Bo Bartlett, ‘The Skippers’ at Miles McEnery Gallery

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Beach-goers and surfers look out to sea and a small group of people gather as if for a memorial while an artist at work on his beach chair records it all in an intriguingly mysterious 22’ painting by Bo Bartlett at Miles McEnery Gallery.  The same tone permeates this painting of a young person pausing in the innocent pastime of stone skipping, perhaps to notice two girls walk by or, more ominously, to gaze out at a smoking blaze on the horizon.  Warm sand and blue skies belie the watchfulness and foreboding of Bartlett’s new work, suggesting the impending end of an idyll.  (On view through March 15th).

Bo Bartlett, The Skippers, oil on linen, 46 x 66 inches, 2024.

Mark Ryan Chariker at 1969 Gallery

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Mark Ryan Chariker’s atmospheric paintings at 1969 Gallery are an intriguing anomaly, situating contemporary characters wearing fashions inspired by European art history in historic-looking settings.  In most paintings, none of the elongated, Mannerist characters seem to be saying a word, but each appears to play a role in an understated drama or fateful moment.  Here, in a painting titled ‘Burning Ceremony,’ five figures demonstrate varying degrees of disregard for an unidentifiable flaming object in a huge dish.  Lackadaisical and lacking conviction, their ritual suggests a culture adrift. (On view through Feb 26th.  Proof of vaccination and masks are required).


Mark Ryan Chariker, Burning Ceremony, oil on linen, 24 x 20 inches, 2021.

Rochelle Feinstein at On Stellar Rays

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Rochelle Feinstein’s paired canvases deliver the same information: two cats in front of table or chair legs plus a pattern of black and white stripes.  But the pairing seems to question how subtly altering the stripes and moving the cats might effect the meaning. (At the Lower East Side’s ‘On Stellar Rays,’ through April 28th)  

Rochelle Feinstein, ‘Today in History,’ oil on canvas and digital prints on vinyl, 2013.

Scott Olson at Wallspace

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From their locally sourced wood frames to their marble-dust surfaces, Ohio-based Scott Olson’s abstract paintings delight in the play of color and shape.  In addition to his current solo show at Wallspace, see more of Olson’s work and that of other artists who dedicate themselves to painting in the Walker Art Center’s ‘Painter, Painter’ exhibition. (At Wallspace through May 4th.)  

Scott Olson, Untitled, oil, wax, marble dust on wood, maple frame, 2013.

Billy Childish at Lehmann Maupin Gallery

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A couple in a rowboat would seem to be tame subject matter for rebellious rocker and prolific writer Billy Childish, but the man’s missing face and this painting’s line-driven style channels provocative Nordic expressionism a la Munch.  (At Lehmann Maupin’s Chelesa location through April 20th).  

Billy Childish, Rowers (version y)(Oyster Catchers, Thames Estuary 1932), oil and charcoal on linen, 2012.

Rita Ackermann at Hauser & Wirth

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The figures in Rita Ackermann’s new paintings at Hauser & Wirth’s 69th Street location appear to materialize from the deep, their outlines like veins seen through flesh or marble.  Ghostly characters with pointy pixy noses and saucer-shaped eyes, they walk the line between benevolent and menacing. (Through April 20th).  

Rita Ackermann, ‘Fire by Days Blues VII,’ spray paint, oil pigments and rabbit skin glue on canvas, 2013.

Hope Gangloff at Susan Inglett Gallery

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Hope Gangloff’s pasty-skinned subjects are likened to hip updates on Egon Schiele’s or Gustave Klimt’s characters but the men and women in her latest solo show at Chelsea’s Susan Inglett Gallery – like this picture of ‘Lydia (The Tattooed Lady)’ – seem to be having a lot more fun.  (Thanks to Nancy on last Saturday’s tour for a link to Groucho Marx’s ode to Lydia!) (Through March 23rd).

Hope Gangloff, Lydia (The Tattooed Lady), acrylic/canvas, 2013.

Barkley L. Hendricks at Jack Shainman Gallery

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In his show at Chelsea’s Jack Shainman Gallery, Barkley L. Hendricks updates his reserved 1969 ‘Lawdy Mama’ beauty with a decidedly more confident woman in the 2011 ‘Triple Portrait:  World Conqueror.’ (Through April 6th).  

Triple Portrait:  World Conqueror, oil, aluminum leaf, variegation leaf and combination gold leaf on linen canvas, 2011.

Suzan Frecon at David Zwirner Gallery

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What does it take for a minimal painting to stand on its own strengths, with no explanation or apparent associations to build a context for understanding?  New York-based Suzan Frecon’s abstractions ask this question, offering pure color, shape and surface to absorbing effect.   (At David Zwirner’s 525 West 19th St location through March 23rd).

Suzan Frecon, composition in four colors, trial 3, oil on panel, 2009.

Thomas Nozkowski at Pace Gallery

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“With Nozkowski, a good, slow look-’n’-solve is part of the fun,” Tyler Green of Modern Art Notes has observed in response to Nozkowski’s puzzle-like paintings.  Packed with familiar yet alien forms, they translate the everyday world into abstraction. (At Pace Gallery’s 508 West 25th Street location through March 23rd).  

Thomas Nozkowski, Untitled (9-22), oil on linen on panel, 2012.

Giorgio Griffa at Casey Kaplan Gallery

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Giorgio Griffa, Festone, acrylic on canvas, 1984.
Giorgio Griffa, Festone, acrylic on canvas, 1984.

‘Festone’ (festoon) feels like the perfect title for this festive, beautifully colored acrylic painting by Turin-based painter Giorgio Griffa.  Hurricane Sandy damaged  the delicate-appearing work in his first New York solo show since 1970 in October; now the prolific Griffa, who folds and shelves his paintings upon completion, is back with a new selection of pleasingly minimal abstractions worth celebrating.  (At Chelsea’s Casey Kaplan Gallery through March 2nd).

Sascha Braunig at Foxy Production

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Sascha Braunig, Nets, gouache and acryla-gouache on paper, 2012.
Sascha Braunig, Nets, gouache and acryla-gouache on paper, 2012.

‘Nets’ by young, Maine-based painter Sascha Braunig blurs the boundaries between her subject and his/her background, begging the question of where this individual’s boundaries lie.  Is (s)he real or virtual?  What effects have applied?  And where might we meet such a person?  (At Chelsea’s Foxy Production, through Feb 9th).

Daniel Buren at Petzel Gallery

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Daniel Buren, installation view at Petzel Gallery, 2013.
Daniel Buren, installation view at Petzel Gallery, 2013.

In the late 60s, when the avant-garde sidelined painting for Minimalism, Performance and Conceptual art, Daniel Buren forged ahead with ‘painting’ that jettisoned aesthetic concerns.  He hit on a formula that he’s used ever since, using vertical stripes 8.7cm in width in site specific installations that force reconsideration of their space.  Petzel’s new 18th Street gallery space has barely had time to be considered (this is only the 2nd show there), but Buren’s work has never looked more attractive.

Jacob Kassay at The Kitchen

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Jacob Kassay, installation view of Untitled (disambiguation), 2012.
Jacob Kassay, installation view of Untitled (disambiguation), 2012.

Jacob Kassay’s electroplated canvases – paintings made with old photographic processes – became better known in the past year or so for their astronomical prices than their artistic merit.  In Kassay’s current show at The Kitchen one of the signature silver-colored pieces sits in the gallery corner behind a beam, an unambiguous message that the artist has moved on. (At The Kitchen through Feb 16th).

Jacob Kassy, installation view of Untitled (disambiguation), 2012.
Jacob Kassy, installation view of Untitled (disambiguation), 2012.

David Humphreys at Fredricks & Freiser

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David Humphrey, Cement Truck, acrylic on canvas, 2012.
David Humphrey, Cement Truck, acrylic on canvas, 2012.dai

A cement truck crashes on an empty highway whose grey surface is mirrored in the air, the red color from the hood bleeds onto the roadway, forming a colorful abstraction, while a skinny kid in an astronaut’s helmet looks on.  It could only be a painting by David Humphry, whose signature mix of abstraction and realism, saturated colors and colliding stories awaken possibilities for strange stories.  (At Fredricks & Freiser through Jan 19th).

Luc Tuymans at David Zwirner Gallery

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Luc Tuymans, Jacket, oil on canvas, 2011.
Luc Tuymans, Jacket, oil on canvas, 2011.

From Belgium’s colonial past to The Disney Company’s practices, Luc Tuymans’s past paintings have obliquely referenced the exercise of power and control.  By contrast, his latest body of work presents fragments from his own life, including this ominous image of a zoo building and a jacket, which looks like a modernist abstraction plus or minus a body.  (At David Zwirner Gallery, 519 West 19th Street through Feb 9th).

Luc Tuymans, Zoo, oil on canvas, 2011.
Luc Tuymans, Zoo, oil on canvas, 2011.

Keltie Ferris at Mitchell-Innes & Nash

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Keltie Ferris, Turn, Turn, Step, Step, oil and acrylic on canvas, 2012.
Keltie Ferris, Turn, Turn, Step, Step, oil and acrylic on canvas, 2012.

‘Fresh, direct and very much of this moment,’ is how the New York Times described Brooklyn artist Keltie Ferris’ show of large, digital-looking handmade oil and acrylic paintings at Chelsea’s Mitchell-Innes & Nash.  Blurs of sprayed paint suggest a plane’s vapor trail while carefully painted pixel-like blocks of yellow-orange color lend the painting a jumpy energy.  (Through Jan 12th.)

Tal R at Cheim & Read

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Tal R, The Minute, rabbit glue and pigment on canvas, 2012.
Tal R, The Minute, rabbit glue and pigment on canvas, 2012.

Danish painter Tal R translates the world into more vibrant colors in paintings which give everyday places a fairground appeal, albeit a slightly foreboding one.  In ‘The Minute,’ the biomorphic shapes of the clouds suggest strange happenings while a dark corner looks like the folded corner of a book page. (At Chelsea’s Cheim & Read Gallery through January 12th.)

Isabella Kirkland at Feature, Inc.

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Isabella Kirkland, Nova: Canopy, oil paint on polyester over wood panel, 2008.
Isabella Kirkland, Nova: Canopy, oil paint on polyester over wood panel, 2008.

Titled ‘Nova: Canopy,’ this meticulously detailed painting by Isabella Kirkland (an artist and a research associate in the department of aquatic biology at the California Academy of Sciences) brings together plants and creatures found in the rainforest canopy, though not all in the same geographic location.  All discovered in the past twenty years, they’re a powerful testament to earth’s profusion. (At Feature, Inc’s group show ‘Punt’ on the Lower East Side through Dec 22nd.)

Mickalene Thomas Landscape at Lehmann Maupin

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Mickalene Thomas, 'Vertical View of Jardin d'Eau,' rhinestones, acrylic, oil and enamel on wood panel, 2012.
Mickalene Thomas, ‘Vertical View of Jardin d’Eau,’ rhinestones, acrylic, oil and enamel on wood panel, 2012.

Mickalene Thomas is having her moment in New York, with gallery shows at Lehmann Maupin Gallery in Chelsea and on the Lower East Side while her retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum continues.  This landscape, now on view on the Lower East Side and titled ‘Vertical View of Jardin D’Eau’ was inspired by Thomas’ residency at Monet’s residence and garden at Giverny, home of his famous water lilies.   (At Lehmann Maupin Gallery through Jan 5th).

Barnaby Furnas at Marianne Boesky Gallery

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Barnaby Furnas, Jonah and the Whale #2, water-based pigment, color pencil and acrylic on linen, 2012.
Barnaby Furnas, Jonah and the Whale #2, water-based pigment, color pencil and acrylic on linen, 2012.

Whale-lovers beware at Barnaby Furnas’ latest solo show at Marianne Boesky Gallery in Chelsea – riffing on Herman Melville’s ‘Moby Dick’ and Jonah’s cetacean misadventure, Furnas’s new paintings picture whalers in total, gory triumph.  Inspired by the fact that whale oil provided light for lamps, Furnas bathes a tattered Jonah in celestial light as he reaches shore, prepared to follow a new path.  (Through Dec 21st).

Peter Stichbury at Tracy Williams, Ltd.

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Peter Stichbury, Xavier Gravas, acrylic on linen, 2012.
Peter Stichbury, Xavier Gravas, acrylic on linen, 2012.

Xavier Gravas is adrift in the contemporary, communication-saturated world.  Consternation bows the perfect swoosh of his arching eyebrows.  His full lips are set grimly together.  He is an invented character that his creator, Aukland-based artist Peter Stichbury, calls a ‘Superfluous Man.’  Haunted by a sense of insignificance, Xavier peruses personal perfection to exquisite and troubling effect. (At Chelsea’s Tracy Williams, Ltd., through Dec 22nd).

Kevin Zucker at Eleven Rivington

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Kevin Zucker, 'Rain (Paradise Cove Towers),' acrylic and toner on canvas, 2011.
Kevin Zucker, ‘Rain (Paradise Cove Towers),’ acrylic and toner on canvas, 2011.

Kevin Zucker’s new paintings of resort hotels in the rain might make us feel bad for the terrible weather on his travels…if he’d actually travelled.  Drawn together from various digital photos, imaginary scenes like ‘Rain (Paradise Cove Towers)’ resonate with recent work by other artists who have created ‘street photography’ from Google Street View.  However, as paintings, they seem to have more gravitas, regardless of how his dot technique emphasizes digital origins.  (At Eleven Rivington on the Lower East Side through Dec 22nd).

Kevin Zucker, 'Rain (Paradise Cove Towers),' acrylic and toner on canvas, 2011.
Kevin Zucker, ‘Rain (Paradise Cove Towers),’ acrylic and toner on canvas, 2011.

Eberhardt Havekost at Anton Kern Gallery

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Eberhardt Havekost, 'Ocean,' oil on canvas, 2012.
Eberhardt Havekost, ‘Ocean,’ oil on canvas, 2012.

Eberhard Havekost’s painting ‘Ocean’ is once again on display as Chelsea’s Anton Kern Gallery reopened today, post-Sandy.  It’s a standout in a show about Havekost as artist and consumer, who transforms an enviable body (sourced from a German ad) into a mottled obstacle to the paradisiacal scene behind.  (Through Dec 15th).

Pieter Schoolwerth at Miguel Abreu Gallery

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Pieter Schoolwerth, After Troy 6, oil acrylic, giclee print and oil pastel on canvas, 2012.
Pieter Schoolwerth, After Troy 6, oil acrylic, giclee print and oil pastel on canvas, 2012.

Painter Pieter Schoolwerth rewrites art history with a new series of paintings that remake 17th century French painter Simon Vouet’s 1635 ‘Aeneas and His Family Fleeing Troy.’  Here, Aeneas, his invalid father and his small son crowd into one dynamic figure (created from digital printout, drawn lines and thick areas of painting) in an urgent escape.  (At Miguel Abreu Gallery, Lower East Side, through Dec 22nd).

Nina Chanel Abney at Kravets/Wehby Gallery & Anna Kustera Gallery

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Nina Chanel Abney, detail of 'I Dread to Think,' acrylic on canvas, 2012.
Nina Chanel Abney, detail of ‘I Dread to Think,’ acrylic on canvas, 2012.

Nina Chanel Abney says she’s ‘living in an age of information overload,’ and her new paintings prove the point by piling up disguised references to mass media content, from politics to advertising. This detail – from an over 20-foot long mural titled ‘I Dread to Think’ – surprisingly jumbles race, religion and gender in two female deities. (At Kravets/Wehby Gallery and Anna Kustera Gallery on 21st Street in Chelsea through Nov 24th).

Mark Bradford at Sikkema Jenkins & Co

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Mark Bradford, We May Be Running Out of a Past, mixed media collage on canvas, 102 x 144 inches, 2012.
Mark Bradford, We May Be Running Out of a Past, mixed media collage on canvas, 102 x 144 inches, 2012.

Mark Bradford is back with more of the mixed media collage/decollage canvases that have made his reputation as a leading contemporary abstract artist, like this mixed media on canvas piece, ‘We May Be Running Out of a Past.’  His latest solo show at Chelsea’s Sikkema Jenkins & Co opened this evening, showcasing eight huge, vibrantly colored pieces that don’t evidence a new direction for the artist but do explain his popularity. (Through Dec 15th .)

Mickalene Thomas at Brooklyn Museum

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Mickalene Thomas, Le Dejeuner sur l'herbe: les trois femmes noires, 2010.
Mickalene Thomas, Le Dejeuner sur l’herbe: les trois femmes noires, 2010.

Mickalene Thomas’s ‘Le Dejeuner sur l’herbe:  Les trois femmes noires,’ rethinks Manet’s 1863 original by substituting three black women for Manet’s two men and a nude woman. Manet’s version was rejected by the Salon, while Thomas’s rhinestone bedecked beauties headline her current show at the Brooklyn Museum (Through Jan 20th.)

Lynette Yiadom-Boakye at Jack Shainman Gallery

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Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, Acid for an Act, oil on canvas, 2012.
Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, Acid for an Act, oil on canvas, 2012.

The young British artist Lynette Yiadom-Boakye was a standout in last spring’s New Museum Triennial.  She’s back with a show of new paintings at Chelsea’s Jack Shainman Gallery titled ‘All Manner of Needs’ in which solitary subjects gaze out at us with searching eyes. (Through October 13th.)

Toba Khedoori at David Zwirner Gallery

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Toba Khedoori, Untitled (mountains 2), oil on linen, 27 1/2 x 40 7/8 inches, 2011-12.
Toba Khedoori, Untitled (mountains 2), oil on linen, 27 1/2 x 40 7/8 inches, 2011-12.

Toba Khedoori is known for her monumental paintings on paper devoid of human subjects, but in her latest show at Chelsea’s David Zwirner Gallery, she makes a major shift to small-scale oils on canvas.  The size change lessens the works’ dramatic impact but a mood of still isolation remains, prompting writer Julian Bismuth to compare each new work to, “…a puzzle piece removed from its set and held up to the light.” (Through October 27th).

Erik Parker at Paul Kasmin Gallery

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Erik Parker, 'Out of the Ark, acrylic on canvas, 2012.
Erik Parker, ‘Out of the Ark, acrylic on canvas, 2012.

‘Bye Bye Babylon,’ the title of Erik Parker’s latest solo show at Paul Kasmin Gallery, and his subject matter – edenic landscapes teeming with psychedelic flora – suggest he’s left the city for greener pastures.  In fact, he’s still Brooklyn-based but uses the exotic locales he depicts to take a mental break from urban life.  (Through October 13th). For more fuchsia skies and purple seas, check out Paul Kasmin’s website.

Andrew Kuo in ‘In Plain Sight’ at Mitchell-Innes & Nash

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Andrew Kuo, 'Tallboy,' acrylic on linen, 2012.
Andrew Kuo, ‘Tallboy,’ acrylic on linen, 2012.

Linsanity goes on hiatus in Andrew Kuo’s tiny painting of Houston Rockets star Jeremy Lin as he is chastised by an angry basketball.  Floating in a tank a la Jeff Koon’s basketballs in his 1985 ‘Equilibrium’ series, the ball becomes the object of our attention, forcing a downcast Lin into the backseat.  The vicissitudes of stardom never looked so cute. (‘Tallboy’ is in the group exhibition ‘In Plain Sight’ at Chelsea’s Mitchell-Innes & Nash through August 17th).

Walter Robinson in ‘Claxons,’ at Haunch of Venison

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Walter Robinson, 'Dallas BBQ,' acrylic on canvas, 2001.
Walter Robinson, ‘Dallas BBQ,’ acrylic on canvas, 2001.

Walter Robinson’s ‘Dallas BBQ’ arouses a different kind of desire than his erotically charged paintings (resembling romance novel covers from the 60s) at Chelsea’s Haunch of Venison.  ‘Here’s the beef’ this small but powerful canvas shouts as it evokes the danger of a cholesterol bomb and the pleasures of one of America’s favorite indulgences. (Through August 17th).

Sandro Rodorigo in ‘Artists Guarding Artists’ at Family Business

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Sandro Rodorigo, Sandro at Work: The Great Self-Portrait, oil on masonite, 2009.
Sandro Rodorigo, Sandro at Work: The Great Self-Portrait, oil on masonite, 2009.

Over years of avid art viewing, particular museum security guards have become as familiar to me as the art they guard though we’ve never exchanged words.  ‘Artists Guarding Artists’ a group show at Family Business breaks the silence with work by artists who work as guards at the city’s major museums, from the Met to the New Museum.  Next time I go to the Guggenheim, I’ll be looking for Sandro Rodorigo to congratulate him on his tongue-in-cheek, self-aggrandizing ‘Sandro at Work: The Great Self-Portrait.’  Though it’s a small painting, it perfectly pillories art world hierarchies of importance that don’t favor guards.  (Through August 17th).