Wednesday, September 4, 2013

fee's LIST / through 10 Sept 2013


WEDNESDAY
NYC
* Kadar Brock "Dredge" @ The Hole / 312 Bowery. You know what I like served dredged? Sweetbreads, run through a cayenne-spiked flour and deep-fried to crispy offal deliciousness. You know what else I like dredged? A suite of new huge-ass canvases by young Kadar Brock, one of the torch-bearers for contemporary abstraction. In the past, he ripped, abraded, and sanded down paintings, and in more recent cycles he's piled, agglomerated, and swept up residue from past works into new textural marvels, landscapes of paint flecks and torn fabric like the stuff you find under your sofa after a wild night of partying, only way artsier. So: dredge, "to sprinkle or coat", also "to unearth or bring to notice" — sounds just about right to this guy.
+ Kasper Sonne "Zero Emotional Content". I think pairing this Danish artist's reductive practice, ranging from monochromes to film to installation, with Brock's historical residue makes for a study in tasty contrasts. We shall see.

* Liu Xiaodong "In Between Israel and Palestine" @ Mary Boone Gallery / 745 Fifth Ave. Back in 2010, Liu depicted idyllic scenes of Muslim and Christian families intermingling in Yan Guan County in north-central China. Around participating in a program at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art this past spring, Liu traveled around the area, interacting with and painting the locals. That this new series includes mostly small-scale diptychs underscores the cultural divides and omnipresent tenseness in the region.

THURSDAY
NYC
* "Parasitic Gaps", curated by Miriam Katzeff @ Team Gallery / 83 Grand St. OK so take two awesome artsy connoisseurs, Margaret Lee (director of 47 Canal) and Matthew Higgs (director and chief curator of White Columns), and put 'em in a room together. Even better if they often show together, which they do. Add Georgia Sagri, most recently awesome for her beguiling performances and installations at the 2012 Whitney Biennial and at PS1 during EXPO this spring. Add James Hoff, 2013 artist-in-residence at famed experimental music venue ISSUE Project Room, whose individual expertise includes the intellectual history and phenomenon of earworms and involuntary audio imagery. Guess what: I'm there. You should be too.

* "Calligraffiti: 1984/2013" @ Leila Heller Gallery / 568 W 25th St. The gallery re-stages its potent 1984 group exhibition on mid-century abstraction, U.S. graffiti, and calligraphic artists from the Middle East and diaspora (then curated by Jeffrey Deitch) with new works and site-specific interventions, including a mural by Tunisian-French artist eL Seed.

* "Digital Expressionism" @ The Suzanne Geiss Company / 76 Grand St. Ben Wolf Noam organized this three-artist exhibition, including transforming the gallery space into a bunch of gradient painted columns. Meanwhile, Korakrit Arunanondchai and Greg Parma Smith take on global commerce and identity, respectively, in works involving real and digitally printed denim and oil-painted graffiti murals (again, respectively).

* Diana Copperwhite "Loose Ends" @ 532 Gallery Thomas Jaeckel / 532 W 25th St. The Irish artist's stateside exhibition debut comes in collaboration with her Dublin gallery, Kevin Kavanagh. Copperwhite's brushy canvases are in full effect here, sharp chromatic stripes executed boldly over cloudy translucent fields and, in some cases, obscuring figures.

* Razvan Boar "Cameo" @ Ana Cristea Gallery / 521 W 26th St. I'm a fan of the young Romanian artist's sexy goth canvases of nudes emerging from perennial shadows, but count me extremely intrigued by his sorta new direction: bright colors, geometries, interspersed with outlines of pinup cuties and storybook-style illustrations.

* Vicki Sher "Always Bring Flowers" @ frosch&portmann / 53 Stanton St. You concentrate when you observe Sher's sparse vignettes, typically pencil, ink, and some sort of acrylic wash on paper, a figure here, an object there, maybe dashes of color or a line of text and that's it. In their ostensible simplicity lies an engaging irresistibility. This time, she brings transparent cotton scrim into play, creating compositions with overlapping layers and dualities.

* Mark Hundley "The Waves, The Body Alone" @ Team Gallery / 47 Wooster St. I dug Hundley's 2011 solo debut at the gallery, which focused on a partially imagined past involving Joan Baez. This time, he takes Virginia Woolf's experimental novel The Waves as the jump-off, and while I am embarrassingly unfamiliar with this particular novel, I expect Hundley's full-experience style (constructed advertisement prints, emotive color choices etc) will make the narrative flow that much clearer.

* Nathan Carter "THE FLY-BY-NIGHT MEGA METRO SUB ROSA TURBULENT TWISTER" @ Casey Kaplan Gallery / 525 W 21st St. From the looks of it, Carter's hyper-industrialized cities of the near future, confidently colorful and in a state of constant flux and repair, remind me a bit of Austin TX's hyperbolic construction boom. Considering the Brooklyn artist hails from Dallas, itself an exuberant hub for build! build! build!, that sort of makes sense. 

* Sonya Blesofsky "Renovation" @ Mixed Greens / 531 W 26th St. Blesofsky is interested in transitions in architecture, but her new series of sculpture and drawings feature concrete (sometimes, like, literally concrete) elements from their original subject matter, outfitting her fragile works with firm undertones.

* Cristina De Middel "The Afronauts" @ Dillon Gallery / 555 W 25th St. In the mid-'60s, there was a brief moment when Zambia was to join the U.S. and Soviet Union in launching a manned rocket to the moon, but a dearth of funding from the Zambian Government and the UN stymied the program. This very true story became the subject of de Middel's 2011 series, which was shortlisted for the 2013 Deutsche Börse Photography Prize and now premieres in a New York gallery.

AUSTIN
* Texas Biennial 2013 @ Big Medium / 916 Springdale Road. OK, so here's the thing! The epicenter of TX*13 (can't make the star in the logo with this keyboard, dammit) excellent-ness goes down at Blue Star Contemporary Art Museum in San Antonio, which is some 30-45 minutes by automobile outside Austin proper. And that's not to forget the TX*13 commissioned project by The Dallas Collective occurring at Ballroom Marfa (in Marfa), nor the invitational four-artist show at the Lawndale Art Center in Houston — all that is happening and I'm sure all of it is awesome, once I actually visit those cities to see it for myself. What I have seen, however, is this "new and greatest hits" group exhibition at Big Medium in Austin, co-curated by former Biennial curators Virginia Rutledge (TX*11) and Michael Duncan (TX*09), featuring some 26 Biennial artists showing past entries and recent works. All in all, it's got some gems, and I particularly dig the contrast of old and new, like Shane Tolbert's TX*11 industrial-dyed and artist-stained fabric paired with brand-new, organically abstract (like finger-painted, almost) paintings. Or Jayne Lawrence's Metamorphosis-like bug-horror graphite drawing (new) vs her fabric/nature humanoid sculpture (TX*09). The Biennial proper is up through early November, but this exhibition at Big Medium runs through 28 September, so hop to it, yo.

FRIDAY
* Matthew Day Jackson "Something Ancient, Something New, Something Stolen, Something Blue" @ Hauser & Wirth / 511 W 18th St. Yeah, alright, I may roll my eyes at the gallery press release dubbing Jackson a "modern American frontiersman", but I dig the guy, really! His hewn wood and heavy metal sculpture and mixed-media oeuvre, which I've been into since at least 2008, hit a deep emotional point that I can't quite express in words but feel, inevitably, indescribably, each time I encounter his works. Beefy automobiles, astronauts, and scholarly landmarks recur here, each with narratives personal to the artist and probably not so far away from our own respective experiences.

* Cary Leibowitz "(paintings and belt buckles" @ Invisible-Exports / 89 Eldridge St. New location alert! I loved the gallery's narrow-ass space on Orchard St, personally, but I am stoked to see what they can do creatively with the "larger, taller, squarer" storefront. Hell, Eldridge is on the up and up, yo, didn't you know? Having "Candy Ass" Leibowitz kick off a new season of programming sounds genius.

* Greg Haberny "Burn All Crayons" @ Lyons Wier Gallery / 542 W 24th St. Haberny takes on pharmaceutical culture via his own experiences as a child with dyslexia and ADHA. "Just go draw," his teachers used to admonish him. And, brother, did he ever, so expect a signature, sensorial-overloading installation to follow.

* Charline von Heyl @ Petzel Gallery / 456 W 18th St. Much as I hype Kadar Brock's upcoming solo at The Hole and his contributions to contemporary abstraction (all deserved, trust me), I gotta give dap to von Heyl, who has over 20 years of boundary-crushing abstraction under her belt, including participation in this year's "Abstract Generation" group show at MoMA. I loved her 2010 solo at the gallery, and this one — her seventh solo at Petzel — should be no doubt right up my alley.
+ Allan McCollum "Plaster Surrogates Colored and Organized by Andrea Zittel". Let that title sink in for a minute. While McCollum's motif of repetitive yet entirely unique "surrogates", which he's produced since the early '80s, bears the imprint of factory production with a handmade twist, the involvement of Zittel adds another layer to the equation. She selected the colors, then McCollum and team painted his monochromatic "surrogates", then with Zittel they collated 24 "panel collections" of the entire production. A new foray into communal artist practice indeed.

* James Cullinane "Limbus" @ Robert Henry Contemporary / 56 Bogart St, Bushwick. Animal traps copied onto Mylar, map pins as "readymade pointillist brushstrokes", lacquer-like red acrylic mixed to vary slightly between each panel, 3D vs 2D, collage vs the artist's direct hand. Lots of push-pull here.

AUSTIN
* "LAME LEWD AND DEPRESSED" feat. Lane Hagood, Mark Flood, and Jeremy DePrez @ Co-Lab / 721 Congress. Can Austin handle the mayhem? An entire show of DePrez's typically refined, patterned abstract paintings in a reduced palette of unmixed colors would be a fine statement in and of itself. Up the ante with the cross-national punk powerhouse Flood and Hagood's art-history-referential and self-referential salon style, and… well, that's one bold way to kick off the Texas gallery season. Considering Russell Etchen, manager of the beloved former Domy Books, co-presents this three-artist extravaganza, I expect we're in for something awesome. Don't sleep, Austin!

SATURDAY
NYC
* Phil Collins @ Tanya Bonakdar Gallery / 521 W 21st St. No, not "that" Phil Collins. I write of the Turner Prize-winning artist, whose 2006 debut at the gallery was also my debut into that most formidable of NY exhibition spaces. I was much younger than, much dumber and perhaps somewhat better looking, but I was doubly hooked on the videos and photography of the artist who shared a name and nationality with a pop musician whom I am unashamed to dig plus on the eclectic international programming of the gallery itself. So here we are, over seven years later, definitely older and probably wiser, returning to my favorite NY gallery and to the artist who started the whole damn thing.

* Blek le Rat "Ignorance is Bliss" @ Jonathan LeVine Gallery / 529 W 20th St 9th Fl. LeVine's gallery comes off a major and successful celebration of graffiti power-hub Wooster Collective's 10th anniversary with a major solo exhibition of new works by the pioneering French stencil artist Blek le Rat. How hugely influential is this dude? For you scenesters, consider a quote from guerrilla artist Banksy: "every time I think I've painted something slightly original, I find out that Blek le Rat has done it as well, only twenty years earlier." Oh, and: Blek le Rat will create a public mural in the city, so get stoked for that, too.

* Carol Bove "RA, or Why is an orange like a bell?" @ Maccarone / 630 Greenwich St. Bove is everywhere right now, from a major project "Caterpillar" commissioned by High Line Art to a seven-part sculpture "The Equinox" at MoMA that opened last month. So can a "mere" gallery contain her? Considering Maccarone's spacious, raw space, and what they've shown of her in the past, I'd say it's not so much "contain" as it is "blossom".

* Kim Gordon "Design Office, since 1980" @ White Columns / 320 W 13th St. The first major survey of the rock legend and former Sonic Youth bassist/frontwoman's ongoing art practice, ahead of a monograph this fall. Gordon's first show at this space was in 1981 and called "Design Office". For the expert reader: Gordon's new noise-rock duo Body/Head unleashes a guitar maelstrom at Union Pool in Williamsburg on Tuesday, 10 September.

* David Adamo + James Castle @ Peter Freeman Inc / 140 Grand St. An intriguing dialogue happening here, between Adamo's chalk floor and typically hewn-to-emaciation wood forms with historic soot drawings from Castle, selected by Adamo in close collaboration with the James Castle Collection and Archive.

* Merike Estna "spinach & banana" @ Winkleman Gallery / 621 W 27th St. In her NY solo debut, the young Estonian artist 'flips the script', as it were, crumpling her stretcherless abstract paintings around the gallery while projecting small videos on the walls. This will be a variation of a multimedia installation Estna staged at Kumu Art Museum (Tallinn) in 2012.

* Charles Gaines "Notes on Social Justice" @ Paula Cooper Gallery / 521 W 21st St. Ahead of his major exhibition at the Studio Museum in Harlem next year comes a four-part survey of Gaines' language-imbued and sociopolitical juxtaposition works. Included here are works from "Night/Crimes" (begun in '94) and the newest series, which shares the exhibition title and features musical scores dealing with political subject matter.

* Michael Raedecker "tour" @ Andrea Rosen Gallery / 544 W 24th St. The London-based Dutch artist hasn't had a proper show in this city since 2009, his previous, captivating exhibition at the gallery. Raedecker incorporates thread into his austere, almost monochromatic acrylic compositions, to where even glitzy subject matter like tricked-out chandeliers take on an almost sinister undertone, like "The Shining".

* Robert Polidori "Versailles" @ Mary Boone Gallery / 541 W 24th St. Photographs from the artist's acclaimed series depicting the Château de Versailles.

* Matthew Craven "Oblivious Path" @ DCKT Contemporary / 21 Orchard St. Craven curated the group show "Acid Summer" in the gallery this past, very very hot NY summer. Now it's his time to shine, revealing deliriously colorful test-pattern compositions and archaeological collages in his solo debut at DCKT. Who's up for a sweltering September?

AUSTIN
* "The New Sincerity" @ Lora Reynolds Gallery / 360 Nueces. When Wes Anderson, Lil B, and the ineffable, late great David Foster Wallace get name-dropped in a press release, you know dopeness is gonna ensue. Granted, none of the three aforementioned gentlemen have works in this show, but the duality of irony and sincerity coursing through their respective oeuvres is an apt springboard to the six artists featured here. Florian Baudrexel, Julia Rommel, Fabrice Samyn, Colby Bird, Roy McMakin, and Rosy Keyser deliver refreshing doses of relatable (and sometimes quite raw) emotion through a range of media. 
+ Frank Selby "Candles and Games". Selby's debut solo in the gallery's project room provides a concise counterpoint (or deeper truth?) to the main show. His method is hyperrealistic graphite drawings on mylar, each depicting either social conflict or natural disaster but usually both, collaged deftly to heighten the emotive impact depicted within and from us, the viewers.

TOKYO
* Takeshi Ikeda "All Day Long" @ Ai Kowada Gallery / 6F 1-3-2 Kiyosumi, Koto-ku (Hanzomon/Oedo Lines to Kiyosumi-shirakawa Station). In his return to Tokyo after a scholarship stint in NYC, Ikeda considers experimental music and its relationship to post-Tohoku earthquake Japanese society. In other words, temporal art.

* Saori Ono @ Gallery MOMO / 1-7-15 Kamezawa, Sumida-ku (Toei Oedo/JR Sobu to Ryogoku Station). The Tohoku devastation continues to resonate in the Japanese art scene. Ono's hometown of Fukushima was the literal epicenter of the destruction, and the odyssey of her family and their collective experience during that time culminated in a mature, hopeful shift in her naturalistic paintings.

BASEL
* Nici Jost "ROSAROT" @ balzerARTprojects / Wallstrasse 10, 4051 Basel. My favorite li'l Basel gallery made the leap across the Rhine to its new location this past summer, and it inaugurates the larger space with lotsa pink. This color is Jost's signature hue, and she delivers every loaded ideology across the pink spectrum in her nostalgic and/or perception distorting video installations and photography. 

SUNDAY
* Cynthia Daignault "Which is the Sun and Which is the Shadow?" @ Lisa Cooley / 107 Norfolk St. The artist's user-interactive invite (evite?) for her upcoming solo show reads like an acutely emotive Mad Lib, concluding with the "send" button changed to "I am trying to tell you something". Meaning, is it us communicating with Daignault? Or Daignault with us? In that, though we select the words in the blanks, she set the parameters. Her own works, paintings with multiple viewpoints or showing the same setting over time, require such duality and deep investigation. Consider me intrigued.

* Raha Raissnia "Series in Fugue" @ Miguel Abreu Gallery / 36 Orchard St. Raissnia is proficient in triangulating the relations between her experimental filmmaking, drawing, and painting. What does this mean. Like, uh, layering and erasing media, creating that same sort of slow flux present in her layered dual slide projections, each bearing a different frame rate. My prognosis: essential.

* "PIZZA TIME!" @ Marlborough Broome St / 331 Broome St. A group show of hot modern and contemporary artists centered around NY-style slices. What could be better? (hint: that's a majorly rhetorical question, yo) Expect that Domino's Perl script hack "Pizza Party" by Cory Arcangel and Michael Frumin, an outsized slice of "regular" by Claes Oldenburg, surrealistic food pron from Michelle Devereux, plus contributions from John Baldessari, Catharine Ahern, Reena Spaulings, and, uh, Willem de Kooning? Why not! A pizza joint installation by madcap duo Jonah Freeman & Justin Lowe? We can only hope.

* Valerie Piraino "Photoplay" @ Cindy Rucker Gallery / 141 Attorney St. I think the exhibition title is particularly apt, for in Piraino's NY solo debut, she unveils a new body of work called 'drawn sculptures' that incorporate burnishing photographic transfers onto drywall, which just sounds dope.

* Beth Dary "New Nature" @ Muriel Guépin Gallery / 83 Orchard St. Dary emphasizes transformation and temporality in her cross-media works, utilizing egg tempera and beeswax in organic compositions — like Yayoi Kusama under an electron microscope.

* John Houck "A History of Graph Paper" @ On Stellar Rays / 1 Rivington St. Much to celebrate here: the gallery inaugurates its new location (the former Sue Scott Gallery space) and its fifth anniversary as a commercial gallery (I've clocked four of those years attending its exhibitions) with its first solo exhibition of LA-based artist Houck. For one, I'm stoked to see what the team does with this larger, 2nd-fl space, which must like double the size of its former street-level (and tiny basement) gallery on Orchard. For two, Houck's a photographer, but he's as keen on experimenting with commercial printing as he is fashioning models to snap the shots. So this could be quite dope.

* Aaron Fowler + Michael Shultis @ Thierry Goldberg Gallery / 103 Norfolk. "Pirate paintings" and pillow fight scenes belie the chromatic overdose and transgressive undertones present in these two young artists' respective works. Their NY gallery debut includes a multipanel collaborative work loaded with cultural signifiers and youth culture relevance.

* Caetano de Almeida @ Eleven Rivington / 11 Rivington + 195 Chrystie St. The gallery celebrates its third solo exhibition for the Campinhas, Brazil-born artist with a two-venue show, featuring large-scale watercolors and Op-tastic paintings. 

* Will Rogan "Sculptures in the Wind" @ Laurel Gitlen / 122 Norfolk St. Subtle interventions factor into Rogan's work, be it altered or erased magazine pages, considered photographic pairings, the transience of time captured on film or, more obliquely, in sculpture — that sort of thing. Expect to spend more than a few minutes in this show. 

TOKYO
* Shinro Ohtake @ Take Ninagawa / 1F 2-12-4 Higashi-azabu, Minato-ku (Tokyo Metro Namboku/Toei Oedo Lines to Azabu-Juban Station, Exit 6). The most recent 10-year encapsulation of Ohtake's assemblagist and mixed-media oeuvre. He has a major installation of archival works in The Encyclopedic Palace at this year's Venice Biennale, and I am pretty stoked to see his contemporary endeavors.

BASEL
* Piet Mondrian + Barnett Newman + Dan Flavin @ Kunstmuseum Basel / Sankt Alban-Graben 16, 4051 Basel. I've enjoyed seeing singular works by these three abstract artists from three different generations within the museum's permanent collection, but now MoMA and the Centre Pompidou and other institutions lend their power plays on this 20th-C investigation into color, form, and space.

TUESDAY
* John McCracken "Works from 1964-2011" @ David Zwirner / 537 W 20th St. In short, a career survey of the West Coast plank pioneer, featuring his signature propped sculptures with those succulent minimalist finishes, plus paintings and sketches to really trick out his oeuvre. A comprehensive McCracken monograph, featuring an essay by art historian and curator Robin Clark, accompanies the exhibition.

* Jean Dubuffet "Late Drawings" @ Pace Gallery / 32 E 57th St. 'Landscapes of the mind', said the late great 'low art' maestro of these like four dozen drawings from the last decade of his career. The gallery mounted an immersive exhibition of Dubuffet's final two years of works last year, but "Late Drawings" is just that: a bunch of works on paper, feverishly detailed, vibrantly colorful and figurative or elementally abstract. 

* Hayv Kahraman "Let the Guest be the Master" @ Jack Shainman Gallery / 513 W 20th St. Kahraman encapsulates the "immigrant consciousness" in her works, having lived in Iraq through Hussein's reign and subsequent U.S. intervention (and now residing in San Francisco). Her solo debut at the gallery includes boundary-blurred nudes on wood panel and linen.

* Kerry James Marshall "Dollar For Dollar" @ Jack Shainman Gallery / 524 W 24th St. Ahead of his major traveling survey that debuts at Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst in Antwerp in October, the Chicago-based artist takes on socioeconomics and conceptual black aesthetics through paintings and a sculptural installation of big-ass coins.

Friday, March 29, 2013

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

fee's LIST / through 10/9


WEDNESDAY
NYC
* "New Photography 2012" @ MoMA / 11 W 53rd St (E/M to 5th Ave, 6 to 51st St). Five young heavyweights — Michele Abeles, the duo Birdhead, Anne Collier, Zoe Crosher, and Shirana Shahbazi — invigorate classic tropes and cutting-edge techniques in photography. I am super stoked to see Abeles' newest works, and Collier's re-photography style is not to be missed, either.

* "Failed States", a reading by Jill Magid @ Art in General / 79 Walker St, 6p. What timing! On the evening of this year's first U.S. Presidential Debate, Magid addresses war-on-terror paranoia and the U.S. security state via her new nonfiction "Failed States". Daniel Kunitz, executive editor of Modern Painters, will discuss Magid's oeuvre after the reading.

* Crystal Castles + HEALTH @ Roseland Ballroom / 239 W 52nd St (CE to 50th St), 8p/$55. I love Crystal Castles live: they convert those fractured-synth suites into thunderous anthems, and petite Alice Glass is a perfect, goth-garbed, snarling frontwoman. Their new LP III is out next month, so expect new songs performed tonight. Expect HEALTH to bring the intensity, too, as their percussion-backed noise freakouts translate to feverish jams.

* RZA "The Iron Fists Tour" @ Music Hall of Williamsburg / 66 N 6th St, Williamsburg (L to Bedford), 8p/$25. OK few shows hold a candle to a Crystal Castles/HEALTH matchup, but this is true contender. Rizza, the mighty Wu-Tang's chief producer, leads an all-star lineup of lyricists, including veterans Supernatural and some surprise guests (Ghostface? GZA?).

TOKYO
* Taro Shinoda "Homo sapiens sapiens" @ Taka Ishii Gallery / 5F 1-3-2 Kiyosumi, Koto-ku (Hanzomon/Oedo Lines to Kiyosumi-shirakawa Station). Shinoda unveils "LRTT", a film piece and part of his ongoing lunar project, plus almost two dozen related celestial paintings.

* Who the Bitch @ Shelter / B1 Daizawa, Setagaya-ku (Keio Inokashira Line to Shimokitazawa Station, S Exit), 7p/2500 yen. Trust me, you don't want to miss a Who the Bitch party, two fierce riot-grrrls and their Guitar Wolf-looking dude drummer. w/ FULLSCRATCH

THURSDAY
NYC
* Wade Guyton "OS" @ Whitney Museum / 945 Madison Ave (6 to 75th St). To say that I am anticipating hotly Guyton's printer ink-fragrant career survey at the Whitney is like saying your taste-buds inflame just a tad after consuming a ghost chile. I am super-duper STOKED, son!

* "Japanese Power Delight" kickoff tour @ Paperbox / 17 Meadow St, E. Williamsburg (L to Grand St), 8p/$8. This sounds insanely dope: three kickass Japanese bands—scene stalwarts Otonana Trio (ex-mems. Dynamite Club), Kansai dynamos Babylon Breakers, and cartoon mashup Gelatine (actually based in NY)—collide w/ two local acts, Brooklyn's Hard Nips and Planet Peelander (actually East Asia/NYC) cuties PeeWonder-Z, in one night of rocking hard. Turning Japanese, are you?

* Weekend @ 285 Kent Ave, Williamsburg (L to Bedford, JM to Marcy), 8p/$8. West Coast feedback fiends Weekend will barrage you straight into next week with their mile-long guitars and glorious, MBV+ soundscapes. w/ Cold Showers

AUSTIN
* Ann Wood "Violent Delights" @ Women & Their Work / 1710 Lavaca St. Wood gets crafty, pairing topiaries and taxidermy, plastic jewels and industrial accents, in a decadent exhibition of death and the hunt.

TOKYO
* Reiko Imoto "Miniascape Window" @ Gallery TOSEI / 5-18-20 Chuo, Nagano-ku (Tokyo Metro Marunouchi Line to Shin-Nakao Station, Exit 1-2). A personalized world as seen cropped through a camera's viewfinder. Imoto takes us into those worlds in a series of beautiful gelatin silver prints. 

FRIDAY
NYC
* "Picasso Black & White" @ Guggenheim / 1071 Fifth Ave (456 to 86th St). So the Metropolitan Museum, a few blocks south, staged an overblown and relatively bland Warhol exhibition. Trust in the Gugg to tune the focus on an artist equally known into something very special. This is a full-career look at Pablo Picasso's exploration of b&w and sultry gray, from Cubism, austere portraiture, sex, sculpture, and much more. It sounds exquisite.

* Noah Becker + David Goodman "No Age" @ Launch F18 / 373 Broadway, 6 Fl. NY/Canadian Becker does emotively realistic portraiture. LESider Goodman shatters contemporary art tropes with his "new painting" virtuosity. I am stoked to see how their respective works play off one another and commend this newish Tribeca space for making it happen. A LIST must-see.

* "V/H/S" (various dirs, 2012) @ Sunshine Cinema / 143 E Houston St (F to 2nd Ave). Reactions in the horror community have been mixed to this new found-footage scare suite, but considering the directors' pedigree — Ti West, Adam Wingard, Joe Swanberg, David Bruckner, Gleen McQuaid, and Radio Silence — I'm willing to bet the dope outweighs the lame.

* Demdike Stare + Andy Stott @ Public Assembly / 70 N 6th St, Williamsburg (L to Bedford), 10p/$20. I've been counting the days since this Modern Love showcase was announced. If you can get into dense and cryptic techno, Lynch-ian soundscapes and ethereal beats, you'll love this night. Demdike Stare's duo Miles Whittaker and Sean Canty trade DJ sets before their headlining live act.

AUSTIN
* Jennifer Caine & Joshua Goode "Trajan's Column" @ Big Medium / 5305 Bolm Road #12. I'm a fan of that all too rare feat of skillful light-sculpting, taking the ethereal and evanescent and displaying it in a very physical — yet still quite emotive — way. Think Anthony McCall and James Turrell. I think the product of Caine and Goode's collaboration, containing an enormous hexagonal column of light via household goods, is akin to trapping a ray of sunshine, just as warming but far grander in scale.

* GZA + Killer Mike @ Mohawk / 912 Red River, 8p/$20. NICE. Two of my favorite lyricists — Shaolin vet GZA ("Liquid Swords" forever) and younger man-mountain outta Brooklyn Killer Mike (his latest LP "R.A.P. Music" is perfect) — school the live music capital of the world. What's it take to be an MC? Class is in session!

TOKYO
* Satoshi Uchiumi "Square and Round Vessel" @ Art Front Gallery / Hillside Terrace A, 29-18 Sarugakucho, Shibuya-ku (JR Lines etc to Shibuya). Uchiumi participated in a rather transcendent group exhibition, "My Place Our Scenery", at MA2 Gallery this past summer. I'm interested in how he explores space in this exhibition, featuring vividly colored prints.

SATURDAY
NYC
* "The Long Hair of Death" (dir. Antonio Margheriti, 1964) screening @ Spectacle / 124 S 3rd St, Williamsburg (L to Bedford, JM to Marcy), 7:30p. The consummate pre-Giallo Italian classic. One one side we have Fellini and Antonioni doing their Modernist thing. On the other, we have Mario Bava and Margheriti promoting blood-curdling Goth, like this mid-'60s beauty. Young Helen's mom is burned at the stake, then Helen herself is killed by a sex-deprived Count. So what does she do? Come back from the dead a year later to exact revenge!

AUSTIN
* Grimes @ Emos / 2015 E Riverside Dr, 10p/$17. Pint-sized producer/singer Claire "Grimes" Boucher is a powerhouse on the stage. Surrounded by synths, she discharges cyborg-pop beats while managing to look awesome and sing damn well, like a possessed faerie. Get enchanted tonight.

TOKYO
* Hollis Brown Thornton @ Aisho Miura Arts / B1F 2-17-3 Shibuya, Shibuya-ku (JR etc to Shibuya Station). The young S. Carolina "vintage" painter's debut solo in Japan happens to occur at one of my favorite edgy galleries. Stoked about this!

* Masahiko Kuwahara "Only in Dreams" @ Tomio Koyama Gallery / 7F 1-3-2 Kiyosumi, Koto-ku (Hanzomon/Oedo Lines to Kiyosumi-Shirakawa Station). Koyama's Singapore branch features Kuwahara in a trio show w/ Japanese heavyweights Yoshitomo Nara and Hiroshi Sugito. In Tokyo, we get his dreamlike waifs and fauna all to ourselves.

* Hideyuki Nagasawa "Painting on Painting" @ Gallery MOMO Ryogoku / 1F 1-7-15 Kamezawa, Sumida-ku (Toei Oedo/JR Sobu Line to Ryogoku Station). There is an incredible depth to this Saitama-born artist's dappled paintings, which he executes in pointillist waves and veils over enigmatic figures and landscapes.

* Takanobu Kobayashi @ Kido Press, Inc / 6F 1-3-2 Kiyosumi, Koto-ku (Hanzomon/Toei Oedo Lines to Kiyosumi-shirakawa Station). Exquisite etchings and aquatints of somnambulant scenes and figures in repose. 

* "Outrage Beyond" (dir. Takeshi Kitano, 2012) @ Marunouchi TOEI / 3-2-17 Ginza, Chuo-ku (Tokyo Metro Marunouchi/Hibiya/Ginza Lines to Ginza Station). If Kitano ushered Yakuza cinema into a new echelon w/ his hyper-violent "Outrage", starring a Dostoevskian-scale cast of vengeful gangsters, the sequel launches it even further. I loved this at Fantastic Fest, and now that Kitano pulls Kansai into the fray, well…you know those Osaka thugs can throw down. 

* "Lost in Beijing" (dir. Li Yu, 2007) @ K's Cinema / 3F 3-35-13 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku (JR etc to Shinjuku Station, East Exit). An intriguing repertory screening of this sexy indie film of nouveau riche and Beijing transplants (led by Tony Leung and Fan Bingbing), which premiered at the 2007 Berlin International Film Festival. 

* Call and Response Records LP party @ 20000 Den-atsu / B1 1-7-23 Koenji-Minami, Suginami-ku (Tokyo Metro Marunouchi Line to Higashi-koenji Station, Exit 2), 5p/2300 yen. Call and Response Records' new compilation LP "Dancing After 1AM" drops in two weeks, but some of that post-punk, indie wave plays at this overstuffed showcase, feat. Twee Grrrls Club DJs, Hysteric Picnic, Extruders, and headlined by LIST favorites She Talks Silence!

* BABYMETAL @ O-East / 2F 2-14-8 Dogenzaka, Shibuya-ku (JR etc to Shibuya Station, Hachiko Exit), 6p/3500 yen. I don't know…I mean, it's three extremely preteen girls throwing "devil horns" and dancing headbanging choreography while a masked metal band performs behind them. Idol innocence and hard-rock anthems clash together…and from the ruins comes BABYMETAL.

SUNDAY
NYC
* Flying Lotus @ Terminal 5 / 610 W 56th St (AC/BD to 59th St/Columbus Circle), 7p/$35. Flying Lotus is on the bleeding edge of electronic music: he combines shattered beats, eclectic funk, shards of hip-hop and glitch, even the odd, angelic guest vocal…and it all works so perfectly. Celebrate his new LP "Until the Quiet Comes" by dancing up a sweat.

MONDAY
TOKYO
* パスピエ @ Shinjuku Red Cloth / B1 6-28-12 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku (JR etc to Shinjuku Station, East Exit, Toei Oedo/Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Lines to Higashi-Shinjuku Station), 7p/3000 yen. Tokyo electro-pop darlings パスピエ (Passepied) channel Brooklynites Twin Sister with a hazy, nocturnal gloss. w/ 日本マドンナ

TUESDAY
AUSTIN
* Maria Minerva @ Mohawk / 912 Red River, 9p/$6. Thanks to a certain "dope music-loving fashionista" in NYC, I got tuned in and turned on to Minerva's wonderful 2nd LP "Will Happiness Find Me?". It's songbird pop psychedelia with enough edgy "The Knife"-esque undertones to keep it outta the mainstream. 

CLOSING SOON
NYC
* Audrey Kawasaki "Midnight Reverie" + Jeff Soto "Decay and Overgrowth" @ Jonathan LeVine Gallery / 529 W 20th St 9th Fl. I thank the gallery for introducing me to both these artists and their fascinating, personal oeuvres. Soto's polluted pop cosmos continues to intrigue, but it's Kawasaki's new series of stunning oil and graphite portraits on wood panel that really have me jazzed.

* Ernst Wilhelm Nay @ Mary Boone Gallery / 745 Fifth Ave + 541 W 24th St. The first comprehensive stateside exhibition of the powerful, Berlin-born painter is a collaboration between Mary Boone's two spaces and Michel Werner Gallery. Boone's Chelsea hangar features Nay's intensely colorful, brushily abstract paintings from the '50s and '60s, while the midtown gallery features Nay's drawings.

* "Searching" @ Mixed Greens / 531 W 26th St. Ever since I was exposed to Bas Jan Ader at MoMA's wonderful "In & Out of Amsterdam: Travels in Conceptual Art, 1960-1976" back in 2009, I've been increasingly captivated by the elusive conceptualist…I say "elusive" because he disappeared while working on his traveling project "In Search of the Miraculous" back in '75. That unfinished (and still missing) body of work grounds this group exhibition, which also features Arianna Carossa and Mie Olise. 

AUSTIN
* Anthony W. Garza @ Tiny Park / 1101 Navasota St. The biting, harsh light of Austin summers befits Garza's naturalistic practice: he either draws or paints highly realistic renderings of nature that work in an incredible attention to lighting itself. There is an entire cycle of discovery going on here, from breathtaking graphite drawings of weathered rocks and truncated branches, to seductive collages of animal and inanimate in watercolor (what seems overwhelming at first becomes far more compelling as you stare into them, the animals' eyes, the texture of fur), to a pair of romantic night skies in varying acrylic washes and textures. Garza's oeuvre cues us back into our discovery sides and bears a deep nostalgia in doing so.

TOKYO
* Taishi Niimi @ Yumiko Chiba Associates / 2F 4-32-6 Nishi-shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku (Toei Oedo Line to Tochomae Station, JR etc to Shinjuku Station, West Exit). The Nagoya-area artist unveils new illustrations, ranging from intimate to monumental but all totally encapsulating his jiggity-jaggety style.

* Hiroshige Fukuhara @ Ai Kowada Gallery / 6F 1-3-2 Kiyosumi, Koto-ku (Hanzomon/Oedo Lines to Kiyosumi-shirakawa Station). Fukuhara introduces new silkscreens featuring silver leaf embossing alongside pencil and gesso compositions on panel, all featuring hyperrealized wildlife. (ENDS SAT)

Sunday, September 16, 2012

fee's LIST takes a Fantastic (Fest) pause


Note: I consider Fantastic Fest a pause in regular LIST programming, not a break nor holiday. From September 20-27, I will be camped out (practically) at Austin, TX's Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar. Last year I caught 24 films (25 if you count seeing the world premiere of Noboru Iguchi's Zombie Ass twice, which I did).

This will be my third Fantastic Fest and second as an Austin local. I think I can break that film-viewing record. Right not it's all about scheduling conflicts, like "do I pick Bring Me the Head of Machine Gun Woman over The Shining: Forwards and Backwards or...?" That kind of thing.

Game plan is #FF2012 -related updates throughout the next two weeks, and a return to regular programming on OCT 3. 'til then, let's get Fantastic!

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

fee's LIST / through 9/18

WEDNESDAY
NYC
* "A Visual Essay on Gutai" @ Hauser & Wirth / 32 E 69th St. A landmark survey of the postwar Japanese art movement's legacy via 12 of its core artists: Norio Imai, Akira Kanayama, Takesada Matsutani, Sadamasa Motonaga, Shuji Mukai, Saburo Murakami, Shozo Shimamoto, Kazuo Shiraga, Yasuo Sumi, Atsuko Tanaka, Tsuruko Yamazaki, and founder Jiro Yoshihara. This exhibition, curated by Midori Nishizawa and organized with Olivier Renaud-Clément, features two decades of masterworks and coincides with the half-century anniversary of Gutai's first U.S. exhibition.

* Gerhard Richter "Painting 2012" @ Marian Goodman Gallery / 24 W 57th St. His German eminence has been challenging traditional art tropes — the portrait, the drawing, the abstract, the minimal — for decades, at every turn of his oeuvre. Here, Richter combines rigorous structure and the explosiveness of chance in his sublime new "Strip Paintings". Which, ostensibly, are colorful stripes. Perhaps a sublime experience? Also perhaps: a big middle-finger to richies getting off on Richter's telltale abstract paintings (so hot right now).
Either way, you know you can't miss it.

* Teresita Fernández "Night Writing" @ Lehmann Maupin / 201 Chrystie St. I have a…complicated relationship with Fernández's output, which (in this writer's opinion) tends to favor highly stylized "stuff" over contemplative objets d'art. That her latest solo exhibition consists of a single, site-specific installation based on night-sky viewing and utilizing fully Lehmann Maupin's lofted space heartens me that it'll be a subtler, more rewarding experience.

* Karin Kneffel @ Gagosian / 980 Madison Ave. The brilliant German artist's vividly patterned, naturalist paintings haven't received fair play in NY (her last solo stateside was in 2008), so I'm stoked to see what Kneffel unveils at tony Gagosian.
+ Mark Grotjahn. Earthy, painted-bronze sculpture from the Pasadena, CA-born artist, a grounded complement to Kneffel's sublime pairings.

* "8 Artists Making Sculpture", curated by Jamie Sterns @ BRIC Rotunda Gallery / 33 Clinton St, Brooklyn Heights (NR to Court St, 23 to Clark St). A properly edgy grouping of young sculptors, awash in an art climate of painting, photography, and "performance". Sounds dope to me. Feat. Arielle Falk, Jamie Felton, Mary-Kate Maher, Abraham McNally, Jong Oh, Carolyn Salas, Ian Umlauf, and Matthew C. Wilson.

AUSTIN
* "Ms. 45" (dir. Abel Ferrara, 1981) screening @ Alamo Drafthouse Ritz / 320 E Sixth St, 10p. So much awesomeness going on here: same director of cult splatterpunk classic "Driller Killer"; one of the preeminent "Girls With Guns" films; the debut for ultra-gorgeous actress/screenwriter Zoë Tamerlis Lund, playing the titular role (subhed: "Angel of Vengeance"!). 

* "Hausu" (dir. Nobuhiko Obayashi, 1977) screening @ Alamo Drafthouse Village / 2700 W Anderson Ln, 7p. If you've never seen this Technicolor- and blood-soaked meta-horror favorite on the big-screen (or — shriek! — AT ALL), schedule this screening on your iCal NOW. And even if you, like me, have seen "Hausu" in a proper theatre multiple times, in multiple cities, see it again. This tale, the feature film debut of a man known for his caffeinated commercials and co-written by his then-13-year-old daughter, is classic as all time and yet unlike anything you've ever experienced. Cute high-school girls visit old auntie's country house, which is haunted, and features a regal Himalayan cat with lasers or something shooting out of its eyes. And carnivorous pianos. And killer futons. And action soundtrack sequences. And tons else that just doesn't translate to "text". ALSO THURS

THURSDAY
NYC
* Mr. "Metamorphosis: Give Me Your Wings" @ Lehmann Maupin / 540 W 26th St. My favorite otaku-loving artist transforms the gallery into a contemplative sanctuary of angst and frustration in post-3/11 Japan. This is the first time Mr. has created such an installation outside his native Japan, and its blending of traditional "cute" subculture and uplifting imagery with the chaos of everyday life should elicit an insightful look into the contemporary Japanese subconscious.

* Mike Kelley "Memory Ware Flats" @ Skarstedt Gallery / 20 E 79th St. The gallery presents the nonpareil late artist's meditative series "Memory Ware Flats", an eight-part suite begun in 2000 of shimmering doodads and trinkets floating across seas of grout. 

* Gelitin @ Greene Naftali Gallery / 508 W 26th St 8th Fl. The Austrian art collective promise a large-scale interactive piece that'll probably keep in line with their messy, exuberant style. Plus, apparently noise-rockers Japanther are planning a related performance to coincide with Gelitin's exhibition. The two groups collaborated in the preview days of the 2011 Venice Biennale at the site-specific Gelitin Pavilion (of course).

* Diana Al-Hadid * "The Nature of Disappearance", curated by Dr. Dieter Buchhart @ Marianne Boesky Gallery / 509 W 24th St. The young, internationally recognized, and supremely awesome artist investigates the 2D picture plane within sculpture's three dimensions. She re-stages "Suspended After Image", the wonderful, gracefully monumental sculpture that premiered at Austin, TX's Visual Arts Center last year, plus showcases works referencing a 14th C. fresco by Jacopo Pontorno and more. 

* Wendy White "Pix Vää" @ Leo Koenig Inc / 545 W 23rd St. The NY-based artist presents her new Fotobild and PVC series, which incorporate photography and sculptural framing into her painting practice.

* Barney Kulok "Building" @ Nicole Klagsbrun / 532 W 24th St. Full disclosure: I've not seen Klagsbrun's new 24th St space, but I'm pretty stoked about this new exhibition of Kulok's marvelous, gelatin-silver print photography, and the related artist's monograph (published by Aperture in October).

* Desi Santiago "This Pop is Perfection" @ Envoy Enterprises / 87 Rivington St. The LES hotspot keeps it rrrreal (and real edgy), unveiling a dark funhouse of fetish fun and idol brilliance courtesy the former NY club-kid. Of note: Santiago is christening the gallery's newly expanded space with his multisensory tour-de-force, plus he contributes a satellite installation at Envoy's project space (131 Chrystie St).

* Louise Fishman @ Cheim & Read / 547 W 25th St. Big, brushy, and new: Fishman's re-appropriation of Abstract Expressionism after decades in the biz demand your full visual participation.

* Gino Saccone @ Ana Cristea Gallery / 521 W 26th St. The young Amsterdam-based artist's oeuvre explores space and painterly deconstruction. This is his first solo exhibition in New York.

* Chris Johanson "Windows" @ Mitchell-Innes & Nash / 534 W 26th St. The West Coast artist's paintings on found wood and containers (and even the gallery walls) are "meditations on being" and portals to the greater world. This is Johanson's first solo in NY since 2008's "Totalities" at Deitch Projects.

* The Joshua Light Show @ NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts / 566 LaGuardia Pl (ACE/BDFM to W 4th St), 7:30p/$20. The legendary light show, founded by multimedia artist Joshua White and showcased in "Midnight Cowboy" and all your or your parents' favorite '60s psychedelia live bands, returns to Greenwich Village for a sequence of special events. Tonight's the kickoff bash, pairing virtuoso percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie (a rare NY appearance!) with experimental harpist Zeena Parks. 

* WHY? @ Music Hall of Williamsburg / 66 N 6th St, Williamsburg (L to Bedford), 8p/$18. I gotta remind myself that WHY? — aka founder Yoni Wolf, brother Josiah, Doug McDiarmid, and keyboardist Liz — have come quite a way from ethereal, sunny nerd-hop debut "Oaklandazulasylum" (and I LOVED that album). Punchy, loopy, and pretty damn groovy, replete w/ Yoni's nasally lyricism. That's new EP "Sod in the Seed", and I'm still a fan. w/ Doseone

* Turbo Fruits (TN) @ Mercury Lounge / 217 E Houston St (F to 2nd Ave), 9:30p/$10. These liquor-chugging, southern-fried punks BRING the party, kids. We just have to show up and mosh. w/ Roomrunner

FRIDAY
NYC
* Thomas Hirschhorn "Concordia, Concordia" @ Gladstone Gallery / 530 W 21st St. Big time. Remember Hirschhorn's 2009 exhibition in this space, the bonkers "Universal Gym"? Well, he's gonna one-up that, do something Big with a capital "B", like…re-imagine the crash of cruise ship Costa Concordia within a gallery setting. Note: this statement solo coincides with Hirschhorn's collage survey at Dia:Chelsea's new project space at 541 W 22nd St. Mayjah.

* Alessandro Pessoli @ Anton Kern Gallery / 532 W 20th St. The Italian artist celebrates his stateside museum solo debut at SFMOMA later this month. But first! Pessoli returns for his fifth solo gallery show at Anton Kern, an "anarchic" affair of gorgeous, painted ceramic sculptures.

* "The Master" (dir. Paul Thomas Anderson, 2012) @ Village East Cinema / 181 2nd Ave (F to 2nd Ave). Straight off the 69th Venice International Film Festival comes Anderson's bracing followup to "There WIll Be Blood", and whether you buy that it's a thinly-veiled depiction of post-WWII Scientology, or not, let's nonetheless state the facts. The cast — Philip Seymour Hoffman as the titular figure, plus Amy Adam, Joaquin Phoenix, and Laura Dern — is all-star, and this theatre is screening it the right way, in glorious 70mm. If you plan to see it NY, see it here.

* "Phantom of the Paradise" (dir. Brian De Palma, 1974) screening @ IFC Center / 323 Sixth Ave (ACE/BDFM to W 4th St). "Phantom of the Opera" told through a glam-rock lens (which facets of "Faust" thrown in for good measure), feat. Gerrit Graham (the dad in "TerrorVision") as a jaded counterpart to our Phantom dude and Alice Cooper as himself! Now THIS is the De Palma I know! ALSO SAT

* The Joshua Light Show @ NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts / 566 LaGuardia Pl (ACE/BDFM to W 4th St), 7:30p/$20. Terry Riley, minimalist pioneer and pan-musical guru, joins his son, guitarist Gyan Riley, in front of a soaring Joshua Light set. Start your evening transcendently, yo.

* The Joshua Light Show @ NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts / 566 LaGuardia Pl (ACE/BDFM to W 4th St), 10p/$40. OR…stay for the big event, featuring downtown legends John Zorn, Lou Reed, Bill Laswell, and Milford Graves revisiting the cinematic colorplay of Joshua Light. For the record: I am envious of anyone attending this spectacular event.

AUSTIN
* Sodalitas "Core" @ Grayduck Gallery / 608 W Monroe Dr. Local art collective all-stars Sodalitas, aka Joseph Phillips, Shea Little, and Jana Swec, are founding members of non-profit studio/gallery Big Medium, the East Austin Studio Tour (hereafter known as "E.A.S.T."), and The Texas Biennial. I reiterate: all-stars. Their collaborative spirit and individual strenghts follow in this exhibition, which focuses on relating the individual and the group via cross-media practices.

* "Ghostbusters" (dir. Ivan Reitman, 1984) 70mm screening @ Alamo Drafthouse Ritz / 320 E Sixth St, 3:45p. Lemme ask you: are you ready to see big-screen ectoplasm in stunning 70mm Alamoscope?! How about Stay-Puft stomping into the skyline, while the only thing standing between marshmallowy death and a cowering populace is four jumpsuited wisecrackers? Bask in '80s paranormal bliss! Who ya gonna call? SCREENINGS THRU WED

* "2 Days in New York" (dir. Julie Delpy, 2012) @ Violet Crown Cinema / 434 W 2nd St. Delpy's smart rom-com followup to "2 Days in Paris" finally visits Austin, and it looks sweet. This time, as one may preclude from the title, Delpy's "family" (incl real-life, scene-stealing Dad Delpy) visit her and beau Chris "Mingus" Rock in NYC.

* Swans + Xiu Xiu @ La Zona Rosa / 612 W 4th St, 8p. I can't stop listening to Swans' stunning new LP "The Seer": it perfectly encapsulates this venerable noise-rock band's live experience and entire history w/o sounding precisely like any previous Swans release. Does that make any sense? Crank up track "Mother of the World" and hear what I mean. Genre-defying duo Xiu Xiu and their simultaneously caustic and comforting new LP "Always" make a good match for Swans' aural assault.

TOKYO
* Masumi Nakaoka "Parapraxis" @ Art Front Gallery / Hillside Terrace A, 29-18 Sarugakucho, Shibuya-ku (JR Lines etc to Shibuya). Ethereal landscapes rendered in soft acrylics and oils, with a deft interplay between colorful forms and cut-out expanses of gauzy white.

* Who the Bitch @ GARDEN / 2-4-5 Kitazawa, Setagaya-ku (Keio Inokashira Line to Shimokitazawa Station, S Exit), 7p/2800 yen. Trust me, you don't want to miss a Who the Bitch party, two fierce riot-grrrls and their Guitar Wolf-looking dude drummer. w/ HERE

* Zeni Geva + Melt-Banana @ Earthdom / B1 2-32-3 Okubo, Shinjuku-ku (JR Yamanote Line to Shin-Okubo Station), 7p/2500. Venerable noise-rockers Zeni Geva, like a musical rocketship piloted by guitarist KK Null and drummer Tatsuya Yoshida, headline this bracing lineup. Melt-Banana blitz the stage w/ their caffeinated punk. w/ Maruosa + Murochin

* i8u "Surface Tension" @ SuperDeluxe / B1F 3-1-25 Nishiazabu, Minato-ku (Toei Oedo/Hibiya Lines to Roppongi Station), 7:30p/4000 yen. The Quebecois sound artist France "i8u" Jobin touches down in Tokyo for this night of eclectic, electroacoustic pairings. The program includes Yoshio Machida x Tadahiko Yokogawa, Jun Iijima x hakobune + Yuki Aida, Toshimaru Nakamura x sawako, and it caps off with i8u x Keiichiro Shibuya. Sounds good to me.

SATURDAY
NYC
* Rodney McMillian @ Maccarone / 630 Greenwich St. The LA-based artist inaugurates Maccarone's refurbished gallery space in a big way. For though McMillian's "desiccated familiarity" awesomeness had him in the 2008 Whitney Biennial and Rashida Bumbray's curated show at the Kitchen that same year, he rarely shows in NYC. This should be a treat.

TOKYO
* Mamiko Masumura "Scab" @ waitingroom / 4B 2-8-11 Ebisu-nishi, Shibuya-ku (JR Yamanote Line/Hibiya Line to Ebisu Station, West Exit). Remarkable, small-scale carved and painted wood figures by the young Tokyo-born artist. Though this is her debut solo at the gallery, Masumura's been making the rounds of the hot indie scene, including appearances at hpgrp Gallery's NY space this March and the recent Gallerist Meeting x SOMEWHERE group show.

* 住所不定無職 @ Unit / 1-34-17 Ebisu-nishi, Shibuya-ku (JR Yamanote/Hibiya Lines to Ebisu Station), 6p/3500 yen. Killer tune explosions! The candy color-coded cuties behind 住所不定無職 (lit. "no job nor fixed address") rock the house with their potent combo of vintage sway and garage rasp. w/ Keiichi Sokabe's BAND

SUNDAY
NYC
* "Process 01: Joy" @ P! / 334 Broome St. The inaugural exhibition at this "Mom-and-Pop Kunsthalle" from Project Projects co-founder Prem Krishnamurty features works by Chauncey Hare, Christine Hill, and Karel Martens. I'm super stoked to see what Hill, of the "Volksboutique" persona, does in this space, though graphic design impresario Martens (who created P!'s logo) and the sleight-of-hand photographic documentation from Hare sounds dope as well. Put this one on your radar, NY.

* The Joshua Light Show @ NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts / 566 LaGuardia Pl (ACE/BDFM to W 4th St), 7:30p/$20. The final night of Joshua Light Show's return to Greenwich Village promises a funky bang, feat. powerhouse groove-mavens Debo Band & Forro in the Dark. Sending it out in style, yo.

TOKYO
* nisennenmondai presents "souzousuruneji+" @ Ochiai Soup / B1F 3-9-10 Kami-Ochiai, Shinjuku-ku (Tokyo Metro Tozai Line to Ochiai Station), 7:30p/TOTES SOLD OUT! It all comes to this, and count yrselves lucky if you scored a ticket to this way intimate performance. Tokyo's consummate kraut-rock starlets nisennenmondai take it back to their punk and no wave roots for one unforgettable night.

* "Wet Dream" @ AiSOTOPE LOUNGE / 1F 2-12-16 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku (Tokyo Metro Marunouchi/Fukutoshin/Shinjuku Lines to Shinjuku-sanchome Station), 9p/3000 yen. Why am I sending you (again) to deepest Ni-chome? For a sinful, end-of-summer fetish party, that's why! Feat. scene DJs incl RINKO and Zil, a kinky performance by Nasty Cats (aka Nancy & Aloe of tokyoDOLORES), a fashion show, and more surprises courtesy Torture Garden Japan.

MONDAY
NYC
* Deerhoof @ Music Hall of Williamsburg / 93 N 6th St, Williamsburg (L to Bedford), 10p/$15. I am so in love with Deerhoof's vibrant, upbeat, contrasty new LP "Breakup Song", which takes their enviable formula for art-rock and kicks it up a notch. "Then you bring me flowers", indeed! w/ Buke and Gase

TOKYO
* "White Agenda" @ Warehouse702 / B1F 1-4-5 Azabu-Juban, Minato-ku (Toei Oedo Line to Azabu-Juban Station, Exit 7), 3:15p/3000 yen. It's not often that I happen across mid-afternoon fetish parties, but the chilled-out nature of this sporadic bash seems super cool. Feat. Nasty Cats (aka Aloe and Nancy of tokyoDOLORES), plus Erebos party DJ Toru Shimizu, White Agenda resident DJ Toru Takeda, some guest stars from Japan Pole Dance, a "white candle artist", and a VIP lounge just for the girls.

TUESDAY
NYC
* "Remembering Warhol: 60 Artists, 50 Years" @ Metropolitan Museum of Art / 1000 Fifth Ave (456 to 86th St). The Pop purveyor's influence in contemporary art runs deep, whether we like to admit it or not (or whether we prefer Picasso's notoriety to young(er) artists over Warhol). The museum stages a grand dialogue between Warhol and 60 contemporary artists — spanning alphabetically from Ai Weiwei and Polly Apfelbaum to Kelley Walker and Christopher Wool — over five thematic sections, "Daily News", "Portraiture", "Queer Studies", "Consuming Images", and "No Boundaries". The befuddling fly in the ointment? The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts' idea to sell off some 20,000 remaining pieces of Warhol's estate at auction, beginning this fall. Though if we take the (hopefully) carefully considered 45 Warhols in this Met exhibition purely on an aesthetic/historical level — vs their 20,000 kin floating on the market — then maybe we're still good?

AUSTIN
* Emily + Andy's Film Club @ Visual Arts Center Courtyard / UT Art Building, 23rd St at Trinity, 6:30p. Ahead of Emily Roysdon's multimedia survey in the VAC's Vaulted Gallery (opening FRI!) comes the third iteration of her co-curated film series with art historian Andy Campbell. They've been saving this one for maximum impact, so attune your eyes to NY underground heavyweight Charles Atlas and his '85 docu-fantasy "Hail the New Puritan" on London's '80s post-punk subculture. 

* TOP SECRET TERRORTIME! screening @ Alamo Drafthouse Ritz / 320 E Sixth St, 10:15p. Terror Tuesday programmer Zack Carlson won't reveal much about this potential gem, except it's from the '80s and a definite "R". One thing: he and Drafthouse programmer Lars recently rescued some 1,300 35mm prints from the midwest…and this super-rare print comes from that haul. That info alone gives me a shot-in-the-dark idea of what it might be, and if so it's gonna be unmissable! 

CURRENT SHOWS
AUSTIN
* Anthony W. Garza @ Tiny Park / 1101 Navasota St. The biting, harsh light of Austin summers befits Garza's naturalistic practice: he either draws or paints highly realistic renderings of nature that work in an incredible attention to lighting itself. There is an entire cycle of discovery going on here, from breathtaking graphite drawings of weathered rocks and truncated branches, to seductive collages of animal and inanimate in watercolor (what seems overwhelming at first becomes far more compelling as you stare into them, the animals' eyes, the texture of fur), to a pair of romantic night skies in varying acrylic washes and textures. Garza's oeuvre cues us back into our discovery sides and bears a deep nostalgia in doing so.

* Jim Torok "There Is Nothing Wrong with You" @ Lora Reynolds Gallery / 360 Nueces. Go for it! Don't give up (yet)! (You can do it; just hang in there a little bit more; nobody said it would be easy; it will be worth it (most likely)!). This is the kind of positivity we need, drenched in bright colors and bearing a nuanced realism, highlighted by that deft comma placement. Torok installed 52 cheery — and sometimes quite poignant — ink on paper "cartoons" in two commanding grids across two gallery walls. We are literally caught in the middle, permitting his color washes and talking Jim heads to do their work. Maybe some of the positivity will stick. Outside, in the larger gallery, hangs the titular text-based work and one super-tiny, ultra-realistic self-portrait, a nonjudgmental reminder of the man behind the mottos.
+ Cordy Ryman. Incredible color-slinging and composition awaits visitors to the gallery's project room. I thought I "knew" Ryman from his many solo shows at NY's DCKT Contemporary, but he continues to delight in works like "Green Book" (ostensibly "just" a painting in photographs, but actually a three-dimensional object in real life, swinging open from its right side to reveal like the inner machinations of the artwork). Or the subtle drama in "Strip Line" and its gorgeous pairing of two unpainted blocks of wood sandwiched between two painted blocks. Elsewhere, arrangements of paint-streaked stir sticks or chunks of wood embedded in Gorilla Glue ooze never looked quite so striking.

CLOSING SOON
TOKYO
* Toru Nogawa "Sanctuary of Darkness" @ Span Art Gallery / 2-2-18 1F Ginza, Chuo-ku. (Yurakucho Line to Ginza-Itchome Station). Sumptuous oils of Gothic Lolitas and sorta domino types? Sign me up! (ENDS SAT)

TOKYO
* Kazuhiro Ito "bridge" @ hpgrp Tokyo / B1 5-1-15 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku (JR Yamanote to Harajuku Station, Tokyo Metro Chiyoda/Ginza/Hanzomon Lines to Omotesando Station). The Fukuoka-born artist continues to redefine the possibilities of bronze sculpture, from blobs and twisting spears to meteoric figurative works. I am particularly stoked about his centerpiece "Starman Loves You" and its "Earthbound"-referencing properties. (ENDS MON)

Wednesday, September 5, 2012

fee's LIST / through 9/11


WEDNESDAY
NYC
* Shimon Minamikawa @ 47 Canal. The artist's debut US show features works made in residence at gallery this past summer. Minamikawa shows w/ Misako & Rosen, one of the chicer residential Tokyo galleries.

* "Props For Memory" @ Invisible-Exports / 14A Orchard St. Joseph Beuys, Amanda Ross-Ho, and Paul P.: sounds dope to me! I'm intrigued by Ross-Ho's recycling of the creative process, which tends to incorporate scans of her parents' commercial photography, plus P.'s portraiture resembles lucid dreams. LIST readers should know my deep admiration for Beuys by now. A thoughtful opener to NY's gallery season.

* "Line Color Space Gesture" @ Site/109 / 109 Norfolk St. Cologne's Galerie Stefan Röpke plunges into the LES with four of its artist heavyweights, incl some locals! Brooklyn-based Jason Gringler, Aleksandar Duravcevic (I've not seen his work in NYC since "Now through a glass darkly" at Arario NY, back in 2010) and Greg Allen-Müller, plus Spain's Jordi Alcaraz, present works with heavy industrial backbones and reflective elements as painterly tools.

AUSTIN
* "Hard Ticket to Hawaii" (dir. Andy Sidaris, 1987) screening @ Alamo Drafthouse Ritz / 320 E Sixth St, 10:30p. When you have a group of bikini-wearing crimefighters called L.E.T.H.A.L. and a "doobie-smoker" skateboarding on his hands upside down, who needs crafty dialogue and SFX? Guess what: Sidaris' exotic locale schlock-fest has those, too!

THURSDAY
NYC
* Susan Philipsz + Analia Saban @ Tanya Bonakdar Gallery / 521 W 21st St. Take a world-premiere "sound-sculptor" (that's Philipsz: Scottish, Turner Prize winner, does disarming installations with "just" audio) and a fascinating young painting "destructor" (that's Saban: Argentinian, worldwide recognition, enjoying her debut NYC solo) and whaddaya get? Another brilliant Fall gallery season opener for one of my favorite NY galleries. Don't miss it!

* Robert Irwin "dotting the i's & crossing the t's: part II" @ The Pace Gallery / 510 W 25th St + 32 E 57th St. Pace continues its Irwin extravaganza, ahead of the seminal light and perception artist's 85th birthday this month. The Chelsea space contains Irwin's last "studio" works, monumental acrylic columns completed some 50 years ago, while the midtown space features the artist's light installations and a site-conditioned installation utilizing the gallery windows. 

* Rosemary Laing "leak" @ Galerie Lelong / 528 W 26th St. Laing focuses her lens on New South Wales in photographic series "leak", exposing suburbanization's threat to the Australian landscape. Four of her moving prints have never been shown, and the entire series makes its U.S. debut here. Laing returns to the gallery on SAT at 3p for a related book signing.

* Liu Ye "Bamboo Bamboo Broadway" @ Sperone Westwater / 257 Bowery. The artist merges traditional Chinese imagery with modernist edge, like bamboo with Bauhaus, in his third solo exhibition at the gallery.

* Simon Starling "Triangulation Station A" @ Casey Kaplan Gallery / 525 W 21st St. Cheeky conceptualist that Starling is, he's staging the "same" show here and at Berlin's neugerriemschneider, commenting on parallax view while mirroring sculpture and film projection.

* Michael Rakowitz "The Breakup" @ Lombard-Freid Projects / 518 W 19th St. Rakowitz unveils a cross-media Beatlemania, centered on a ten-part series for a Ramallah-based radio station in Palestine, a cascading narrative generated from Michael Lindsay-Hogg's documentary "Let It Be".

* "The Feverish Library", organized in cooperation w/ Matthew Higgs @ Friedrich Petzel Gallery / 537 W 22nd St. Expect multilayering on a Jorge Luis Borges level at this group exhibition, inspired by the book as a conceptual, psychological, and cultural device. Feat. Wade Guyton, Sean Landers, Jorge Pardo, Seth Price, Stephen Prina, John Stezaker, and Heimo Zobernig…you know, the heavyweights.

* "Searching" @ Mixed Greens / 531 W 26th St. Ever since I was exposed to Bas Jan Ader at MoMA's wonderful "In & Out of Amsterdam: Travels in Conceptual Art, 1960-1976" back in 2009, I've been increasingly captivated by the elusive conceptualist…I say "elusive" because he disappeared while working on his traveling project "In Search of the Miraculous" back in '75. That unfinished (and still missing) body of work grounds this group exhibition, which also features Arianna Carossa and Mie Olise. 

* Kwang Young Chun @ Hasted Kraeutler / 537 W 24th St. You gotta see this dude's oeuvre in person to fully understand the badassery present. Check it: what appears to be foliage-covered canvases from across the room — or heavily impastoed canvases, if we're keeping it art-related — transform into intricate sculptural reliefs, thousands of subtly colored, hand-molded paper triangles creating a forest floor, rock wall, sun through the leaves…something naturalistic and mind-blowing.

* Jonah Bokaer & Anthony McCall "Eclipse" @ BAM Fisher / 321 Ashland Place, Ft Greene (23/45 to Nevins St, G to Fulton St), 7:30p/$20. Choreographer Bokaer and light-sculpting pioneer McCall inaugurate BAM Fisher with a brilliant concert of dance and light. ALSO FRI-SAT 7:30p, SUN 3p.

AUSTIN
* The Sour Notes @ Stubb's / 801 Red River, 10p/FREE. Hometown indie heroes The Sour Notes play their first local show following their summer 2012 US tour…and it's a free one! Way to have it back to school, kids. Rock on.

TOKYO
* Momus + nisennenmondai @ UFO Club / 1-11-6 Koenji-minami, Suginami-ku (Toei Marunouchi Line to Higashi-koenji Station), 7:30p/2500 yen. Wowsers! Globe-trotting performance artist/musician/tender pervert Momus follows Japanese kraut-thrashers nisennenmondai for a truly transcendent performance. w/ OBANDOS 

FRIDAY
NYC
* Tony Smith "Source" @ Matthew Marks Gallery / 522 W 22nd St. Meet "Source", Smith's dynamic, 12,000-pound steel sculpture that once graced Documenta iV in Kassel, Germany, back in '68. BOOM. Way to open NY's fall gallery season, Matthew Marks. 

* Richard Tuttle "Systems, VII-XII" @ The Pace Gallery / 534 W 25th St. Less is more with this pivotal postminimalist. You may know Tuttle for his stretched fabric "reliefs", but he can't be "pinned" down to just one practice. The artist continues his investigation into sculpture with space physicality that maintains the discreetness of his earlier, smaller works. In these "Systems", he focuses on the relationship between the works' horizontal axis and the floor.

* Robert Adams "On Any Given Day in Spring and Light Balances" @ Matthew Marks Gallery / 523 W 24th St. For those seeking a…subtler answer to Tony Smith's monumental "Source" sculpture (at MM's 22nd St space), check these two graceful b&w series, the titular one and "Light Balances", which find Adams training his lens on flocks of seabirds and a forest, respectively.

* Ernst Wilhelm Nay @ Mary Boone Gallery / 745 Fifth Ave + 541 W 24th St. The first comprehensive stateside exhibition of the powerful, Berlin-born painter is a collaboration between Mary Boone's two spaces and Michael Werner Gallery. Boone's Chelsea hangar features Nay's intensely colorful, brushily abstract paintings from the '50s and '60s, while the midtown gallery features Nay's drawings.

* Al Taylor "Pass the Peas and Can Studys" @ David Zwirner / 519 W 19th St. The cheeky title alludes to its comprehensive study of Taylor's surveys "Pass the Peas" (1991-2) and "Can Studys" [sic] (1993) of deftly abstracted ephemera, plus related works from "Cans and Hoops" (1993).

* Toba Khedoori @ David Zwirner Gallery / 525 W 19th St. New hyperrealistic paintings of "virtual" landscapes from the LA-based artist.

* James Welling "Overflow" @ David Zwirner Gallery / 533 W 19th St. The artist presents a hybrid relationship between photography and painting, basing some prints off Andrew Wyeth's classic mid-century compositions. Others are even more malleable and watercolor-like, created by exposing wet photographic paper to light from a color enlarger.

* Guido van der Werve "Nummer veertien, home" @ Luhring Augustine / 531 W 24th St + 25 Knickerbocker Ave, Bushwick. The Dutch artist's latest film, which shares title with this exhibition, takes its form from a classical Requiem, intertwining Alexander the Great, Frédéric Chopin, and van deer Werve himself. He includes the multimedia work "Nummer dertien: emotional poverty", which features photography, text, and a slide projection with the HD film. The gallery's Bushwick location hosts eight of van der Werve's earlier "Nummer" films, from 2003-2009.

* Chris Dorland "Permanent Vacation" @ Winkleman Gallery / 621 W 27th St. The hallucinogenic titular video reminded me of Arboria from "Beyond the Black Rainbow". So expect a seriously hallucinogenic, pop-cultural trip from this dude. 

* Xeno & Oaklander + Led Er Est @ 285 Kent Ave, Williamsburg (L to Bedford, JM to Marcy), 11:45p/$9. Resident "Wierd"-o's Xeno & Oaklander (Brooklyn analog aficionados) and '80s-obsessed Led Er Est drop the temperature 60 degrees in their chilly pop persuasion. w/ IKE YARD

AUSTIN
* Anthony W. Garza @ Tiny Park / 1101 Navasota St. Garza, an Austinite and heavy presence in Texas' inaugural Biennial, unveils truly humanizing, richly detailed paintings and drawings based on geology and the cosmos.Ties in nicely with the 70mm release of "Baraka" today (read on!).

* Ink Tank "More Awkward Than Heavy" @ UP Collective / 2326 E Cesar Chavez. The local artist collective and 2011-12 winner of the Austin Critics' Table "Outstanding Work of Art: Independent or Public Project" (for Rosewood House's "LAST NEW YEAR" exhibition) carpetbomb their next venue with a fluid, experimental installation, guaranteed to elicit diverging experiences like the members themselves.

* "Compliance" (dir. Craig Zobel, 2012) @ Alamo Drafthouse S. Lamar / 1120 S Lamar. Finally Zobel's sophomore chiller hits Austin, guaranteed to turn you off to fast food — as it's the indirect player in this based-on-true-events thriller of blind obedience. A "cop" (Pat Healy, totally one-upping the creep factor) calls in, blaming cute register girl blamed for stealing. Instructs world-weary female manager to strip-search girl. And it gets wincingly worse, quickly.

* Pujol (TN) @ Stubb's / 801 Red River, 10:30p/$10. Aw yeah, "y'all": Austin gets served up a funky night of southern-fried rock tonight, courtesy Daniel Pujol and his Nashville crew. Now buy those boys a beer!

TOKYO
* Taishi Niimi @ Yumiko Chiba Associates / 2F 4-32-6 Nishi-shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku (Toei Oedo Line to Tochomae Station, JR etc to Shinjuku Station, West Exit). The Nagoya-area artist unveils new illustrations, ranging from intimate to monumental but all totally encapsulating his jiggity-jaggety style.

* Torturing Nurse + NOJIJI @ Ochiai Soup / B1F 3-9-10 Kami-Ochiai, Shinjuku-ku (Tokyo Metro Tozai Line to Ochiai Station), 9p/2000 yen. Straight outta Shanghai come harsh noise performance duo Torturing Nurse (aka Misuzu and Junky, both formerly of no wavers Junkyard). They're joined by Beijing collective NOJIJI, featuring core noisicians Mafeisan and Mei Zhiyong, plus Hong Kong alt-improvisor Sin:Ned. One helluva tight night of noise.f 

SATURDAY
NYC
* Audrey Kawasaki "Midnight Reverie" + Jeff Soto "Decay and Overgrowth" @ Jonathan LeVine Gallery / 529 W 20th St 9th Fl. I thank the gallery for introducing me to both these artists and their fascinating, personal oeuvres. Soto's polluted pop cosmos continues to intrigue, but it's Kawasaki's new series of stunning oil and graphite portraits on wood panel that really have me jazzed.

* Paul Pfeiffer "Playroom" @ Paula Cooper Gallery / 534 W 21st St. Pfeiffer returns in his first solo in NYC since 2007 by recreating the "playroom" from basketball legend Wilt Chamberlain's LA mansion. Film works and photography set the mood.

* Dave Cole @ DODGEgallery / 15 Rivington St. Nostalgia and a personal take on national identity. Cole conveys these in labor-intensive works, like his lead and stainless steel sewn flag and the absolutely bonkers-sounding centerpiece: a functioning music box powered by a steamroller. 

AUSTIN
* Jim Torok "There Is Nothing Wrong with You" @ Lora Reynolds Gallery / 360 Nueces. The Brooklyn-based artist's previous exhibition here focused on his hyperrealistic, super-tiny portraiture. This new one turns to Torok's other strength: loosely gestural, "cartoon-y" ink drawings. If the 50-some-odd works on paper overwhelm you, have a perusal through Torok's first major monograph "Portraits", coinciding with this exhibition.
+ Cordy Ryman. The artist son of white-paint nonpareil Robert Ryman — well, one of his artist sons, anyway — gets all visceral in the gallery project room with his genre-blurring conglomerate reliefs.

* "Baraka" (dir. Ron Fricke, 1992) @ Alamo Drafthouse Ritz / 320 E Sixth St, 1p/4p. The Drafthouse's ongoing presentation of gorgeous classics in 70mm "Alamoscope" continues w/ this wordless, global journey! ALSO MON 7p.

TOKYO
* "Livid" (dirs. Alexandre Bustillo & Julien Maury, 2011) @ Theatre N Shibuya / 2F 24-5 Sakuragaoka-cho, Shibuya-ku (JR etc to Shibuya Station, West Exit). Sick shit goes down good in this fairytale for f'ed-up adults. What begins as a robbery heist by a young caregiver and her stupid BF at a Brittany-area estate leads to darker passageways and devilish nastiness.

* Tokyo Decadance "Oedo" @ Christon Cafe / 5-17-13 Shinjuku, Shinjuku-ku (JR etc to Shinjuku Station, East Exit), 11:30p/3000 yen. This kitschy venue goes supremely old-school, transforming into an Edo-era castle town. UK-based performer/choreographer YUSURA headlines, while the requisite tech-house DJs, Geisha go-go dancers, and more fill out the lineup.

* nisennenmondai @ Shibuya O-Nest / 6F Maruyamacho, Shibuya-ku (JR etc to Shibuya Station, Hachiko Exit), 7p/3000 yen. Another outing for Tokyo's esteemed kraut-rock trio, anchored by Sayaka Himeno's ferocious drumming! This is all building towards—spoiler!—nisennenmondai's "Souzousuruneji+" show on SEPT 16 in Ochiai, Tokyo. Stay tuned! w/ AUTORA

* AISHA @ HARLEM / Maruyama-cho 2-4, Shibuya-ku (JR etc to Shibuya Station, Hachiko Exit), 10p/3000 yen. Hip-hop cutie AISHA celebrates the release of her new single, with lyrical b-boys Chehon, Richee, and Simon backing her up. Plus DJs and "supa dupa Saturday" opulence, don't miss it! 

SUNDAY
NYC
* Bernadette Corporation "2000 Wasted Years" @ Artists Space / 38 Greene St, 2nd Fl. The NY-based conceptual art trio's first major retrospective encompasses signature video works from the mid-'90s to today, plus faux-corporate promotional materials for as-yet unrealized projects, branded gear, "Made in USA" (the magazine!), and a veritable hotbed of other awesomeness.

* Alex Olson "Palmist and Editor" @ Lisa Cooley / 107 Norfolk St. New paintings with a strong graphic element and emphasis on the works' respective surfaces. Sounds like my style of abstraction.

* Alix Pearlstein "The Drawing Lesson" @ On Stellar Rays / 133 Orchard St. Pearlstein presents two new videos, "Moves in the Field" and the titular work, ahead of her newly commissioned solo exhibition at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center in January.

* Anya Kielar "WOMEN" @ Rachel Uffner Gallery / 47 Orchard St. Large-scale fabric prints boxed within wooden frames and hung from the ceiling, revealing Kielar's ongoing investigation of the female form. A catalogue accompanies her second solo show at the gallery.

* Naama Tsabar "Propagation" @ Thierry Goldberg Gallery / 103 Norfolk St. I've been a huge fan of Tsabar's since her rockin' performances at MoMA PS1's "Greater NY" — her audio-infused sculpture takes on whole new levels. Tsabar contributes a site-specific installation in her debut solo exhibition, featuring sculpture that double as instruments. Plus, she performs at this evening's opening (7:30p!) and will enact other performances with musicians on Sundays throughout the show's run; check the gallery website for further details.

TUESDAY
NYC
* Richard Phillips @ Gagosian / 555 W 24th St. Classical portraiture, pop culture, and La Lohan. Oh yeah, but I can't help myself. See you there?

* Cosmetics @ Glasslands / 289 Kent Ave, Williamsburg (L to Bedford, JM to Marcy), 8:30p/$10. Canada's Cosmetics emerge from the venue's haze (no doubt the smoke machine will be tuned to full blast) with their intoxicating glacial electro-pop. w/ Black Marble + Warm Ghost

AUSTIN
* Emily + Andy's Film Club @ Visual Arts Center Courtyard / UT Art Building, 23rd St at Trinity, 6:30p. Ahead of Emily Roysdon's multimedia survey in the VAC's Vaulted Gallery (opening Sept 21, tune back in!) comes the second iteration of her co-curated film series with art historian Andy Campbell. They pair up with PhD candidate Kara Carmack to screen three short films: Cecilia Barriga's "The Meeting of Two Queens"; Isaac Julien's "Looking for Langston"; and Todd Haynes' "Dottie Gets Spanked".

* "A Burning Hot Summer" (dir. Philippe Garrel, 2011) screening @ Alamo Drafthouse S. Lamar / 1120 S. Lamar, 7p. Reasons to see this: 1) the latest searing drama from French auteur Garrel, 2) his brooding, oft-acting son Louis is the lead, 3) Monica Bellucci plays Louis' wife (what the hell?) and 4) John Cale scored the film. Summer ain't over just yet, kids.

* "Piranha II: The Spawning" (dir. James Cameron, 1981) screening @ Alamo Drafthouse Ritz / 320 E Sixth St, 9:45p.  Whatta feature film debut, right? Before Cameron, lover of the deepest deep, went transcendent in "The Abyss", he tackled B-Movie bliss with airborne piranhas (did you know the alternate title was "Piranha II: Flying Killers"? sick, right?). 30 years later, John Gulager's "Piranha 3DD" may have had more boobs, but Cameron's sequel wins in good ol' bloodshed.