The art world is heating up this summer—and lucky for us, galleries and museums have AC!
Our art experts Molly Surno, a Brooklyn-based installation artist and the art director at Elsewhere, and Paddy Johnson, an art critic and founder of Art F City—as well as our Secret Culinary Insider, who happens to be an insider in art beyond just that of the culinary type—pick their must-see shows for the rest of the summer.
“Obsession: Nudes by Klimt, Schiele, and Picasso” at the Met Breuer, through October 7
Marking the centenary of the deaths of Klimt and Schiele, the Met Breuer has put together a moody, titillating exhibition of 50 works by the Expressionist heavyweights—along with a little-known painter named Picasso. This is the first time the nude watercolors, drawings, and prints by the trio have been shown together. —Secret Culinary Insider
© 2018 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.
“Sonia Louise Davis: Refusal to Coalesce,” through September 2
A fellow at Brooklyn’s International Studio & Curatorial Program Project Space and a recent speaker on the intersection of sound and abstraction, Davis is on her way up. Her new solo exhibtion at the Rubber Factory is just one more indication of that trajectory. This show will include hanging color-field rugs, minimalist gestural abstraction, and a personal text addressing issues of race and gender. —Paddy Johnson
“David Wojnarowicz: History Keeps Me Awake at Night” at the Whitney Museum of American Art, through September 30
Rivaled only by Felix Gonzales-Torres, there is perhaps no better artist-cum-poet than Wojnarowicz. Though his career was cut tragically short due to AIDS, some of his most powerful art, now on display at the Whitney, responds directly to the epidemic of the ’80s and ’90s. —PJ
“Giacometti” at Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, through September 12
Glide up the spiral walkway of Frank Lloyd Wright’s white structure and you will meet Giacometti’s slender, lanky men and women cast in sculpture. His 170 works on show are organized chronologically, the early works soaked in sex, humor, and Surrealism. But Giacometti was stuck in Geneva during World War II and deeply affected by this: His art still related to the human form, but now in the landscape of isolation, rigidity, and suffering. Though crafted some decades ago, the work is as timely—and desired—as ever. One of the sculptures on display (Pointing Man) sold for $141 million at an auction in 2015. —SCI
“Laugh Back: Farah Al Qasimi, Natalie Baxter, Deborah Castillo, Kristina Davis, Dyna, and More,” through August 19
This Smack Mellon exhibition explores the “transgressive potential” of female comedy and laughter to challenge the status quo. Translation: The works of art on display—videos, performances, collages, photographs, and sculptures—should make you chuckle the way you do when you watch Samantha Bee. —Molly Surno
“Matthew Morocco: Orchid: RGB” July 20–August 26
Photography, at its core, is refracted light interpreted through our eyes as colors. It’s also a way to convey an individual’s unique perspective of the world. “Orchid: RGB” at Brooklyn’s Pioneer Works encapsulates these two touchstones of the photographic medium. The subject of the images is an unidentified figure in classic portraiture poses placed among a range of RGB color fields, creating an oddly intimate sense of detachment. —MS
