The word for Italian born, Alaska-based artist Paola Pivi’s installation of multi-colored, feathered baby bears at Perrotin Gallery on the Lower East Side is ‘cute.’ Explaining that the installation was inspired by her adopted son’s “energy, life and positivity,” Pivi developed a series of bears playfully fighting, doing acrobatics and generally looking to inspire ‘awwwws.’ (On view through June 8th).
Having painted every block on Broadway and drawn every object she owns, New York artist Elise Engler is no stranger to the long-term project. Her most recent obsession – creating a daily visual record of radio news headlines since November 2015 – has resulted in a dense installation of images on the walls of Frosch and Portman Gallery on the Lower East Side. A somber recording of natural disasters, political intrigue and more, the assembled works testify to troubled times. (On view through May 19th).
17th century Dutch still life painters delighted in the effect of light hitting rich fabric or shiny glass; contemporary Brooklyn artist Matthew Hansel is into optical delights of a different sort as he mimics digital distortion in oil and flashe paint. Included in The Hole’s continuing investigation of how digital techniques have impacted non-digitally created art, this shaped painting throws a little fun-house mirror effect into a traditional momento mori. (On view on the Lower East Side through May 19th).
Did Warhol just like Campbell’s soup? Was Roy Lichtenstein simply enamored of blonds? American pop art thrives on its ambiguous criticality towards consumption and mass media marketing, but iconic British pop art icon Peter Blake’s enjoyment of contemporary culture feels less ambiguous. In a noteworthy show at Garth Greenan Gallery, for which a portion of Blake’s London studio has been packed up and reinstalled in Chelsea, the artist’s portraits of wrestlers, clowns, musicians and Marilyn-like woman are a tribute to the more and less famous. (On view through May 18th).
Under a recreation of the night sky as it appeared at the start of the Haitian Revolution, Firelei Baez presents a dramatic installation at James Cohan Gallery’s Lower East Side space featuring empowered female figures who assert their presence in the gallery and in history. Wearing a tignon that refers to the 18th century legal requirement for African-diasporic women to cover their hair, this casually posed yet regal figure lacks a mouth yet speaks with her eyes. (On view through June 16th).
