Over the past decade, the art world’s calendar has expanded into a far-flung 365-day-a-year whirlwind of openings, talks, performances, fairs and their attendant parties. That’s why the locally specific White Columns Annual, a roundup of art seen over the past year in New York through the subjective eyes of one curator, has become one of Chelsea’s most anticipated events. Celebrating a decade of helming White Columns, executive director Matthew Higgs has curated the tenth version of the show. The exhibition showcases Higgs’s singular sensibility for the conceptual, handwrought and humorous. A Ruth Root painting combining artist-made digital fabrics and handpainted geometric motifs, one of former fashion designer Susan Cianciolo’s showstopping kits, and a multimedia sculpture by wunderkind Kevin Beasley are three of the best-known works in the bunch. Also featured are downtown legends like genderqueer performer Vaginal Davis, John Giorno and Suicide frontman Alan Vega. Outsider art—just in time for this week’s fair—gets pride of place, with selections from artists such as Christopher Knowles, Ray Lopez, Birdie Lusch and William Scott. Don’t miss Marlon Mullen’s rendition of A.i.A.‘s May cover above the reception desk.
Pictured: View of “Looking Back: The 10th White Columns Annual,” 2015, at White Columns. Courtesy White Columns, New York.