Ori Gersht at CRG Gallery

A landscape is never just a beautiful view in Ori Gersht’s photographs. A past series pictured tranquil scenes not far from a former concentration camp; the more recent ‘Floating World’ images – shot in Kyoto’s formal gardens – play up the multi-layered meanings of meticulously planned spaces like this one by combining reflected and inverted images. (At CRG Gallery on the Lower East Side through May 21st).

Ori Gersht, Floating Bridge, archival ink print, 47 ¾ x 47 ¾ inches, 2016.

Butt Johnson at CRG Gallery

Titled ‘Quaint Abstractions,’ new ball-point and Gelly roll pen drawings by pseudonymous New York artist Butt Johnson are mind bogglingly precise. Now that deskilling has become an art world buzzword, is meticulously rendered artwork quaint? (At CRG Gallery on the Lower East Side through Feb 21st).

 Butt Johnson, Study for Regression Towards the Mean, ballpoint ink on metallic foil paper, 8.5 x 11,” 2013.