This month, the international art ensemble takes on New York, from downtown For Tribeca— culminating in Frieze New York’s return to the Shed in Hudson Yards for its 11th edition. We’ve rounded up 10 exhibits to catch during the annual art fair super bloom.
Wangechi Mutu, “Intertwined”
New museum, until June 4
Installation view of “Intertwined” by Wangechi Mutu. Courtesy of the New Museum.
Wangechi Mutu caused a stir when his solo exhibition of 110 works from the past 25 years was unveiled at the New Museum in March. And for good reason, each room, occupying all the available galleries, transports the spectators to another world where the physical, the mechanical and the botanical mingle through collage, video and sculpture. May 20 will offer an afternoon of programmingincluding a conversation between the exhibition’s co-curators and Nasher Museum Director Trevor Schoonmaker, followed by artist Sanford Biggers and DJ Reborn in discussion with catalog contributor and author Maureen Mahon.
Seth Price, “Ardomancer”
Petzel Gallery, until June 3
Installation view of “Ardomancer” by Seth Price. Courtesy of Dan Bradica and Petzel New York.
AI remains in vogue. While some fear that technology will harm their careers, dozens of others are using it to explore new possibilities. As Seth Price said, “Making art with wildly different tools and media helps you gain control and lose it, back and forth.” For his new exhibition at Petzel, the artist suggested words to an algorithm, coaxing it into a resonant image before applying it to gesture paintings. This is his second presentation of new works in New York in a decade.
Misha Japanwala, “Beghairati Ki Nishaani – Traces of shamelessness”
Hannah Traoré Gallery, until July 30
Misha Japanwala, Artifact SJ02 (2023). Courtesy of Hannah Traoré Gallery.
At the reception, the Lower East Side gallery of zeitgeist Hannah Traore was so packed that devotees had to dodge delicate bronze casts of breasts and hands floating from the walls and ceiling of the hall. solo exhibition of Japanwala. Inspired by the ancient civilizations of the Indus Valley, the artist and fashion designer’s series pays homage to the stories of women, queer and trans in Pakistan while using the Urdu term for “immodesty”. Notable subjects include filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy and former Karachi kidnapping victim Dua Mangi.
Yayoi Kusama, “I Spend Every Day Kissing Flowers”
David Zwirner, until July 21
Three flower sculptures welcome visitors to Yayoi Kusama’s latest exhibition at David Zwirner. © Yayoi Kusama, courtesy of David Zwirner.
Get into that feeling, but be prepared for the crowds. Yayoi Kusama reunited with David Zwirner for a lap of honor coinciding with the closing of his retrospective at the M+ Museum in Hong Kong, his largest outside of Japan. The gallery exhibition presents 36 new paintings, six monumental sculptures and a infinity mirror bedroom which will surely play in the background for many, many selfies. Expanding on motifs central to Kusama’s practice, the exhibition takes its title from the three massive flowers at its entrance and the artist’s famous fascination with the natural world.
Joan Brown, “Facts and Fantasies”
Matthew Marks Gallery, until June 17
Joan Brown, twenty to nine (1972). Courtesy of Matthew Marks Gallery.
Autobiographical painter Joan Brown’s first solo presentation with the Matthew Marks Gallery oscillates between reality and fantasy through paintings, sculptures and drawings between 1971 and 1986. Brown defined facts as “travel situations, everyday situations , sitting on a bed and looking out the window. and fantasies as imagined scenes abroad. If you missed Brown’s retrospective at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, don’t worry, as curator Beau Rutland has included several works from that exhibit here.
Richard Mayhew, “Natural Order”
Venus Over Manhattan, until June 17
Installation view of ‘The Natural Order’ by Richard Mayhew. Courtesy of Venus over Manhattan.
Venus Over Manhattan kicks off its latest gallery by spotlighting 20 often overlooked paintings and works on paper by 99-year-old African-American Indian artist Richard Mayhew. The contemporary of artists like Norman Lewis, Alma Thomas and Romare Bearden call these “mental landscapes” or “moodscapes”. Infusing fauvist palettes with low-fi realism, this collection of 26 works marks Mayhew’s gallery debut, despite the Spiral group founder’s fame, relying on his multicultural identity to harmonize nature and memory with elements of Cherokee, Lumbee and Shinnecock spirituality.
Oona Brangam-Snell, “The Lands of Shadow”
MRS., until June 30
Oona Brangam-Snell, Treelicker (2023). Photo: Olympia Shannon. Courtesy of MME.
New works of embroidered jacquard by Queens-based Oona Brangam-Snell occupy the “Shadowlands”, defined by the artist as “an indeterminate boundary between places or states”, “the realm peopled with shadows”, “the realm of the unconscious” or just “darkness”. Much like the artist’s practice, the exhibition blends textiles and paintings into works that seek out liminal spaces – sometimes with scenes between safety and danger, other times with expressions balancing wonder and disbelief. There’s magic in this show, aptly described as “an IKEA starter pack for spiritual seekers”.
Ariamna Contino and Alex Hernandez Duenas, “REVERSE”
Nunu Fine Art, until June 10
Installation view of “REVERSE” by Ariamna Contino and Alex Hernández Dueñas. Courtesy of Nunu Fine Art.
Nine years after curator Nunu Hung opened Nunu Fine Art in Taipei, the intercultural gallery celebrates its arrival in New York with this joint exhibition of two Cuban artists – Ariamna Contino and Alex Hernández Dueñas – with resolutely social practices, also marking their debut in the city. There are three bodies of work between them, highlighting the threatened ecosystems of Cuba’s eroding coastline and the melting glaciers of the Arctic. In conversation with each other, the works examine geopolitics and environmental ethics through data that the artists have translated into collaborative drawings and installations.
Georgia O’Keeffe, “Seeing Takes Time”
MoMA, until August 12
Georgia O’Keeffe. Beauford Delaney (1943). Pastels on paper. Myron Kunin Collection of American Art, Minneapolis. © 2023 Georgia O’Keeffe Museum / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
Think you know Georgia O’Keeffe? Think again. New angles for the American artist are revealed in his current exhibition in MoMA’s Third Floor South Galleries, the first to focus on O’Keeffe’s works on paper. A whopping 110 abstractions and portraits spanning over 40 years were created using pastel, charcoal and watercolor – and not a single cow’s skull in sight. Paintings from O’Keeffe’s practice accompany the focal points of the exhibition, providing additional insight into how the artist’s lesser-known studies fit into the more famous elements of his oeuvre.
Grada Kilomba, “18 verses”
Pace Gallery, until July 1
Grada Kilomba, A soul | a memory (2022) in “18 Verses” at the Goodman Gallery in London. Courtesy of Goodman Gallery.
Portuguese interdisciplinary artist, writer and Venice Biennale curator Grada Kilomba joined Pace’s roster this year and makes her gallery debut with the installation of her work in “18 Verses”, in collaboration with the Goodman Gallery in London, where the work has most recently been on view. It’s anchored in the silhouette of a shipwreck, crafted from burnt wood and engraved with a hand-painted Kilomba poem in gleaming gold leaf. The installation features nautical motifs introduced by his acclaimed 2021 work O Barco | The boatrecognizing the cyclical violence in society through the prism of Mediterranean migrants in particular.
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