More Art Ramblings

So the de Kooning exhibit is a must, opening at the Museum of Modern Art on the 18th, but there's much more to see! As I was strolling around Chelsea, fashion week was in full fling. Skinny, chain smoking girls and boys where everywhere. Admittedly there where some stunningly beautiful girls mixed in, but what a freaky world they inhabit; that said, a fitting mix for the Chelsea art scene.

And speaking of art, Anne Neely's dripping, glowing, and otherwise manipulated paintings at Lohin Geduld brought me back for a second look. Very nice, complex surfaces. My Vermont neighbor Anne Pibal's small acrylic-on-aluminum wonders at Meulensteen are great: loving the washy backgrounds on some of them. Courtesy of the Pace Gallery, David Byrne has a huge bulging, inflatable earth sculpture with sound stuck in a garage on 28th Street? Lots of photo-ops with models when I was there.

Nick Cave is back at Jack Shainman with his new fashion week-friendly show, Forever-After. His sound suits, which he calls visual landscapes, camouflage the body, concealing race, gender, and class; they're amazing, beautifully crafted, yet as usual, a little creepy. The video of dancing suits is fun to watch. Digitally manipulated art can be cold and impersonal, and yes -- admit it -- we're all guilty sometimes. With new paintings at Jeff Bailey Kris Chatterson manages to manipulate his imagery and still keep his surfaces hands-on and painterly.

So many 9/11 tributes and I will admit I went underground this past week; however, Woodward Gallery has an interesting take, Charting Ground Zero: ten years after. The exhibit uses aerial shots with cartographic representation, laser imaging, and GPS tagging. It's as complex and impersonal as it sounds, until the image of the GPS locations of remains, fire equipment, and plane parts. Ten years later it's still unfathomable.

I think Alex Katz probably made a good decision moving from Pace to Gavin Brown. Not only is he now the big fish, but his paintings look great in the space. Nicole Etienne, at Sloan Fine Art, is all fantastical and dreamy: good shows, always worth a stop. Sloan's lease is up, and they may be moving to a new location -- watch their site. I happen to be quite proud of myself: I can finally find my way around the LES galleries without a map; well, I peek.

Loren Munk may be better known for his James Kalm Rough Cuts of gallery openings on his YouTube site, but his show up at Lesley Heller should qualify him as a master historian of the New York art world. His paintings or painted maps of the studio locations of art stars, both past and present, are quite thorough and entertaining. He could have a book in this somewhere or, maybe better, a game app.

Looking forward to Agnes Martin at Pace Gallery, opening the 15th, and Degas is coming to Boston. Brace yourselves, Beantown, the buses are coming!