Publicity photo of “Sleep No More” at the McKittrick Hotel, courtesy Yaniv Shulman

Punchdrunk’s “Sleep No More,” a Hitchcockian interpretation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, officially opening to the public on April 13th, 2011 at New York City’s McKittrick Hotel and has been extended due to its clearly impactful launch in New York. Since 2000, the British theater company Punchdrunk has been devoted to developing sensory theater; at “Sleep No More” audience members explore the 100 or so rooms of the hotel, encountering snippets of the performance and a unique display of theater, performance and an interactive art installation. Punchdrunk blurs the division between performer and audience, inviting spectators to explore, touch, and invent within the many spaces.

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Wiliam Kentridge, Man With Trumpet (2010), via Galleria La Rumma

Currently at Galleria Lia Rumma is an extensive exhibition by famed activist, director, animator, printmaker, sculptor and illustrator William Kentridge.  The self-titled show is a personal exhibition of the artists work, being held in conjunction with his involvement in Teatro alla Scala (The Magic Flute), Palazzo Reale (WILLIAM KENTRIDGE & MILANO. Arte, musica, teatro), Palazzo della Triennale (What Will Come, has Already Come) and  Teatro Verdi (Woyzeck on the Highveld).  The show itself is chock-full of Kentridge hits, including monochromatic prints, drawings, Caulder-like sculplture, and an installation with eight video projections and a performance piece entitled “I am not me the horse is not mine.”

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All pictures by Caroline Claisse for Art Observed

Currently on view at Tate Modern is “Joan Miro: The Ladder of Escape” featuring over 150 paintings, sculptures, drawings, and prints in the first London retrospective of the renowned Surrealist artist in over fifty years. Working in a rich variety of styles, Juan Miro (1893-1983) is considered a precursor to Abstract Expressionism. He effectively combined his surrealist style with strong political views to create work which is all at once playful and socially thought-provoking.

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Diane Arbus, A Castle in Disneyland (1962), via Gagosian

The Gagosian Gallery in Los Angeles presents “People and Other Singularities,” an exhibition of the photographs of Diane Arbus between the years of 1956 to 1971. The gallery showcases  the most extensive collection of Arbus photographs within Los Angeles since “Diane Arbus: Revelations” at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 2004. “People and Other Singularities” contains several photographs that have never before been exhibited publicly, along with some older favorites that have become part of photography’s canon.

Diane Arbus, Identical Twins(1962) via Diane Arbus Photography

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Andrew Kuo, The Walk Home After Being Racially Slurred/I’m Not Tall, Dark or Handsome, 2011. Via Taxter & Spengemann.

New York City-based artist Andrew Kuo is presenting his second solo show, My List of Demands, at Taxter & Spengemann through April 30th. Kuo meticulously tracks events in his life on digitally-produced charts, including rational and emotional insights on his milieu or on the music he listens to. The richness of the color palette on these charts, as well as the highly stylized use of lines and shapes, and the ludic quality of the variables reflect the artist’s concern on creating beautiful and empathetic representations of messy and conflicted life experiences; enclosing either a gesture, an incident, or a temporal subject (e.g. a musical piece) in a tight, quantifiable, bi-dimensional object.

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David Altmejd, The Vessel (2011), via Andrea Rosen Gallery

Currently on view at Andrea Rosen Gallery is an exhibition by Canadian artist David Altmejd, whose show includes sculptures that use a wide range of media and technique- terrines that house massive, undulating sculptures share the space with and site-specific pieces that draw their material from the wall of the gallery itself. Altmejd gained prominence in 2007 after his participation in the Whitney Biennial. His sculptures take many forms, but usually are centered around themes of life, death, decay and birth (not necessarily in that order.)

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Yayoi Kusama, Reach Up to the Universe, Dotted Pumpkin (2010). All images via Gagosian Gallery.

Following a solemn exhibition of black and white photographs by Gregory Crewdson at the Gagosian Gallery Rome is a psychedelic installation of recent works by Yayoi Kusama, on view now through May 7th. Five bold canvases, including two self portraits, are hung in the main gallery. Around the floor’s perimeter are dozens of highly polished and reflective chrome balls that are a later incarnation of a piece Kusama presented at the 33rd Venice Biennale in 1966 (though back then she was not invited to do so).

Yayoi Kusama, Installation View at Gagosian Gallery Rome

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Untitled (de kooning) (2008) by Richard Prince, via Gagosian Gallery

Currently on view at Gagosian Gallery in Paris is “Richard Prince: De Kooning” an exhibition of paintings and works on paper  by American artist Richard Prince which pays homage to the late abstract expressionist. The show takes places at the same time as “Richard Prince: American Prayer” at the Bibliothèque nationale de France.  Prince’s “De Kooning” series references iconic images from the work of the renowned American-Dutch Abstract Expressionist Willem de Kooning.  Also, relevant to this show’s continuation of Prince’s appropriative artistic dialog, is the artist and the Gagosian Gallery’s recent loss of a lawsuit (which will likely be appealed) against Patrick Cariou regarding Prince’s “Canal Zone” exhibition at Gagosian in 2008.

Untitled (de kooning) (2009) by Richard Prince, via Gagosian Gallery

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Turner Contemporary, via Turner Contemporary

David Chipperfield’s Turner Contemporary was opened today in Margate by artist Tracey Emin and muscian Jools Holland on the site where J.M.W. Turner (1775- 1881) often visited. Emin grew up in Margate and the grandmother of Holland lived in the Kent town.  It was here on the spot of the new museum that Turner was enraptured by the skies which he called “the loveliest in all of Europe.”  The stunning light and landscape of the coast of Kent stimulated his imagination and inspired his painting. The dynamic new visual arts venue thus takes heed from Turner’s artistic spirit of curiosity and discovery. The opening exhibit, Revealed displays the work of six contemporary artists, four of which have made new work specifically for the exhibition. Like Turner, they create their art while employing the same spirit of exploration and intrigue into the natural world around them.

Ellen Harvey, Turner Contemporary Revealed Opening, via Turner Contemporary

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All images courtesy Maccarone Gallery.

Currently on view at Maccarone New York is Hanna Liden‘s “Out of My Mind, Back in 5 Minutes.” The installation includes three photographs and several sculptures made from plastic shopping bags, t-shirts, and garbage bags. These items are stacked and filled with poured plaster or covered with latex, rendering them heavy and useless.

Loaded with references to memento mori and tribal customs, this process-based work transforms markers of the ephemerality and mundaneness of city life. It offers what the exhibition’s press release calls “a meditation on urbanity […] The result is a gallery space turned reliquary, containing the ghosts of an urban tribe now obsolete.”

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Félix González-Torres, Untitled (Lover Boys), 1991. Courtesy of MMK Frankfurt.

The traveling retrospective of artist Félix González-Torres reached its last venue, the Museum für Moderne Kunst (MMK), Frankfurt, on January 29th and will be closing April 25th. The exhibition, curated by Elena Filipovic and titled “Specific Objects without Specific Form”, provides an illustration of the elements of participation, dislocation, and transience that are prominent in González-Torres’s work. For each venue, an artist was invited to curate during the second-half of the show’s run. The three artists-curators–Danh Vo at WIELS, Brussels; Carol Bove at the Fondation Beyeler, Basel; and Tino Sehgal at the Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt–refer to their own practice as directly influenced by the work of González-Torres. In this retrospective’s specific mode, they aspire to cast new light into the exhibited work, and construct new meanings and interpretations.

Félix González-Torres, Untitled, 1998 and Untitled (Blood), 1992. Courtesy of MMK Frankfurt.

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Richard Serra, Calvino (2009) via Artnet.com

Currently showing at Gagosian Geneva, is Richard Serra‘s “Greenpoint Rounds,” featuring large-scale drawings using a paint stick and showcasing a medium Serra is not often associated with. Primarily know for his sculptural work, Richard Serra plays on minimalism through methods that encompass both shape and texture. The gallery’s rounded, sparse walls emphasize the shape and movement in the new drawings, which will be on display through May 15th.

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Julian Opie, Hirofumi, fashion designer (2005). via Galerie Bob Van Orsouw

Currently showing at Galerie Bob Van Orsouw is Julian Opie‘s new exhibition, showing work primarily from the last decade and largely focused on portraiture. Opie is widely known for his acclaimed cover album for British Alt-rock band “Blur,” and is also recognized as a member of the New British Sculpture Group, which emerged in the 1980’s and includes artists such as Tony Cragg, Anish Kapoor and Anthony Gormley.  The show will be open through May 14th.

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Installation view via Mitchell-Innes & Nash Gallery

Mitchell-Innes & Nash Gallery recently opened an untitled exhibition showcasing various sculptures by two of the prime examples  of modernism and three-dimensional abstraction: Jean Arp and Constantin Brancusi. Considered to be of differing artistic generations, these two artists followed two seemingly diverging paths. However, similar styles and a shared proclivity for “abstracted, somewhat amorphous forms relating to the natural world” (via Mitchell-Innes & Nash Gallery Press Release) have led to a union of the works, offering a fresh perspective. The show features various reliefs painted by Arp, and carvings in wood, bronze and marble by both artists.

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Antony Gormley,  MEME CLII (2011). Via Anna Schwartz Gallery

Antony Gormley‘s new work, a series of small iron sculptures, is being exhibited at Anna Schwartz Gallery from March 17th through April 23rd. The show’s title, “MEMES”, draws inspiration from the analogical relationship between genes and the unit of social information named memes–a cultural phenomenon that transmits information through self-replication and mutates in order to successfully adapt to its environment. These properties provide a syntactic framework for Gormley’s series, where he aims to set up a correlation between the dynamic and unpredictable meme, and the individual iron-cast sculptures.

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Installation view of Elemental at Paula Cooper Gallery. All images via Paula Cooper Gallery.

On view now through April 16th at the Paula Cooper Gallery is a group exhibition titled Elemental. What binds the selected works of Carl Andre, Jennifer Bartlett, Donald Judd, Sherrie Levine, Sol LeWitt and Robert Wilson is the use of “repeated elements arranged in a sequential structure.” The gallery notes that this strategy is often associated with minimal art, and the show pairs pieces by three pioneers of Minimalism with works by what the exhibition is defining as representatives of the second (and possibly third) generation of Minimalists.

Donald Judd, Untitled (1982)

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Alexis Rockman, Manifest Destiny (2003-2004), via the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Alexis Rockman: A Fable for Tomorrow, is currently open at the Smithsonian American Art Museum until May 8th. It is Rockman’s first major career retrospective, and showcases 47 paintings and works on paper.  The New York City artist has for more than two decades defied the parameters of traditional artistic collaboration through his work with scientists and researchers such as Peter Douglass Ward and molecular biologist Rob DeSalle, and the title of the show is a reference to environmentalist Rachel Carson’s book Silent Spring.

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Alexis Rockman, Hollywood at Night (2006), via the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

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Installation view of José Parlá: Walls, Diaries, and Paintings at Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery. All images Nicolas Linnert for Art Observed.

Entering into its final week is José Parlá’s Walls, Diaries, and Paintings, at Bryce Wolkowitz Gallery. It is the Brooklyn-based artist’s second solo exhibition in New York. For the show, the painter expanded his surface area from the canvas planes to include large parts of the gallery walls as mixed media installation.

José Parlá, DeKalb Avenue Station (detail) 2011.

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Louise Bourgeois, Arch of Hysteria (1993). via Fundación Proa

In late march, The Fundación Proa, a prominent cultural center in Buenos Aires, Argentina became host a to an impressive retrospective of world-renowned French – American Artist Louise Bourgeois. Bourgeois, who was born in Paris and later moved to New York, worked mainly in sculpture and is recognized for her contribution to the American Abstract Artists’ Group. Her work is largely autobiographical, drawing inspiration from trauma suffered in early childhood and describing the later emotional turmoil she underwent. For the first time in Argentina, a wide range of Bourgeois’ life’s work will be on display, including samples of her various mediums of production such as sculpture and installation and even a collection of her writings on psychoanalysis. The exhibition, entitled “Louise Bourgeois: The Return of the Repressed”, will additionally feature a cast of the prominent giant spider sculpture “Maman” (“mother” in French) guarding the entrance to the Fundación Proa. The replications of “Maman” maintain equally conspicuous and permanent positions in London, St Petersburg, Seoul, and Tokyo.

A view of the entrance to the Fundación Proa in Buenos Aires via Why on Earth Did I Move to Argentina?

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Vja Celmin’s show at LACMA discusses a part of her life that often goes overlooked-  her time as an young artist. For over three years, Celmins lived in a small studio in Venice Beach, California and though she is known for fairly serene subject matter, Celmins’ installation within LACMA showcases her preoccupation with more violent topics during this period in her life. These paintings emphasize  crashing war planes,  handguns and images of death and destruction.  Though the images are violent in nature,  they are tinged with Celmin’s own personal history and attention to the medium.

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Wolfgang Tillmans, Installation view at Regen Projects II (2011). Via Regen Projects.

German artist Wolfgang Tillmans continues his practice of large-scale photography at his sixth solo exhibition at Regen Projects.  These new works are large-scale, compelling photographs of places in cities intimate to the artist.  Cities like New York, Berlin and and London, as well as other less familiar locations, make lively subjects for an artist known for his discerning photographic eye.  The photographs are large inkjet prints hung without frames, allowing for a minimal exhibition style that showcases both the work and the medium.

Wolfgang Tillmans, Eierstapel (2009). Via Regen Projects.

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Mona Hatoum, Suspended (2011). All images via White Cube.

Installed on three floors of White Cube Mason’s Yard in London is an exhibition showcasing new work by Mona Hatoum titled Bunker, now on view through April 2nd. Hatoum recently made headlines by joining a group of artists in threatening to boycott the Guggenheim due to allegations that the museum is mistreating laborers constructing the Abu Dhabi branch. While Bunker does not specifically address the boycott, the themes of displacement and violence permeate this latest body of work.

Mona Hatoum, Bunker (2011)

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Brendan Fowler with Joel Mesler and Carol Cohen (Spring 2011), via Untitled

Currently on view until April 3rd is Brendan Fowler’s show Brendan Fowler with Joel Mesler and Carol Cohen (Spring 2011), at Untitled,  located at 30 Orchard Street. As its title indicates, the show consists of work  that plays with art exhibition techniques. Fowler’s show is only the fourth since the gallery’s opening in September, where his work was included in the inaugural exhibition. Untitled is the reincarnation of RENTAL Gallery,  whose owners, Joel Mesler and Carol Cohen, wanted to open a new space with a different set of goals. As Cohen told Art Observed at Untitled’s opening, the gallery’s goal is to “give more stability to the Lower East Side…not necessarily an art gallery district, but a way of seeing galleries. A place that can be professional without being in Chelsea. We want to give everyone more access to the gallery world.”

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Rachel Whiteread, Daylight, 2010. Via Luhring Augustine

Rachel Whiteread’s latest exhibition opened on March 25th at Luhring Augustine, displaying works that the British artist made between 2007 and 2011. In this show, the artist presents a new series of sculptures and work on paper. The sculptures have been made with resin, a medium that Whiteread has been using along with plaster, for the casting of objects or architectural structures, and sometimes, a subsequent recasting of the obtained mold. With this technique, Whiteread creates a material reproduction of the space that was contained by, or that surrounded the cast object. This resulting sculptural object then embodies an ascetic elegy for the relationships that existed between the object and the space, or the object and the users.

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