A pair of long white legs tiptoe toward a hanging curtain on the right side of Carolyn Salas’ laser-cut aluminum sculpture ‘Gone’ at The Hole as if making a quick and quiet exit. Behind, assorted disembodied heads, legs and vases suggest a crowded domestic environment from which our protagonist is slipping away to find her own space. (On view in Tribeca through Dec 31st).
A pot of gold in this new painting by Kerry James Marshall symbolizes good fortune but rests near a skeleton’s arm, suggesting that someone’s luck has run out. Such contrast is at the heart of the artist’s new show, Exquisite Corpse, at Jack Shainman Gallery in Chelsea. Titled after the Surrealist game invented in the 1920s, each of the exhibition’s drawings and paintings are divided into three or four rectangular zones and appear to have been completed by separate individuals who had no knowledge of what was drawn or painted by the previous game participants. The conceit might seem humorous at first – Marshall winkingly signed his own name different ways and suggests that he’s playing a game in this series. But operating with no knowledge of the past can have implications if the stakes are higher than a fun time with friends. Beauty ideals, a (disappearing) house, or a pot of gold are mirage-like, unstable symbols, offering food for thought about contemporary life and perceptions. (On view through Dec 23rd).
From toddler fight clubs to flat earth theories, colorful sculptures by Richard Ibghy & Marilou Lemmens at Jane Lombard Gallery symbolize rumors and conspiracies of the 21st century with seriousness tempered by humor. The purple head in the foreground of this installation view represents the notion that climate activist Greta Thunberg is actually an actor in thrall to nefarious powers. Other pieces suggest that the US government can control the weather or that patterns of holes in ripped jeans have been used to communicate secret messages. Lighthearted in appearance but representing harmful misunderstandings, the installation emphasizes the absurdity and ubiquity of widespread falsehoods. (On view in Tribeca through Dec 17th).
Typically, Fiona Rae’s ambiguous painted forms suggest real-world objects but elude identification. Further complicating the work, both gestural and geometric abstraction appear on the same canvas, a surprising combination geared to upend our expectations. Her latest work at Miles McEnery Gallery distills these artistic strategies into paintings featuring distinctly formed clusters of organic and geometric shapes set against a spare white background. Titles reveal that each grouping is a word from a phrase taken from a written source, from pop music to Shakespeare. This airy assemblage reads, ‘I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe,’ a line from the movie Bladerunner expounding on futuristic technological marvels. (On view in Chelsea through Nov 26th).
Inspired by the manically busy brooms in Disney’s Fantasia, Emily Mae Smith’s recurring broom character is set apart – an individual posing with tense self-assurance in several of the artist’s new works now on view at Petzel Gallery. Initially, Smith saw the brooms as representative of unrecognized female labor; separated from the pack, they become lone underdogs constructed from the discards of wheat production but forming identities of their own. This figure is host to two mice on her legs and birds and a squirrel on her head, offering sanctuary and even enduring abuse as part of her relationship to nature. (On view through Nov 12th).
