Curious crustaceans, a creepy-cute sea creature in the form of a cat and plenty of sandy beach landscapes feature in Nino Meier’s two-gallery summer group show ‘Beach,’ but Woomin Kim’s textile is a standout for its texture and color, a reference to the Korean markets that inspire her fabric collage. Places for shopping, meeting friends and, here, enjoying seafood, Kim’s market scenes celebrate a beloved institution. (On view through Aug 5th).
LA based artist Kent O’Connor’s paintings of carefully arranged objects are less still lives than just ‘objects on a table,’ explains Mendes Wood DM Gallery, where the artist is also showing portraits, landscapes from a residency in Alberta. The fruit, animal head and bottle in ‘Zebra Between Two Objects’ are carefully chosen and arranged but difficult to connect or interpret; the painting is nevertheless eye-catching for its dramatic lighting and the sense that the zebra is in motion, rearing upward, despite being immobile. The head’s precarious balance– which we’d more likely encounter oriented vertically on a wall, not horizontally as here – along with a placid, almost peaceful expression and the bubblegum pink table frame are unexpected elements that keep the eye moving around this unusual and arresting interior scene. (On view through Aug 5th in Tribeca).
Known for large paintings of plug sockets, phallic sharks rearing out of the ocean depths, surreally distorted human figures, multi-horned unicorns called ‘Morecorns’ and other uncanny imagery, Frankfurt and Brussels-based painter Jana Euler addresses power, gender and sexual relations with humor. In the group exhibition ‘Suncrush’ at GreeneNaftali Gallery in Chelsea, Euler’s ‘Closed Circuit,’ connects a washing machine and a Canon camera by a flexible, fabric lens that joins the circular forms on the front of each device. Each of the improbably joined devices suggest viewing – through a lens or window – but while the assumption is that the camera will be trained on something interesting, the washer recalls the banality of housework. Together, the two elements of the painting suggest the coexistence of, or perhaps battle between, a tool’s potential for excitement vs drudgery. (On view through July 28th).
Like an orderly stack of oranges in the supermarket, Graham Anderson’s new paintings at Klaus von Nichtssagend Gallery in Tribeca are both organic and curving, arranged with rigid geometry, just one contrast of many that generates visual interest and tempts exploration. Some paintings feature a sheet of orange spheres – so orderly they appear stamped out – alongside circular forms with green leaves and shading that suggests natural citrus fruits. Most contain areas of pointillist painting in orange, blue and white color that contrasts flat monochrome orange spheres with no shading. In this painting, that dotted surface breaks up to reveal a background devoid of natural referents. Christmas ornaments, planets, fruit, punctuation, billiard balls and more come to mind in a strange space ripe for invention. (On view through July 29th).
Jessie Henson’s sewn works on paper at Broadway Gallery’s project room are unabashedly beautiful, harnessing the allure of gold to draw viewers in. Abstract yet evoking natural forms – earth’s strata, a horizon – Henson composes patterns with thread and her industrial sewing machine. Waves of textured color wash across the surface of each piece, made more dynamic by the literal bending of paper loaded with thread. Abundant use of 12, 18 and 24K gold – together with areas of day-glo orange, flecks of blue or pink – resist the suggestion of realistic representation, creating a kind of hybrid beauty derived from nature and the man-made. (On view in Tribeca through July 28th).
