
This is not a broken image; it is the only available preview for the mysterious new Merlin Carpenter show at Reena Spaulings. Photo courtesy of Reena Spaulings Fine Art.
With some artists, it’s better to skip a gallery opening, when it will be hot and crowded and there will be people you have to talk to, and instead go a week later, in the middle of the day, and see the artist’s new works in relative quietude. This is not the case with the conceptual painter Merlin Carpenter, a former Martin Kippenberger protege who has consistently made a show’s vernissage an essential part of the viewing experience. Take, for example, his 2007 show at Reena Spaulings Fine Art, which he titled “The Opening” and announced with a press release promising long-lost early works discovered in a storage unit on the remote Italian island of Pantelleria. When viewers entered at 6 p.m. for the opening, they encountered a space filled with platters of finger sandwiches, a profusion of alcoholic beverages, a man playing the piano… and, on the wall, nine blank canvases. Then, suddenly, Carpenter emerged from the crowd and started painting, quickly on each canvas in thick black marks, different incendiary phrases: “Die collector scum,” “I hate the art world you cunts,” “Relax It’s only a crap Reena Spaulings show.” The performance of sorts lasted ten minutes, and then Carpenter left. The New York Times called the whole shebang “flippant punk posturing.” Is it? I don’t think so, maybe you do, but regardless: Do you really want to miss out on whatever Carpenter has up his sleeve when he opens a mysterious new show at Reena Spaulings called “Paint-It-Yourself” this Friday at 6 p.m.? Exactly.
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
Taylor Anton White, Various Cowboys (2019). Courtesy of the artist and Monica King Contemporary.
6. “Taylor Anton White: Free_Hotdog.pdf” at Monica King Contemporary
Taylor Anton White’s first solo show is opening at Monica King Contemporary, and he’s starting out hot. The Richmond-based artist seems to revel in the arcane as much as the cutting edge—his work straddles the disparate modes of communication that we rely on, with a healthy dose of humor that is just as cerebral as it is visually enticing. Though his works live on the wall, many are composites that have as much in common with the work of Claes Oldenberg as they do with Chris Ware.
Location: Monica King Contemporary, 39 Lispenard Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Tuesday–Saturday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Caroline Goldstein
Saturday, February 1
Rocio Marie Cabrera, Uptown Baby Liz, 2019. Courtesy of Longwood Art Gallery.
7. “The Update” at Longwood Art Gallery
Curator Kiara Ventura leads a discussion on the role of the Bronx in the group show she organized at Longwood Art Gallery. “The Update” runs through February 26 and features 10 Bronx artists of color, all under the age of 30, including Patrick Alston, Rocio Marie Cabrera, and Monica Flores.
Location: Hostos Community College, 450 Grand Concourse, Room C-190, Bronx
Price: Free
Time: 1 p.m.–3 p.m.
—Cristina Cruz
Through Sunday, February 23
![Mark Flood, <i>Vote for Law and Order [Blood Stain]</i> (1992). Courtesy of the artist and Karma.](https://news.artnet.com/app/news-upload/2020/01/MAF-92-003-687x900.jpg)
Mark Flood, Vote for Law and Order [Blood Stain] (1992). Courtesy of the artist and Karma.
In 1992, Mark flood made roughly 50 wry silkscreened paintings on cardboard for left-wing demonstrations at the Republican Convention in August of that year. “FREE THE RICH” read one. “FOUR MORE YEARS” boasted another. Twenty-eight years later, the signs recovered from those marches are on view together for the first time at Karma, and they still feel relevant.
Location: Karma, 172 East 2nd Street
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday – Sunday 10 am – 6 pm
—Taylor Dafoe
Through Saturday, March 7
“Kim Westfall: Splendid Bitch” installation view. Photo by Tatiana Berg.
9. “Kim Westfall: Splendid Bitch” at White Columns
Working with tufted yarn, Kim Westfall creates vibrant tapestries are some of the plushest, most original “paintings” you’re likely to find. The artist’s imagery is both deeply personal and slyly humorous, addressing, among other topics, the uncomfortable history of faith-based adoption of Korean children by American families. The resulting works are wholly original—one standout work from the show, I Was Born to Love You, depicts a smiling woman breastfeeding a small dog and has proven impossible to forget.
Location: White Columns, 91 Horatio Street
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Tatiana Berg
Through Saturday, February 15
Installation view of “100:01,” 2019. Courtesy of Y2K Gallery.
10. “100:01: Luke O’Halloran and Patrick Sarmiento” at Y2K Group
The roles of chance and choice in art making are the two central questions explored in this energetic two-person show curated by Sara Blazej. Channeling the “100:01” odds, Luke O’Halloran’s paintings of the spinning wheels of a slot machine recreate the high drama and exhilaration experienced in a moment of chance—with the “right” image standing in for the jackpot. Reminiscent of the kind of bathroom graffiti that is built up over time and by numerous individuals, Patrick Sarmiento’s paintings, on the other hand, seem to compress time and space, compacting innumerable subjectivities into a single image—but one he creates using stencils of freehand tags, repeated again and again.
Location: Y2K Group, 373 Broadway #518
Price: Free
Time: Saturday, 1 p.m.–6.p.m.
—Katie White
Through Saturday, February 15
Salman Toor, Immigration Portrait (2019). Image courtesy Marianne Boesky Gallery.
11. “Xenia: Crossroads in Portrait Painting” at Marianne Boesky
Marianne Boesky’s group show “Xenia: Crossroads in Portrait Painting” explores the resurgence of portraiture through the varied cultural lenses of 17 artists who, in their distinct ways, examine the role of the individual in a globalized society that’s becoming increasingly fractured. With contributions from artists such as Chloe Wise, Maria Farrar, Polina Barskaya, Salman Toor, Cristina Canale, Amoako Boafo, Cindy Ji Hye Kim, and Somaya Critchlow, Boesky’s thought-provoking exhibition addresses the tenuous relationships between one’s identity, place, and social mores, suggesting that as our perceptions of these become more complex, so, too, do our notions of the self.
Location: Marianne Boesky Gallery, 509 West 24th Street
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m
—Noor Brara