Jaume Plensa’s latest exhibition at Galerie Lelong continues his investigation of portraiture, featuring several of his signature, elongated heads with closed eyes that suggest unseen inner lives. In Chelsea, they are arranged on wooden beams and are joined by spectral faces on the wall that transform the gallery into a contemplative space. (On view through March 11th).
Comparing Elise Ansel’s remake of Northern Renaissance master Hugo van der Goes’ Portinari altarpiece with the original isn’t the point. Ansel distills the main characters from the 15th century Adoration and enlivens them with a dynamic quality that doesn’t exist in the still and measured quality of the original, positing that color, not extreme detail carries the emotion of the scene. (At Danese Corey Gallery through March 11th).
One stone is real, the other is a replica. Vija Celmins entices viewers to ponder which one came from the earth and which from the artist’s hand in this pairing at Matthew Marks Gallery’s 22nd Street space in Chelsea. In other works, Celmins turns her hand to the skies and the seas with meticulous realist paintings that celebrate the creative powers of the artist. (On view through April 15th).
Green Caribbean waters turn menacing under steely grey skies, their currents outlined in rows of fishhooks in this meditation on isolation by Cuban artist Yoan Capote. (At Jack Shainman Gallery’s 24th Street location in Chelsea through March 11th).
Young Brooklyn-based artist Jordan Kasey channels Picasso’s monumental females, Botero’s swollen figures and a sense of the surreal in her huge paintings, now on view at Nicelle Beauchene Gallery. With faces mostly cropped out, ‘Poolside’ foregrounds log-like stacks of limbs belonging to a brand new breed of weighty Titans. (On the Lower East Side through March 12th).
