Each week, we search for the most exciting and thought-provoking shows, screenings, and events, both digitally and in-person, in the New York area. See our picks from around the world below. (Times are all ET, unless otherwise noted.)

Monday, November 15–Sunday, December 12

Martha Zmpounou, Man in Yellow Suit (2021). Courtesy of Young Space.

1. “Intimate Spectres” at Young Space

Virtual platform Young Space presents an online group show of 12 artists presenting paintings, sculpture, and multi-media works. Taking the theme of presence and absence as a jumping off point, the show explores how we can be so well connected through technology, yet lack physical—and emotional—intimacy.

Time: Daily at all times

—Neha Jambhekar

Tuesday, November 16

Image courtesy of Powrplnt.

2. “Legal Basics Every Artist Should Know: Licensing 101” at Powrplnt, Brooklyn

Anibal Luque, cofounder of artist network Powrplnt, will talk creatives through the tricky process of licensing their art—and, presumably, how you can get compensated if someone uses your work without permission. You can send in your questions on the topic to [email protected].

Price: Suggested donation $5–$25
Time: 6 p.m.–7:30 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Wednesday, November 17

Michelle Hartney is launching her new project “Unplanned Parenthood” with a Zoom talk. Image courtesy of Michelle Heartney.

3. “Unplanned Parenthood: Fireside Chat with Artist and Activist Michelle Hartney” at the Jane Club, Los Angeles

Los Angeles women’s co-working space the Jane Club is helping Chicago-based feminist artist and activist Michelle Hartney launch her new textile-based installation, “Unplanned Parenthood,” with a virtual talk. Hartney will speak with Jane Club editorial director Carmen Rios on topics including the history of attacks against women’s health access, and how we can achieve true, intersectional reproductive justice in the future.

Price: Free
Time: 2:30 p.m. PT

—Sarah Cascone

Wednesday, November 17–Sunday, January 2, 2022

Inside “Immersive Van Gogh.” Photo by Ben Davis.

4. “Immersive Van Gogh ” at Pier 36 NYC

For better or worse, the sensation that is “Immersive Van Gogh” returns to New York for the holiday season. It’s undoubtedly overpriced, but the source material is obviously world-class, and the production values are strong. If your mom is still dying to go, tickets would make a nice gift.

Location: Pier 36 NYC, 299 South Street, New York
Price: $29.99–$99.99
Time: Sunday to Thursday, 10 a.m.–9 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 10 a.m.–10 p.m. (opening day 1 p.m.–9 p.m.)

—Sarah Cascone

Thursday, November 18

Marco A. Castillo, Generación (2019), still. Photo ©Marco A. Castillo, courtesy Nara Roesler Gallery and KOW, Berlin.

5. “Generación Screening and Discussion” at the Institute for Research in Art Contemporary Art Museum at the University of South Florida, Tampa

Ahead of the opening of the controversial 14th Havana Biennial, USFCAM is hosting a virtual screening of Cuban artist Marco Castillo’s short film Generación, about the suppression of artist voices on the part of the nation’s authoritarian regime. After the movie, the museum’s curator-at-large, art critic Christian Viveros-Fauné, will moderate a discussion with Castillo and exiled Cuban artists and activists Katherine Bisquet and Hamlet Lavastida.

Price: Free with registration
Time: 6 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Thursday, November 18 and Friday, November 19

Maggie Steber, Masuda Dreams of the Past (2005). Photo ©Maggie Steber, courtesy of the artist.

6. “WOPHA Congress: Women Photography and Feminisms” at the Perez Art Museum Miami

Even if you’re not in Miami, you can tune in virtually for the first annual congress of Women Photographers International Archive (WOPHA). (There is also a wait-list to attend in-person.) The two-day event looks to bring together women art historians, artists, and photography professionals to both celebrate and examine the history of women in the medium. A keynote speech will be delivered by artist Deborah Willis, and panel discussions include topics such as “Can Men Create Feminist Photograpky?”

Price: Free with registration
Time: Sunday–Thursday, 10 a.m.–9 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 10 a.m.–10 p.m. (opening day 1 p.m.–9 p.m.)

—Sarah Cascone

Friday, November 19–Sunday, December 19

Tatyana Murray, CLOUD, detail. Photo courtesy of 11 Newel, Brooklyn.

7. “Effervescent Reflections: Tatyana Murray” at 11 Newel, Brooklyn

For its second outing, Brooklyn’s new 11 Newel gallery offers a pair of solo shows curated by artist and writer Coco Dolle. In the main gallery, self-taught British artist Tatyana Murray presents a selection of her sculptures from the last 20 years. Working with rubber, plexiglass, and metal, Murray explores geometric and circular patterns in her dreamlike abstractions. The project room, meanwhile, features video art and NFTs by David Henry Nobody, Jr.

Location: 11 Newel, 11 Newel Street, Brooklyn
Price: Free with RSVP
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–10 p.m.; Wednesday–Friday, 2 p.m.–5 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 12 p.m.–5 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Through Saturday, November 20 

Maggie Ellis, Cold Couple (2021). Courtesy of Charles Moffett.

8. “Maggie Ellis: Strange Strangers” at Charles Moffett, New York

Maggie Ellis’s second solo exhibition at Charles Moffett gallery brings together just over a dozen large-scale figurative paintings that offer up refreshingly strange New York scenes—a man watches pornography with his window open in The Neighbors, while, in another, the faces in a crowd are glaringly lit up by a movie theater screen. Ellis works from memory and quickly sketched ink and pencil studies, imbuing these intimate—if somewhat freaky—paintings with fluidity, eye-popping colors, and an irreverent sense of humor. All in all, the show gives visitors the one-of-a-kind pleasure of people-watching.

Location: Charles Moffett, 511 Canal Street #200, Buzzer 3, New York
Price: Free
Time: Wednesday to Saturday, 12 p.m.–6 p.m. 

—Katie White

Saturday, November 20–Friday, January 21

Chris Marker, PASSENGERS, Untitled #26 (2011). Courtesy of Peter Blum.

9. “Chris Marker: 100” at Peter Blum, New York

Peter Blum Gallery presents a solo exhibition presenting seven decades of work by the late French photographer and film director Chris Marker, with 250 photographs, film stills, and prints on view. From rare snapshots of life in North Korea captured in 1957 to everyday view of the Paris Metro taken just before his death in 2012, Maker built a “lasting influence across media and through his writings on the ways in which we consider time, memory, and observation of contemporary life,” according to a gallery statement.

Location: Peter Blum, 176 Grand Street, New York
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday to Friday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m., Saturday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m.

—Neha Jambhekar

Sunday, November 21

The Highbridge Water Tower, in Washington Heights, New York. Photo by Beyond My Ken, GNU Free Documentation License and Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International, 3.0 Unported, 2.5 Generic, 2.0 Generic and 1.0 Generic license.

10. “Highbridge Water Tower Tour” in Washington Heights, New York

Firmly on the architectural side of the art and design spectrum, New Yorkers have a rare chance to climb the 179 steps to the top of the nearly 200-foot-tall Highbridge Water Tower, recently featured in Lin Manuel Miranda’s In the Heights. The Parks Department just completed at $5 million restoration of the historic stone structure, built in 1872 as part of the Old Croton Aqueduct that supplied the city’s water. This weekend marks the first of a series of free tours of the landmark, conducted by NYC Parks Urban Park Rangers.

Location: Highbridge Water Tower, West 174 Street and Amsterdam Avenue, New York
Price: Free with registration
Time: 1 p.m.–2 p.m.

—Sarah Cascone

Through Saturday, November 27

Macauley Norman, Spaghetti Western (2021). Courtesy of Deep Space Gallery.

11. “Cryptic Clutter: New Works by Macauley Norman” at Deep Space Gallery, Jersey City

Head over to Jersey City to catch Macauley Norman’s “Cryptic Clutter”, the artist’s third solo show with the gallery. Norman fills his drawings and paintings with pop cultural references and painterly textures to create fun and imaginative still-lifes and interior spaces.

Location: Deep Space Gallery, 77 Cornelison Avenue, Jersey City
Price: Free
Time: Monday to Sunday by appointment

—Neha Jambhekar

Through Saturday, December 4

Jake Kean Mayman, Chroma Key Capture (Jack Nicholson, Cybermaxx and Pikes Peak after Stuart Williams) (2021). Photo by Josh Schaedel, courtesy the artist and Candice Madey, New York.

12. “Jake Kean Mayman: Technium Territories” at Candice Madey, New York

In his latest solo exhibition, Los Angeles-based Jake Kean Mayman gives a firmware update to the most classical of artistic genres—still-life oil painting—by lushly depicting components of what technologist and author Kevin Kelly calls “the technium,” the conceptual ecosystem of devices, philosophy, and culture invented by humankind. From obsolete V.R. headsets and single-board computers, to once-scarce fruits now available daily (at least, in rich countries), thanks to advances in agribusiness and logistics, Mayman’s chosen subjects simultaneously document and indict our civilization’s delusions of grandeur. Amid rhetoric from today’s Silicon Valley billionaires about eternal life via imminent digital breakthroughs, the paintings are wry, poignant, and necessary reminders that this too shall pass.

Location: Candice Madey, 1 Rivington Street, New York
Price: Free
Time: Wednesday to Saturday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m.

—Tim Schneider

Lumin Wakoa, In Time (2021). Courtesy of Deanna Evans Projects.

13. “Lumin Wakoa: In Time” at Deanna Evans Projects, Brooklyn

Deanna Evans Projects’s Lumin Wakoa solo exhibition is made up of small paintings inspired by and made during last year’s quarantine. Wakoa employs the “plein air” technique, but instead of painting what she sees outside, she paints from memory while outside and in the studio. In the process, she goes back and forth over her subject matter several times. As a result, “the paintings explore subtle color shifts, rhythmic outward movement, and can feel like they are pressing forward into the canvas,” according to the gallery statement.

Location: Deanna Evans Projects, 1329 Willoughby Avenue, #171E, Brooklyn
Price: Free
Time: Wednesday to Saturday, 1 p.m.–6 p.m.

—Neha Jambhekar

Through Saturday, December 18, 2021

Claire Lehmann, The Mocking of Nature (2019). Courtesy of David Lewis.

14.  “Claire Lehmann” at David Lewis Gallery, New York

Brooklyn-based painter Claire Lehmann’s first solo exhibition at David Lewis Gallery is remarkably also the first time she’s shown her work publicly in around 18 years. In the nearly two intervening decades, Lehmann has worked as a writer, editor, and curator (she co-curated the 2013  “Ileana Sonnabend: Ambassador for the New” exhibition at MoMA with Ann Temkin). Whether or not she’s been covertly painting all this time, her nocturnal, and eerily beautiful canvases seem imbued with a spirit of the clandestine and the unseen. Photography manuals, detached hands, video equipment, and still-lifes all serve as subjects: her paintings seem to ask both how we see and the ways we classify those images too. (One painting, The Object Lesson, will conjure up certain iconology lessons for anyone whose ever taken an art history course). Her titles often hint at Biblical symbols or scenes familiar in Western art, and evoke in themselves a sense of the profound mystery of the unseen world.

Location: David Lewis Gallery, 57 Walker Street, New York
Price: Free, RSVP required
Time: Tuesday to Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m. 

—Katie White