Off-the-wall artwork isn’t unusual on the Lower East Side, but artist Daniel Canogar’s flexible LED screen-sculptures give new meaning to the phrase. In a solo show at Bitforms Gallery, Canogar employs grids of LEDS on flexible backing to display undulating patterns, derived from real-time environmental data, from temperature to seismic activity. (On the Lower East Side through Oct 14th).
Son a Thai diplomat, globe-trotting artist Rirkrit Tiravanija has traveled the world for much of his life. On tables covered in rich, purple felt, copper reproductions of the artist’s passports from throughout the years glint in the abundant sunlight of Gavin Brown’s Grand Street gallery like bars of precious metal. (On view through Oct 28th).
Lewis Hine’s early 20th century photos of young women employed in Boston’s textile mills – which aimed to show the deleterious effects of their labor on their bodies – accompany images like this magnification of a textile fragment in Lisa Oppenheim’s latest show at Tanya Bonakdar Gallery. By zeroing in on this fragment of fabric, Oppenheim aims to reduce the distance created in industrial production between bodies and the products of their labor. (In Chelsea through Oct 21st).
Intercut with circus and festival ads and excerpts from Allen Ginsberg’s ‘Howl,’ Allen Ruppersberg’s pointed yet ambiguous texts – one asks, ‘Is one thing better than another?’ – question the status quo in eye-catching day-glo color. (At Greene Naftali Gallery in Chelsea through Oct 21st).
Emily Mae Smith’s huge sea creature is a monumental iceberg waiting to surprise mariners drawn in by the tiny sirens – fantasia brooms morphed into mermaids – atop her head. Both the visible femmes fatale and the lurking, pouty-lipped presence suggest visible and hidden forces to be reckoned with. (On view at Simone Subal Gallery on the Lower East Side through Oct 29th).
