With an ever-growing number of galleries scattered around New York, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. Where to begin? Here at A.i.A., we are always on the hunt for thought-provoking, clever and memorable shows that stand out in a crowded field. Below is a selection of current shows our team of editors can’t stop talking about.
This week we check out Franklin Evans’s immersive artist’s studio/library/listening booth environment at Sue Scott, new paintings plus a giant bronze by Georg Baselitz at Gagosian, and delicately layered fabric paintings by Lauren Luloff at Horton.
Donald Moffett at Marianne Boesky, through April 7
It’s a good spell for Donald Moffett: a 20-year traveling survey has landed at the Tang in Sarasota Springs, and his newest works, displaying a strong new direction, are on view at Boesky. Here richly hued paintings-in his signature technique, spikes of thick extruded paint on panels cut with holes of various shapes-are borne on armatures of found industrial materials and concrete statuary. The assemblages are formally adroit, their allusions to modernism, pop culture and American violence by turns funny and chilling.
James Juthstrom at Westwood Gallery, through March 31
For 60 years the reclusive painter James Juthsrom (1925–2007) dedicated himself to exploring biology, mathematics, expressive abstraction and the human form. This selection of drawings, etchings and mixed-medium works from the 1950s reveals a remarkable talent for depicting nudes in economical, living lines and evoking landscape—as well as more cerebral realms—in semi-abstractions occasionally reminiscent of Mark Tobey.
Charles Long at Tanya Bonakdar, through Apr. 7
The delightfully puzzling sculptures in Long’s ninth show with Bonakdar may call up the loosest of associations—tree branches, a hooded figure, a lectern—but the works remain slippery and unfamiliar. Steel frames are filled in with biomorphic forms in a soy peanut epoxy, a new material for the artist.
Lauren Luloff at Horton, through March 31
A few years ago, Lauren Luloff’s work tended toward the oversize-washy paintings on bed sheets messily draped over wood frames. The small-scale new work at the narrow looks as if it were collaged together from scraps left over from previous projects. Each neatly constructed work had a base of nearly see-through fabric stretched over the frame, onto which Luloff has glued bits of patterned fabric marked with bleach and colorful dyes.
Franklin Evans at Sue Scott, through April 15
To access this gallery-wide installation, you must step gingerly across a glass floor beneath which are shelves filled with trompe l’oeil sculptures of art history, poetry and biographical books. These belong to the artist and his longtime partner, who appear in hanging grids of photos along with friends, family and web-snagged images of art and artists. Colorful abstract tape paintings and collages cover walls and floors in the main gallery with a sound piece of readings permeating all; it’s an immersive environment cerebral and personal, systematic and chaotic.
Georg Baselitz at Gagosian, through April 7
Revisiting his airy painting style of the 1960s, with lively brushwork, energized splatters and a relatively bright palette, Baselitz has come up with a group of monumental canvases that are among his best in years. The elusive figures in these compositions come in and out of focus as the viewer gets swept up in the organized frenzy of it all. Complementing the two-dimensional works is a new—and massive-double-figure bronze, Sing Sang Zero, which adds a note of weighty sobriety to the proceedings.
Thomas Schütte at Carolina Nitsch Project Room, through April 28
Thomas Schütte is better known for large-scale figurative and architectural sculptures, so it’s a treat to see Carolina Nitsch’s compact project room hung floor to ceiling with three different suites of etchings. Old Friends is based on small clay sculptures the artist made in the early ‘90s; the Women revisit earlier ceramic, steel and bronze sculptures of the female body; and Architectural Models documents structures the artist designed (some built, some not) from 1980–2006.
“The Lookout” is compiled by A.i.A. associate editor Leigh Anne Miller.