| It was snowing this past Saturday, and as I tromped through the newly pearly plain beneath the subway tracks, I realized I didn’t quite recognize the white-blanketed world of my own neighborhood — a feeling simultaneously jarring and wondrous. Some of this week’s reviews similarly address the ways that the surreal can bubble up in the everyday. Alexis Clements’s review of the Guerilla Girls, for instance, is in conversation with Hrag Vartanian’s around the efficacy of the group’s strategies of revealing the inequities of the art world. Natalie Haddad walks us through the dark fairytales of Nathalie Djurberg and Hans Berg — gold beavers and girlish pigs acting out tales of iniquity — remarking dryly that it’s about as dreamlike as the nightly news. And don’t miss Haddad’s review of the light-infused landscapes of Etel Adnan and my review of Cy Twombly’s little-seen experiments on canvas and paper. Brecht Wright Gander points out that Allan Wexler’s elegant sculptures magnify the prosaic absurdities of life (though not without railing against our word count first). In one work, Wexler drives wedges into a twisted tree branch to straighten it out; in woodworking nomenclature, Gander tells us, that’s called making something “true.” Stay true out there, whatever that means in a world as warped as this. And remember that there are guideposts all around to help straighten out your thinking, from the art in the galleries to the ephemeral eden of an expanse of snow. — Lisa Yin Zhang, Associate Editor | | |
|
|
|
| You’re currently a free subscriber to Hyperallergic. To support our independent arts journalism, join us as a member. | | Become a Member |
|
|
|
 | | From AbEx giant Cy Twombly to explorations of assimilation by Serena Chang to the politics of prettiness in the portraits of Marie Laurencin, these shows deserve close looking. |
|
|
|
SPONSORED |  | | | | Black Dress II: Homage continues to explore the contributions of underrepresented Black designers and fashion professionals. Learn more |
|
|
|
FROM OUR CRITICS |  | | | | Etel Adnan: This Beautiful Light at White Cube | | “How many visitors had been raised, like myself, in the diaspora, surrounded by pictures and stories of a bygone Lebanon, grown-ups mythologizing the landscape so that it seemed eternal to a child, the sun-bleached buildings and Roman ruins radiating an otherworldly light?”
|
|
| | | | | | |
|
 | | | | Nolan Oswald Dennis: overturns at the Swiss Institute | | “That invitation to reimagine — and the ability to withhold — is an apt way to see how art can promise the unattainable, creating spaces that have never existed before while demanding we follow certain rules to be granted access.”
|
|
| | Serena Chang: Sweet Water at Island Gallery | | “The suggestion of a field evokes the memory of a historical time and place, utilizing a product that was once ubiquitous for working women as a way to conform to corporate standards, encouraging them to cover up for propriety’s sake.”
|
|
| | | | |
|
WHAT ELSE IS HAPPENING? |  | -
The Brooklyn Museum will lay off dozens of workers due to a $10 million budget deficit. -
In happier news, the Schomberg Center for Research in Black Culture is celebrating its 100th birthday. -
Editor-in-Chief Hrag Vartanian will be in discussion with Tamara Lanier about her new book documenting her struggle with Harvard over ownership of photographs of her ancestors. [hyperallergic.com] -
Aperture, Parsons, and the Vera List Center team up for a conversation about Maurice Berger’s Race Stories: Essays on the Power of Images (2024) at the New School. (Wed Feb 12) [aperture.org] -
Eric Adams was just effectively un-indicted by the Justice Department, in part due to the proximity of the election. Thursday the 13th is the final day to change your party affiliation and vote in the primary. [vote.nyc] -
Mohammed El-Kurd will be in conversation with Fred Moten to discuss Perfect Victims, his book about treating Palestinians with dignity, at McNally Jackson Seaport. (Thu Feb 13) [mcnallyjackson.com] -
Thots & Trots: A Socialist Singles Mixer is happening at SILO Brooklyn this Thursday. (Thu Feb 13) [instagram.com] -
In 2011, Lindsay Caplan, Colby Chamberlain, and Nadja Millner-Larsen began thinking through their individual book projects in the wake of Occupy Wall Street’s encampment. Now, they discuss its impact on their now-published books at Printed Matter. (Thu Feb 13) [printedmatter.org] -
MORESOUPPLEASE — Isaac “Soup” Campbell’s DJ persona — is headlining House Party, an audio experience and opening reception for his exhibition at BRIC. (Sun Feb 15) [bricartsmedia.org]
|
|
|
|
| You’re currently a free subscriber to Hyperallergic. To support our independent arts journalism, join us as a member. | | Become a Member |
|
|
|
This email was sent to newsletter@newslettercollector.com
|
|
|
|
|
