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.)
Jeppe Hein calls his water-based fountain sculptures “liquid architecture.” His latest interactive water pavilion work at Rockefeller Center will feature four concentric circles of sprinkler “walls” which rise and fall at random, the water creating an ever-changing artwork that doubles as a respite from the summer heat.
Location: Rockefeller Center, Center Plaza, 45 Rockefeller Plaza, New York
Price: Free
Time: On view daily at all times
2. “M.A.L.E.H.: Messages About the Landscapes of the End of the History, Never Again Edition” at Elma, Brooklyn
For two years, the Ukrainian artist Anton Varga painted apocalyptic landscapes and failed utopias, often using the imagery of Socialist Realism. The works were a way of communicating what he saw as the beginning of the “End of History,” he has written, “and its arrival is expressed in the painful disappearance of utopian will from our societies.” Then Russia invaded Ukraine and similarly dystopian imagery began appearing everywhere. So he stopped the series, darkly pronouncing to himself, “never again.” Proceeds from the sale of works will be donated to Ukrainian aid group Come Back Alive.
Location: Elma, 216 Plymouth St., Brooklyn
Price: Free
Time: Saturday–Sunday, 12 p.m.–6 p.m. or by appointment
—Rachel Corbett
Wednesday, June 22–May 2023
Meriem Bennani, Windy. Photo courtesy of High Line Art and Audemars Piguet Contemporary.
3. “Meriem Bennani: Windy” at the High Line, New York
High Line Art unveils its latest work, a co-commission with Audemars Piguet Contemporary that is the first kinetic sculpture by Meriem Bennani, as well as her first sculpture that doesn’t incorporate any video.
Location: High Line, West 24th Street and 10th Avenue, New York
Price: Free
Time: On view daily at all times
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, June 23–Friday, July 15
Honor Titus, Thy Margent Green (2021). Courtesy of Timothy Taylor, New York and London.
4. “Spotlight: Honor Titus” at the Flag Art Foundation, New York
Flag’s Spotlight series pairs a new or previously unseen work of art with a commissioned text. This time around, it’s writer and editor Derek Blasberg with Honor Titus’s 2022 painting Thy Margent Green.
Location: The Flag Art Foundation, 545 West 25th Street, 9th Floor, New York
Price: Free
Time: Wednesday–Saturday, 11 a.m.–5 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, June 23–Friday, July 29
Paola Pivi, Free Land Scape. Photo courtesy of Perrotin, New York.
5. “Paola Pivi: Free Land Scape” at the Perrotin, New York
At last month’s Frieze New York, Paola Pivi was behind one of the art fair’s most talked-about works, a sculpture of the Statue of Liberty with an emoji-like mask, inspired by her adopted son’s extended immigration battle. A larger version, titled You know who I am, is on view on view at the High Line through next spring, and the artist also has a solo show at Perrotin featuring an immersive installation. Pivi takes over the gallery’s third floor with Free Land Scape, an 80-foot-long denim tunnel.
Location: Perrotin, 130 Orchard Street, New York
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–5 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Thursday, June 23–Friday, August 5
Misheck Masamvu, Pink Gorillas in Hell are Gods (2019), detail. Courtesy of Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York.
6. “Marianne Boesky Gallery x Goodman Gallery: Fragile Crossings” at Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York
This two-part show opens this week at Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York, and on July 21 at Goodman Gallery in London. It features sculpture, installation, film, and painting by artists from both dealers, including Ghada Amer, Sanford Biggers, Kapwani Kiwanga, and Misheck Masamvu. The overarching theme is about global instability and the fragility of the human condition, with art responding to issues such as global warming, the African diaspora, and the slave trade.
Location: Marianne Boesky Gallery, 507 West 24th Street, New York
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian, Untitled (2015). Courtesy of James Cohan, New York.
7. “Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian: The Language of Symbols” at James Cohan, New York
Iranian artist Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian achieved late-in-life fame for her cut-glass mosaic technique. But the same geometric forms that appear in her sculptures are also the basis for her far less recognized drawing practice. James Cohan looks to celebrate this important aspect of Farmanfarmaian’s career with a show featuring early works on paper as well as later geometric drawings, demonstrating her long-term engagement with spacial thinking.
Location: James Cohan, 48 Walker Street, New York
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–9 p.m.; Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Friday, June 24-Monday, August 1
Blair Borthwick, Starkeepers. Courtesy of the artist and Matriark.
8. “Blair Borthwick: The Way You Embrace the Stars and the Moon” at Matriark, Sag Harbor
This solo art show featuring a new body of work from Shelter Island-based artist Blair Borthwick, who left a corporate finance career to study at the Parsons School of Design and the Art Students League in New York. Her works in painting, drawing, and collage, which recall Abstract Expressionism, are deeply rooted in the exploration of self. The show is located inside Matriark, a retail space founded by Brazilian-born entrepreneur Patricia Assui Reed that looks to celebrate women designers and artisans.
Location: Matriark, 133 Main Street, Sag Harbor, New York
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 5 p.m.–7 p.m.; 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Eileen Kinsella
Friday, June 24
Jan Steven van Calcar, Muscle figure, (detail) from Andreas Vesalius, De humani corporis fabrica libri septem (1543), page. 170–171. Courtesy of the Getty Research Institute.
9. “The Polykleitos Problem: Illusions of the Ideal in European Anatomical Images” at the Getty Center, Los Angeles
This virtual talk by University of California at Irvine professor Lyle Massey will explore some of the problems confronting early modern anatomists as they tried to define and grasp the human body. For instance, in De humani corporis fabrica (1543), a foundational volume for modern anatomy, writer Andreas Vesalius instructs his readers to find and dissect a human body that looks like an ancient Greek sculpture by Polykleitos. Although almost none of the bodies he himself dissected looked that way, the illustrations in his influential publication rely heavily on tropes of antique male muscularity and direct references to Greek statues. Many anatomical treatises portray the human body as more permeable, abstract, and resistant to Vesalian norms.
Price: Free with registration
Time: 3 p.m.–4 p.m.
—Eileen Kinsella
Saturday, June 25–Friday, August 12
Joshua Petker, Pink Promenade (2022). Courtesy of Rachel Uffner, New York.
10. “Joshua Petker’s Serenade” at Rachel Uffner, New York
In his first solo show at the gallery, Los Angeles painter Joshua Petker draws on a wide range of influences to create kaleidoscope-colored canvases with overlapping layers of images that recall the work of Francis Picabia. The result, which is something of a cross between psychedelic rock posters and traditional stained-glass windows, contains references to everything from historical European paintings to cartoon-like, mid-century fairy tale illustrations to tarot cards.
Location: Rachel Uffner, 170 Suffolk Street, New York
Price: Free
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Saturday, June 25–Sunday, September 25
Portia Munson, Reflecting Pool (2013). Photo by JSP Photography, courtesy of Portia Munson.
11. “Portia Munson: Flood” at Art Omi, Ghent, New York
You might know Portia Munson for her monochromatic installations of all manner of pink objects, from dolls to dildos. Her monumental sculpture Reflecting Pool does the same thing for the color blue, filling a 15-foot-wide above-ground swimming pool with a profusion of mass-produced blue plastic objects. Arranged in a pleasing gradient from dark to light, the display is at once visually appealing and depressing in that it illustrates the waste and disposability of commodification. If you haven’t seen this work in person—it appeared at the 2019 invitational exhibition at New York’s Academy of Arts and Letters—it’s really not to be missed. The exhibition features two additional sculptural installations, including a new work, Blue Altar, with blue plastic items displayed on a shrine-like bedroom vanity, and a dozen small paintings, all on the theme of water.
Location: Art Omi, Newmark Gallery, 1405 Co Rte 22, Ghent, New York
Price: $10 suggested donation
Time: Opening reception, 6 p.m.–8 p.m.; 9 a.m.–5 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Sunday, June 26
Photo by JJ Shulin, Courtesy of Children’s Museum of the Arts.
12. “Children’s Museum of the Arts Beach Block Party” at Spring Street Park, New York
This outdoor festival will feature a wide range of projects with artists in residence at the Children’s Museum of the Arts, from spin art and plastic bag weaving to crustacean mosaics and “mer-made” costumes. There will be music courtesy of Duneska Suannette Michel, also known as DJ Luni, as well as popular beach activities including sand castles and volleyball.
Location: Spring Street Park, 6th Avenue, New York
Price: Free
Time: 12 p.m.–3 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
Through Friday, July 1
Clementine Keith-Roach, New Mourning (2022). Photo courtesy of P.P.O.W., New York.
13. “Clementine Keith-Roach and Christopher Page: Knots” at P.P.O.W., New York
Artist couple Clementine Keith-Roach and Christopher Page share a home and two kids, but this is the first time they’ve had a gallery show together. The exhibition pairs Page’s trompe l’oeil paintings mimicking windows with Keith-Roach’s powerful feminist take on terracotta vessels, which feature casts of her own body.
Location: P.P.O.W., 392 Broadway, New York
Price: Free
Time: Tuesday–Saturday, 10 a.m.–6 p.m.
—Sarah Cascone
