Each week, we search New York City for the most exciting and thought-provoking shows, screenings, and events. See them below.
Monday, November 11
Florence Knoll. Photo courtesy of Phillips.
1. “ART MATTERS A Woman in Charge: Florence Knoll” at Phillips
In the new season of “ART MATTERS,” Phillips’s speaker series hosted by Arnold Lehman, witness a celebration of mid-twentieth-century American women furniture designers, namely Florence Knoll Bassett. The panelists include Knoll’s biographer Paul Makovsky, design expert and author Suzanne Slesin, and Sarah Lichtman, director of the history of design and curatorial studies masters program at Parsons in New York.
Location: Phillips, 450 Park Avenue
Price: Free with RSVP
Time: 6 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Monday, November 11–Saturday, December 21
George Condo, Prismatic Head Composition (2019). ©George Condo/ARS (Artists Rights Society), New York. Courtesy of the artist and Skarstedt, New York.
2. “George Condo: Paintings and Works on Paper” at Skarstedt
George Condo’s latest works include six large colorful compositions with layers of gesso, ink washes, and metallic paint—all done on paper, rather than canvas (atypical for works of such size). There are also three monumental canvases measuring 11-by-10 feet and smaller improvisational drawings.
Location: Skarstedt, 19 East 64th Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Tuesday–Friday, 9:30 a.m.–6 p.m.; Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Tanner West
Tuesday, November 13
Roger Brown, Sarajevo the Serbian Way. Courtesy of Venus Over Manhattan.
3. “Roger Brown” at Venus Over Manhattan
As a student at the Art Institute of Chicago in the late 1960s, Roger Brown began showing with the Chicago Imagists. Inspired by his southern childhood and long road trips taken with his family, Brown’s Folk Art-influenced paintings most often depict the American landscape. Venus Over Manhattan has teamed up with the Roger Brown Study Collection at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Kavi Gupta to present a comprehensive survey of his long career.
Location: Venus Over Manhattan, 980 Madison Avenue
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Tanner West
Thursday, November 14
Arantxa Araujo wearing a garment by Boris Kourtoukov for “Cuerpxs Radicales: Radical Bodies” at the Brooklyn Museum. Photo by Wei Chao.
4. Anthony Haden-Guest + Arantxa Araujo perform Wonder Without Land at the Orange Art Foundation
In celebration of “Wonder Without Land,” the Kuzma Vostrikov and Ajuan Song photography exhibition curated by Coco Dolle and Milk + Night (on view through December 2), the Orange Art Foundation presents an evening of performance featuring art critic and cartoonist Anthony Haden-Guest and Mexican multidisciplinary artist Arantxa Araujo.
Location: Orange Art Foundation, 12 Wooster Street
Price: Free
Time: 6 p.m.–8 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Robert A.M. Stern. Photo courtesy of Robert A.M. Stern Architects.
5. “2019 Louis Auchincloss Prize Presentation & Reception” at the Museum of the City of New York
The Museum of the City of New York is honoring architect Robert A.M. Stern, the former dean of the Yale School of Architecture in New Haven, Connecticut, with its annual Auchincloss Prize. During the award presentation, he’ll speak with architectural critic Paul Goldberger, a contributing editor for Vanity Fair magazine.
Location: Museum of the City of New York, 1220 5th Avenue at East 103rd Street
Price: From $250
Time: Cocktails, 6:30 p.m.; award presentation, 7:30 p.m.
—Nan Stewert
Thursday, November 14–Saturday, November 16
SPEAKING TRUTH | SUMMIT X. Image courtesy of Creative Time.
6. “Speaking Truth | Summit X” at Cooper Union
Now in its 10th year, the Creative Time Summit is back in New York to consider such hot-button issues as censorship in the arts, climate science, reproductive justice, gun violence, the global economy, and the future of public art. Expected highlights include presentations from Charles Gaines and Chris Kraus, a series of artist-hosted dinner activations, and a panel on criticism featuring Artnet News’s National Art Critic, Ben Davis, plus Gretchen Coombs and Jasmine Weber.
Location: The Great Hall at Cooper Union, 7 East 7th Street and satellite venues across New York City
Price: $35–$303
Time: Thursday, 7 p.m.–9 p.m.; Friday–, 10:30 a.m.–6 p.m.; dinner 7:30 p.m.–9:30 p.m.; Saturday, 11 a.m.–4 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, November 14–Monday, November 18
Chris Schanck, Puff and Stuff Chairs. Photo courtesy of the artist.
7. “Salon Art + Design” at the Park Avenue Armory
Salon Art + Design, now in its eighth edition, aims to bring together the best of vintage, Modern, and contemporary design from 56 galleries hailing from 14 countries around the world. Fair programming includes talks on collecting sustainable jewelry and on how artisans are embracing 21st-century technology.
Location: Park Avenue Armory
Price: General admission $30
Time: Thursday, Dia Art Foundation First Look 4 p.m.–5 p.m.; Collectors Preview, 5 p.m.–7 p.m.; Vernissage, 7 p.m.–9 p.m.; Friday, 11 a.m.–8 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 11 a.m.–7 p.m.; Monday, 11 a.m.–5 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, November 14–Sunday, January 17, 2020
Katsura Funakoshi, Sound of Tree Water (2019). Photo courtesy of Van Doren Waxter.
8. “Katsura Funakoshi: A Tower in the Night Forest” at Van Doren Waxter
In his first US show in over a decade, Japanese artist Katsura Funakoshi presents hand-carved sculptures and drawings made between 2011 and today. The artist is known for employing camphor wood, traditionally used for religious objects, to chisel out futuristic figures featuring painted marble eyes.
Location: Van Doren Waxter, 23 East 73rd Street, second floor
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, November 14–Saturday, January 11, 2020
Xenia Hausner, Agent Provocateur (2019). Courtesy of Xenia Hausner.
9. “Xenia Hausner” at Forum Gallery
Forum Gallery presents the first US solo exhibition in a decade of Austrian artist Xenia Hausner. The show consists of 12 arresting new works, all brightly colored group portraits of women that engage with the “inner drama of the subjects.”
Location: Forum Gallery, 475 Park Avenue at 57th Street
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 5:30 p.m.–7:30 p.m.; Monday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–5:30 p.m.
—Neha Jambhekar
Thursday, November 14–Thursday, February 20, 2020
Photo courtesy of Chellis Baird.
10. “Chellis Baird: Meditative Motions” at Saint Peter’s Church
While Louise Nevelson’s Chapel of the Good Shepherd at Saint Peter’s Church, the only artist-designed chapel in New York City, is undergoing renovation, Chellis Baird has created an installation of her sculptural, deeply textured paintings at the entrance to the 1977 artwork.
Location: Saint Peter’s Church, 619 Lexington Avenue at East 54th Street
Price: Free
Time: 8:30 a.m.–8:30 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, November 14–Friday, July 3, 2020
Edwin Land, inventor of instant photography, holds a Polaroid SX-70 camera and photograph. Photo by Joyce Dopkeen/Archive Photos/Getty Images.
11. “Made at the NYPL” at the New York Public Library
Since its founding almost 125 years ago, how many important inventions, publications, and works of art have come together thanks to research done at the New York Public Library? This exhibition details no less than 34 creative projects that had their genesis at the library’s 42nd Street flagship and research branches, from Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique to the Polaroid camera, which was made possible thanks to an 1852 article about polarizing crystals that inventor Edwin Land found at what was then called the library’s Science Division.
Location: New York Public Library, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, Celeste Auditorium, 476 Fifth Avenue at West 42nd Street
Price: Free
Time: Sunday, 1 p.m.–4:45 p.m.; Monday, Thursday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–5:45 p.m.; Tuesday and Wednesday, 10 a.m.–7:45 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Saturday, November 16
dieFirma. Photo courtesy of dieFirma
12. Introduction to Screen Printing with Noelle Dilman at dieFirma
Learn to screen-print with dieFirma team member Noelle Dilman at the company’s newly opened space in the East Village. Attendees will learn the history of serigraphy (“silkscreen/screen-printing”), as well as how to create stencils, prepare screens, expose images, and print an image onto fabric. Fee includes the workshop, materials, printed tote bag, and a silkscreen kit. The workshop is concurrent with dieFirma’s exhibition featuring the work of Gloria Kisch, which includes printed ephemera.
Location: Die Firma, 32 Cooper Square New York
Price: $220
Time: 10 a.m.–2:30 p.m.
—Eileen Kinsella
Marinella Senatore. Photo courtesy of Magazzino.
13. “Marinella Senatore and the School of Narrative Dance” at the Magazzino Italian Art Foundation
Italian artist Marinella Senatore has tapped close to 100 local Hudson Valley performers, both professional and amateur, to take place in the monumental, partially improvised procession that is the School of Narrative Dance. The piece will take place along the streets of Cold Spring, New York, for three hours this Saturday, culminating in a grand finale at the town bandstand.
Location: The performance begins at the Veterans Monument on the lawn of St. Mary-in-the-Highlands, near the corner of Main Street and Route 9D, Cold Spring, New York
Price: Free
Time: 12:30 p.m.–3 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Saturday, November 16–Fall 2021
Dick West, Spatial Whorl (1949–50). Courtesy of the National Museum of the American Indian, gift of Dwight D. Saunders, 2004.
14. “Stretching the Canvas: Eight Decades of Native Painting” at the National Museum of the American Indian
This selection of 39 paintings from the Smithsonian’s collection at the National Museum of the American Indian look to broaden viewers’ conceptions of Native American art beyond romanticized or caricatured stereotypes. Although the market for Native art has often pigeonholed these artists, the act of painting on canvas was quite revolutionary in the early 20th century, disregarding market demand for basketry and ceramics. “The desire to exist on their own terms,” says museum director Kevin Gover in the exhibition description, “is a potent form of resistance.”
Location: National Museum of the American Indian, George Gustav Heye Center, in the Alexander Hamilton US Custom House, One Bowling Green
Price: Free
Time: 10 a.m.–5:30 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Through Sunday, November 17
A photograph of an iceberg from “Honey and Ice: Fragile Elements – Photographs by Bonnie Lautenberg.” Photo courtesy of Bonnie Lautenberg.
15. “Honey and Ice: Fragile Elements – Photographs by Bonnie Lautenberg” at the 92nd Street Y
Photographer Bonnie Lautenberg traveled far afield for this exhibition, shooting out of an airplane to capture the mountains of Israel and sailing to the remote shores of Antarctica to document the icy seas. Her 92nd Street Y exhibition juxtaposes the quiet majesty of these two dramatic landscapes, both so different from the bustling streets of her native New York.
Location: 92nd Street Y, Gilda and Henry Block School of the Arts, Milton J. Weill Art Gallery, 1395 Lexington Avenue
Price: Free
Time: The gallery is open during Kaufmann Concert Hall events and by appointment
—Nan Stewert
Through Friday, December 6, 2019
Robert Rauschenberg, Bellini #1 (1986). Courtesy of LX Arts.
16. “On the Turn: Selections from the Collection of Emily Fisher Landau” at LX Arts
Since the 1960s, eagle-eyed collector Emily Fisher Landau has been busy amassing one of the most important postwar art collections in the world—and it’s one she’s been eager for the public to see. In 1991, Landau opened the Fisher Landau Center for Art in Long Island City, which presented nuanced exhibitions curated from her collection until the center closed in 2017. In 2010, she also promised 400 of her artworks to the Whitney Museum of American Art. This insightful exhibition, which is composed of art-world heavy-hitters like Robert Rauschenberg, Louise Bourgeois, and Cy Twombly, is a small and unexpectedly personal window into one of the great collecting minds of the age.
Location: LX Arts, 36 East 60th Street
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 11 a.m.– 6 p.m.
— Katie White
Through Saturday, December 14
Asif Hoque, Our Renaissance (2019). Photo courtesy of Selenas Mountain.
17. “It’s More About Us: Sanié Bokhari l Asif Hoque” at Selenas Mountain
Selenas Mountain presents an exhibition of work by Pakistani artist Sanié Bokhari and Bangladeshi-American artist Asif Hoque. At first glance, Bokhari’s ceramics and drawings appear to be innocent depictions of women and botanicals, but upon closer inspection they are wild AF—heads on branches, long claws and tongues, blood and hell-fire—the works. As for Hoque, a triptych of angels that are blessed with melanin and lashes is a definite highlight of the show.
Location: Selenas Mountain, 63 Woodward Ave. #632, Ridgewood, New York
Price: Free
Time: Saturday, 1 p.m.–5 p.m., and by appointment
—Cristina Cruz
Through Saturday, December 21
Emmet Gowen, The Nevada Test Site. Photo courtesy of Pace/MacGill.
18. “Emmet Gowin: The Nevada Test Site” at Pace/MacGill
Since 1996, Emmet Gowin has been the only photographer granted permission to document the site outside of Las Vegas where the US Department of Energy has conducted its nuclear tests for the last 40 years. Coinciding with the release of a new monograph of the same name, “The Nevada Test Site” brings together a series of stark black-and-white pictures the artist has made of the area in the years since. The landscape is ravaged and pocked with craters, but Gowin’s interpretations border on the sublime.
Location: Pace/MacGill, 540 West 25th Street
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 9:30 a.m.–5:30 p.m.
—Taylor Dafoe
Through Saturday, January 18
Niki de Saint Phalle, Gorgo (1964). Courtesy of Matthew Marks, New York.
19. “One hundred drawings” at Matthew Marks
Sometimes the best shows emerge from the simplest concepts. This surprisingly intimate, wide-ranging exhibition brings together one drawing each by 100 different artists, stretching from an Edgar Degas sketch completed circa 1860, to a Jasper Johns work finished in 2019. Between them you’ll find a mesmerizing 19th-century ink-and-gouache rendition of a tiger hunt by an unidentified northern Indian artist, a delightful monster sketched by Niki de Saint Phalle, a gauzy green-and-red abstraction by Norman Lewis, and 95 other works, every one blazing a different trail outward from the most fundamental starting point in art-making.
Location: Matthew Marks, 523 West 24th Street
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Tim Schneider