Art in America presents its curtain raiser to the New York art world’s March Madness, the 2011 edition of Armory Week. Here are just some of the off-site highlights to hit this week.
The Independent
Filling three floors of the former Dia Center space in Chelsea, the INDEPENDENT offers the quality of a blockbuster fair without all the fanfare that can sometimes overshadow the art. Last year it debuted to unanimously favorable reviews, and its second installment features some of today’s best international galleries: Approach, London; Andrew Kreps, NY; Sutton Lane, London, Brussels, Paris; Johan Konig, Berlin. March 3–6. 548 West 22nd Street. Free.
The Dependent
Pop-up fair, mini-fair, experimental fair, whatever you want to call it, the Dependent (it’s name an obvious nod to its predecessor, the Independent) launches this year with a more DIY spirit than other satellite fairs around town. If you want to discover less commercial, more concept-driven art shown by innovative galleries like Canada, KS Art and Cleopatra’s, this one-day fair is your best bet. March 4, 5–9 pm. The Sheraton Hotel, 160 West 25th Street. Free.
Balice Hertling & Lewis
Balice Hertling & Lewis is an open-ended collaboration born out of a friendship between Paris gallerists Daniel Balice and Alexander Hertling and the American art critic David Lewis. The trio will take over the SoHo project space of Front Desk Apparatus, run by art advisors Rob Teeters and Michael Capio, and present new work by mostly European-born artists like Neil Beloufa, Isabelle Cornaro, Nikolas Gambaroff, Das Institut, Falke Pisano, Stephen Willats and Viola Yesiltac. Opens March 4, 5–7 pm. On view through April 16. 54 King Street, parlor floor. Free.
Moving Image
This new fair, conceived by Ed Winkelman and Murat Orozobekov and co-organized with P.P.O.W. Gallery, was created to remedy the instant attention-deficit-disorder that besets viewers as soon as a video work comes into range at an art fair. Carolee Schneeman, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Miranda Lichtenstein and Hannah Wilke are among the more than 30 artists whose short videos will be featured in an installation of suspended monitors. Come on Saturday for a panel discussion focusing on the state of moving image-based work, with curators Chrissie Iles, Barbara London and Glenn Phillips. March 3-6. Waterfront New York Tunnel, 269 11th Avenue, between 27th and 28th Streets. Free.
Ryan McGinness
When he first presented “Women: The Blacklight Paintings”–featuring live dancers in full-body fluorescent paint–at a seedy strip club during Art Basel Miami Beach in 2006–many viewers didn’t quite know how to navigate so many naked women in one room. Some retreated, leaving a trail of under-tipped neon strippers in their wake, but the brave stayed on to celebrate the spectacle. At the bar Le Bein at the Standard Hotel, a slightly tamer venue, McGinness will present his second installment of the series involving painted dancers as well as four canvases and a blacklight installation. March 4, 9 pm–4 am. 848 Washington Street. RSVP required.
Hort Armory Brunch
Only once a year do you get to enjoy bagels and lox while admiring a Marlene Dumas in the master bedroom of two of New York’s most prominent art collectors. Known for nurturing some of the city’s more interesting emerging artists (they were first to collect Keltie Ferris and Matt Connors), Susan and Michael Hort open their Tribeca triplex for their annual Armory brunch, where guests get to mingle art and mimosas. March 6, 10 am–noon. RSVP required.
Volta Show
The Armory Show’s younger sibling, Volta, highlights solo exhibitions by artists, among them Laurina Paperina, who “kills” her idols through their own mediums (Cory Arcangel is run over on a Nintendo superhighway and Banksy’s rat takes a hit out on him), and Swedish-born Fredrik Hofwander, who evokes the bleakness of his country’s winters through painstakingly detailed graphite drawings. March 3–6. 7 West 34th Street. Admission $15.
Pulse
With an emphasis on emerging artists, Pulse is under new management this year and, for the first time in its New York showing, is centrally located in the Flatiron District. Kim Dorland’s thick impastoed oil paintings at Mike Weiss, Trenton Doyle Hancock’s collage and painting at Singapore’s STPI and Adam Cvijanovic’s landscape wallpaper murals at Cristin Tierney will be among the highlights. March 3–6. The Metropolitan Pavilion, 125 West 18th Street. Admission $20.
Zabludowicz Collection Breakfast
Poju and Anita Zabludowicz’s extensive emerging and contemporary art collection is housed in three cities around the world: London, New York and Sarvisalo, Finland. At their New York space, located in Times Square, they will host a breakfast to showcase new commissions by Sarah Braman, Ethan Breckenridge, Sean Dack, Nick van Woert and Matthew Darbyshire. Also on view is “Proposal for a Floor,” a show of emerging artists curated independent of the collection. March 3, 9–11 am. 1500 Broadway at 43rd Street. RSVP required.
Rirkrit Tiravanija
During Armory week, the art world plans more events centered on food than a Jewish holiday. It’s fitting then that Rirkrit Tiravanija, known as much for cooking curry in blue-chip art spaces as for re-imagining the architectural confines of a gallery, would do the same. Borrowing its title from the Fassbinder film Ali:Fear Eats the Soul, the exhibition will incorporate, among other elements, a T-shirt factory and a soup kitchen. Opens March 5, 6–8 pm, runs through April 16. Gavin Brown’s enterprise, 620 Greenwich Street. Free.
David Wojnarowicz
The prolonged controversy surrounding the censorship of David Wojnarowicz’s 1987 film A Fire in My Belly during the “Hide/Seek” exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, has garnered the late artist renewed attention. As part of “Spirituality,” P.P.O.W. will present this piece in its entirety, along with paintings, photographs, sculptures and other films, dating from 1979 to 1990, to help contextualize and clarify misconceptions surrounding the video. On view March 3–April 9, with an opening reception on March 5, 6-8 pm. 535 West 22nd Street, 3rd Floor. Free.
“Involuntary” at FordProject
Launched in January of this year, in a lavish penthouse on 57th Street, FordProject tiptoes the line where fashion and art intersect. For its second exhibition, critic and curator Neville Wakefield asked Scott Campbell, Liz Magic Laser, SUPERFLUX and Ryan McGinley, among others, to create work that responds to the building’s rich history. Numerous reports say the space is haunted, so it’s no surprise that the results are at times morbid, mysterious and visceral. Opens March 1, runs March 2–April 15. 57 West 57th Street, floors 19 and 20. RSVP required for opening.
