Many wonderful artists wielded their prowess in and around New York this month, in a myriad of ways and media. Moving around the city in the height of summer can be a daunting task, but these shows draw you into other realms that make you forget all about humidity and glad you made the trip. From Brooklyn to Governors Island to Storm King, here are some standouts that were definitely worth the journey.
Brooklyn, NY
Elizabeth Insogna and Jesse Bransford, Pale Hekate’s Team, Tappeto Volante, ended on July 21, 2024
Ghostly Overlaps, healing rituals, earthly elements, and celestial divinations abound within the magical sphere that is Pale Hekate’s Team at Tappeto Volante. Gorgeous life-size ceramic sculptures by Elizabeth Insogna seductively drip with handmade glaze, seemingly in suspended animation. Deeply etched Greek letters are carved into the tree-like forms that harness the spellbinding power of goddesses and incantations.
Jesse Bradford’s works on the walls invite parallels to ancient maps, spells, and topographies of other worlds, dimensions and existences. Indeed, as one enters the gallery, they are instantly aware of the artists’ channeling of the four elements, rife with the magical energy moving through the space in magnetic ways. The wall installation of ceramics are symbolic of talismans and offerings to the deities that rule all. Bransford and Insogna create invisible threads for us to pull, pluck, and play. These lovely gestures were extended for a special performance by Kay Turner to channel the inner witch and heal collectively. Indeed, this exhibition is spiritually awakening and deeply nourishing, something to experience and behold in all its splendor.
Governor’s Island
The Golden Colonel, Flux Factory, July 12- August 11, 2024
Curated by Heather Kapplow and Itala Aguilera, with assistance from Shinobu Akimoto, co-director of Residency for Artists on Hiatus; featuring work by John Allen, Sydni Ann Baker, Margaret Bellafiore, Noémie Jennifer Bonnet, Ben Galaday, Carrie Hawks, Li-Ming Hu, Shushanik Karapetyan, Alix Lambert (in collaboration with Itala Aguilera), Marcel Marcel, Nancy Nowacek, Moses Ros, Mark Shaw, Walker Tufts, Yolanda He Yang, Silvana Zuanetti, and an anonymous submitter using the moniker “Older Artist.”
An ingenious exhibition; The Golden Colonel highlights the inevitable aging of artists in the form of a rest home that is exploratory, engaging and interactive. From activities channeling convalescence to exercises in the form of physical fitness, card games, and more, its utter charm and wit both delight and bemoan the inevitability that is the albatross of getting old. How do artists navigate such dire straits in a place as expensive and difficult as NYC? The curators and artists provide examples through wit and humor as you move through the house, each installation beautifully telling stories that we can all relate to as we encroach upon the tedious task of growing older by the day. Delight, revel and peek into the future in this savvy, sensitive and relatable show.
Michele Brody, Ernie Paniccioli, Sally Twin, Louel Valentine, Lisa Wade, Art Crawl Harlem, July 2024
Riveting presentations abound in the Art Crawl Harlem house on Colonel’s Row, Governors Island, in its Boundaries & Connections: Games People Play theme. Indeed, the first floor is crawling with a myriad of intriguing works, spanning from photography to installation.
Ernie Paniccioli’s exhibit, Game Changers: Photography and Rap Legacy features timeless icons of hip hop are framed with precision and care, highlighting the legacies and significance of artists such as Queen Latifah, Tupac Shakur, Flavor Flav, Beastie Boys and more.
Louel Valentine’s Echos of Interaction features soulful photographic portraits. These photographs inspire its viewers to appreciate the beauty, tenderness, and externalities around us, poignantly framed against a chicken wire backdrop that considers the human relationship to our surroundings and how we relate to the endless encounters in our lives.
Lisa Wade’s The Barely Visible, the Barely Allowable highlights the fragility of permanence, which features thoughtful photos and text that reflect on society’s ills regarding the issue of being unhoused. It’s haunting reminder that so many increasingly teeter on this continual edge of instability draws a tenderness from the viewer, and its social messaging is an urgent reminder to continue to push for change, empathy and equity for all.
Michele Brody’s paper installation, Nature in Absentia: Monarch Migrations explores the plight of the Monarch butterfly, through migration patterns and the threat to its existence, due to climate change and political exploits on the planet. Created from handmade mugwort/milkweed paper with community members’ stories written on them, the butterflies span up the walls of the interior of the building, drawing us to respect the natural world through its focus on ecology.
Sally Beauty Twin’s ceiling installation of kites brings a joyfulness that truly uplifts and asks us to dream freely and fluidly, and inspire endlessly, as light reflects and shines through the kites in an ethereal dance of hope and positivity. The range of visions within this space holds many connections that draw us through the numerous emotions of humanity and ultimately chart multiple courses for our vision of the future through world-building in eloquent ways.
The House of Confluence: Far and Near, at the Residency Unlimited house on Governors Island
Curated by Guest Curator Data Chigholashvil, this group exhibition features six artists currently in the RU residency program: Sanja Andjelković (Serbia/Austria), Renea Begolli (Kosovo), Alina Grabovsky(Austria), Nate Hester (USA), Zahra Jewanjee (United Arab Emirates) and Jacob Ott (Switzerland).
Art and architecture meld together as they become an amorphous hybrid of oversized organs that expand, contract, and conflate with glee and agility. The wall-size painting of Alina Grabovsky beckons viewers like a siren in the tempestuous sea: drawing you in with its slickly pink and meaty, fleshy qualities that feel as though it will swallow you whole without remorse; but what a glorious way to go. This experience is liberating; its scale and specificity swirl within the expanse of the room like a dizzying tundra in the dead of summer. It is sensationally luscious with undertones of resistance, and its push-pull dynamic is electrifying.
Renea Begolli’s large swathes of blue fabric drape from the ceiling and onto the floor, gathering softly and simulating rope ladders as they hold court and allude to architectural relics of a different time. The patterning in their sheer material mimics the chipped paint of the ceiling, creating a unique sensory melding of different eras, media, and relationships within the interior structures. This is an exciting dynamic that wedges the viewer between two worlds; indeed, entering this scene feels very specific to the site, and so very exciting.
Fabulous sculptural installation work by Nate Hester creates harmonious conversations that tie into the videos by Sanja Andjelković and Renea Begolli. Zahra Jewanjee’s lusciously blue and sensorial painting is blissfully endless in its terrains and depths as it expands upon horizons, humanity, and honoring all that lies in between. Lots of allegories at work within a space that contains such histories and stories of their own. The artworks revel with delight as they greet their visitors, a pleasure to witness upon an island of wonder.
Arlene Shechet: Girl Group, Storm King, New Windsor, NY
This new exhibition of Arlene Shechet’s work beautifully melds with the interior and exterior environments of Storm King’s majestic grounds. Six large, formidable metal sculptures in an array of colors and designs bask in the sun-kissed hills of their new home. Their riveting designs and palettes are truly breathtaking. Inside the museum, smaller ceramic sculptures occupy the rooms, enchanting and delighting in their various combinations, pigments, textures, and marks that are richly tactile and deliciously captivating. Delicate works on paper round out the show, a soft purr amidst the powerful structures that demonstrate the breadth and fluidity within Shechet’s artistic endeavors.
About the writer: Yasmeen Abdallah examines history, contemporary culture, materiality, reuse, memory, and space. She has been a visiting artist at institutions including Columbia University Teaching College, Children’s Museum of NYC; El Barrio Artspace; Fairleigh Dickinson; Parsons; Pratt Institute; Residency Unlimited; Sarah Lawrence; and University of Massachusetts. She holds Bachelor’s degrees in Anthropology and Studio Art with honors, with a Minor in Women’s & Gender Studies from University of Massachusetts; and received an MFA in Fine Arts, with distinction, from Pratt Institute. Exhibitions include Art in Odd Places; the Boiler; Bronx Art Space; Clemente Soto Velez Cultural Center; Cornell University; Ed Varie; Elizabeth Foundation; Nars Foundation; Open Source; Pratt Institute; PS122 Gallery; Spring Break; University of Massachusetts; and Westbeth. Publications include Anthropology of Consciousness;; Bust Magazine; Emergency Index; Hyperallergic; Papergirl Brooklyn; Free City Radio; Radio Alhara; Tussle Magazine and Transborder Art. Her work is in public, private, and traveling collections in the U.S. and abroad. Instagram: @86cherrycherry