Jim Shaw at Metro Pictures

The perfectly coiffed blond hair of the model in this surreal painting by Jim Shaw is not only coming from her head but powering her whole being as she emerges from a mass of curls like a genie materializes from smoke. Now on view at Chelsea’s Metro Pictures Gallery, the painting is part of Shaw’s bizarre but powerfully intriguing merger of advertising imagery and storytelling. (On view through Dec 22nd).

Jim Shaw, The Ties that Bind, acrylic on muslin, 56 x 48 inches, 2017.