THE WEEK/WEEKEND: August 2-9.

Summer Group Exhibition 2012@Joshua Liner
Joshua Liner

August 2 to August 25, 2012

Joshua Liner Gallery is pleased to announce the 2012 Summer Group Exhibitionshowcasing 16 artists, including established gallery regulars and newcomers. This presentation will feature painting, sculpture, and drawing, with works by the following artists – Alfred Steiner, Clayton Brothers, Cleon Peterson, Damon Soule, Daniel Rich, David Ellis, Ian Francis, Jean-Pierre Roy, Kris Kuksi, Mars-1, Oliver Vernon, Pema Rinzin, Riusuke Fukahori, Tat Ito, Tiffany Bozic, and Tomokazu Matsuyama.

IRABAGON FEST: BARRY ALTSCHUL, JON IRABAGON TRIO
Cornelia St Cafe

Thursday,  Aug 02 – 8:30PM 

Jon Irabagon and Barry Altschul have performed continually in the last few years, including their tour-de-force Foxy (Hot Cup Records) and their upcoming duo release on Jon’s Irabbagast Records. As a preview of their upcoming trio tour, they invite master bassist Mark Helias to join them tonight at Cornelia St. Cafe, where they will be debuting new compositions as well as delving into the group improvisations that have made Barry and Mark such an important rhythm section combination over the last two decades.

IRABAGON FEST: BARRY ALTSCHUL GROUP
Cornelia St Cafe
Friday,  Aug 03 – 9:00PM & 10:30PM 

Since the early 1960’s, Barry Altschul has been associated with being at the forefront of Modern Jazz, playing with innovators such as Paul Bley, Steve Lacy, Chick Corea, Sam Rivers, Anthony Braxton, Dave Holland, Muhal Richard Abrams, George Lewis, Andrew Hill and Roswell Rudd, to name a few, as well as the likes of musicians such as Lee Konitz, Hampton Hawes, Sonny Criss, Art Pepper, Johnny Griffin, and many others.

IRABAGON FEST: JON IRABAGON JAZZ QUARTET
Cornelia St Cafe

Saturday,  Aug 04 – 9:00PM & 10:30PM 

Cyro Baptista @The Stone
The Stone
8/7 Tuesday and 8/8 Wednesday

Multicultural, polyphonic, highly creative entertainment that takes rhythms beyond their natural frontiers and creates a brand of music too innovative and varied to be labeled.

CAROUSEL @ SOLOWAY
SOLOWAY
Friday, August 3rd

Soloway is pleased to host the latest CAROUSEL, a long running series of Cartoon Slide Shows and other projected pictures, created and presented by a wide array of writers, cartoonists, and other characters. Hosted by R. Sikoryak.
This episode features:
Gabrielle Bell
Emily Flake
Myla Goldberg & Jason Little
Danny Hellman
Matthew Thurber

in the open
Kesting/Ray
Aug. 2 – 18, 2012

KESTING/RAY is pleased to announce its upcoming exhibition in the open, a group show featuring five emerging artists who recently completed their Masters in Fine Arts from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

The Skin We’re In
Yossi Milo Gallery
August 2, 2012–August 31, 2012

Yossi Milo Gallery is pleased to present The Skin We’re In, a group exhibition featuring the work of David Goldes,Lindsay Lawson, João Enxuto & Erica Love, Stephen Prina, Jon Rafman and Mark Tribe. The exhibition will be on view from August 2 through August 31, with an opening reception on August 2 from 6:00 – 8:00PM.

MIDNIGHT MONSTER MELTDOWN
Opening Party and Birthday Celebration: Saturday August 4th, 7pm-10pm
MF Gallery

Both artists are known for their colorful and horrific 2-D artwork in the form of drawings, prints and comic books. For this show, they have embarked on a brand new journey that will take us down the darkest roads of gore, the supernatural, and all things unknown. Witness Frankenstein, larger than life! Stand in awe of the giant blood dripping face, protruding from the wall! Behold the latest incarnation of The Creature From the Black Lagoon! Stumble in fear as you encounter Aliens dripping and oozing in blacklight pus, and look into the eyes of Death Itself! “Midnight Monster Meltdown” provides a visual explosion comparable to being high on LSD, trapped on a roller coaster inside an old time Spook House that never ends… All this and more only at MF Gallery!

Signs of the Apocalypse
myplasticheart
Friday August 3rd 2012 6 – 9pm

Underpinnings
House of Yes
Thursday, August 9th

Underpinnings presents a look into the wiry world of performance, dance, music, and fine art as interpreted by its involved artists. With motifs of peeling, multiple selves, sustainable creativity, streaming consciousness, power/submission, synth-art-pop, symbiotic siblingship, and sacrifice, each short individual act envelops viewers in an original experience. The performances will be followed by a party where drinks, video installation, and fine art will flow forth, served on a platter by the ritualistic art community that exists solely in Underpinnings.

Kimmo Pohjonen & Helsinki Nelson: Accordion Wrestling (U.S. premiere)
Damrosch Park Bandshell
Aug 3–4 at 8:30

SurroundSound grunts and groans punctuate accordionist Kimmo Pohjonen’s dance-theater work in which music, sport, and dance blend into a unique multimedia “squeeze play.” Reviving the dormant Finnish tradition of accordion-accompanied wrestling matches, Pohjonen performs while grapplers struggle on a custom-made mat embedded with microphones. His work, with choreography by Ari Numminen, comments on Cold War and gender politics while lending a modern artistic twist to a classic Olympic competition.

RUFUS CAPPADOCIA’s ROOTS QUARTET
Barbes

Thursday, Aug 9

The cellist draws from “the similarities between seemingly diverse music forms such as blues, Sufi, Middle Eastern and even Gregorian chant.”.

OLIVIA SALVADORI/PILLARS AND TONGUES/DJ HIRO KONE
Zebulon
AUG 4, 2012

Overturn Theater’s rendition of : Waiting for Godot
Arts@renaissance
August 2st – 18th, 7pm

Overturn’s artistic director Kristy Dodson has placed Samuel Beckett’s 1953 Godot in an former medical ward in North Brooklyn. Starring Joshua Levine (Off Bway’s Channeling Kevin Spacey ) Casey Greig (Off Bway’s Pure Confidence) James Fauvell, & Daniel Piper Kublick with set design by Cara Shih, lighting design by Jennifer Schriever, fight choreography by Casey Robinson, and sound design & costume design by Kristy Dodson. Overturn’s Godot will be running for three weeks August 2st – 18th(Wednesdays -Saturdays) at 7pm at Arts@Renaissance, 2 Kingsland Ave. BK, NY Garden level.

SCOTT TIXIER & ISOPROPYL BOP
Cornelia St Cafe
Sunday,  Aug 05 – 8:30PM

Violinist Scott Tixier is an award-winning recording artist, named as “Rising Star Violin” in the 60th Annual critics poll Downbeat. He is a true innovator on his instrument and is quickly becoming known as the new voice of jazz violin. He has earned international recognition for his playing.

M. Ward,Yo La Tengo, Wyatt Cenac (of The Daily Show)
Prospect Park Bandshell

Tue, August 7, 2012

Benefit concert to support free programming at Celebrate Brooklyn! a Performing Arts Program of BRIC Arts | Media | Bklyn.

AMPLIFIED QUARTET – Jeremiah Cymerman, Peter Evans, Nate Wooley, Matt Bauder
Roulette
Thursday, August 9, 2012 @ 8:00 pm

Jeremiah Cymerman (clarinet, electronics) Matt Bauder (sax, electronics) Peter Evans (trumpet, amplifier) Nate Wooley (trumpet, amplifier)
After several performances as an amplified ensemble, the intense and uncompromising quartet of woodwind players Jeremiah Cymerman & Matt Bauder and trumpeters Nate Wooley & Peter Evans will convene at Roulette for two days of rehearsing & workshopping, leading up to a performance on August 9th.

PULVERIZE THE SOUND/AURAL DYSTOPIA
The Grand Victory
Wednesday, August 8, 2012

An evening of punishingly heavy improv: PULVERIZE THE SOUND (Peter Evans/Tim Dahl/Mike Pride), SHEAJOY (Stuart Popejoy/Kevin Shea), BURNING GENITALS (Jamie Saft solo).

The Alaev Family (New York debut)
Damrosch Park Bandshell
Aug 8 at 7:30

The propulsive doyra hand drums of Bukhara, Uzbekistan, drive the ecstatic sound of “Bucharian Groove” band the Alaev Family, who immigrated to Israel in 1991. The Alaevs blend together the sounds of Turkey, Persia, China, and Russia alongside lyrics by Tajiki poets on their latest album, produced by Balkan Beat Box’s Tamir Muskat, which captures the fire and drive of their live shows.

NoTornado
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
ZirZamen 90 W. Houston St., NY, NY

Fay Victor and Anders Nilsson’s Exposed Blues Duo, Ed Pastorini, Jonathan Wood Vincent

GREEN SCREEN
Cornelia St Cafe
Wednesday,  Aug 08 – 8:30PM 
“Green Screen” was formed by the meeting of 3 musicians that were playing the Big Apple Circus. In contemporary music circles, the circus probably doesn’t hold much respect. But, the history of circus musicians would surprise most. According to Joe De Mare, ( Bronx trumpeter who played with Louie Prima ) – “back in the day , all the big bands got their cats from the circus – ( including Count Basie and Duke Ellington ) – these cats had chops and endurance. They could play ANYTHING. “
Under the Mattress
303 10th Ave.
August 2-25

Under the Mattress is a solo exhibition of works by Billy Frey. The collages are done by hand using original vintage materials and imagery, primarily from magazines fromt he 1930’s to the 80’s. With bold and often complex patterns of re-appropriated images, he offers us tales that are humorous, dark disturbing, playful, perverse, and fantastical. Frey is heavily influenced by classic film, comic book art, cartoons, surrealist film and literature. The collages represent a fusion of times past and present, creating an environment where time is non-linear. Within our minds, it is happening all at once. A place where the 30’s and the 60’s can do a dance together, unaware of the fact that time has already come and gone.

Heritage Sunday AYITI RASANBLE!
Hearst Plaza
August 5, 1pm

Ayiti Rasanble! (“Haiti, come together!”) celebrates the indomitable spirit of the Caribbean nation with dance and musical groups reflecting its resilience and pride. Feet of Rhythm Afro-Haitian Dance Company works to preserve traditional dance forms under the vision of founder Nadia Dieudonné, the dancer and choreographer best known for her infectious interpretations of banda, the dance of Ghede, the revered Haitian spiritual figure of the underworld.

Christopher Smith: Underbody
site95 @ Launch F18, New York, NY
August 6 – 18, 2012

In “Underbody,” Smith continues his investigation into the usage of current technology and assembly line manufactured materials to break beyond the traditional two-dimensional form of painting. The 14-minute projection of foaming paint drips across a 9 x 6 ft Plexiglas surface.

S!CK MAGIC W EGYPTRIXX//SINJIN HAWKE//N0ms//GOBBY//MIKEQ//REZZIE//RPEG//TOMAϟϟ
285 Kent
Saturday, Aug 4, 11:30pm until 4:00am

JENNY ODELL: THE FOSSILIZED PRESENT
Breeze Block Gallery
Wed. Aug. 1, 5:30-8

Interpreting the inhuman experience bred from modern technological advances that compose our commonplace environments, for the past two years Bay Area native Jenny Odell has been utilizing imagery taken from Google Satellite images in a commentary on the sanctification of otherwise mundane objects in our lives that are taken for granted. The show will feature eighteen prints displaying Odell’s unique interpretation on the alienation of this perspective provided by the revealing landscape that she manipulates in her distinct evaluation of our surroundings.

Alex Gingrow: All the money IS in the label
Mike Weiss
August 2, 2012 – September 1, 2012

Mike Weiss Gallery is pleased to present All the money IS in the label by Brooklyn based artist Alex Gingrow.  For her first solo exhibition, Alex Gingrow presents dozens of obsessively rendered drawings on paper loaded with cutting, antagonistic humor and a quick trigger finger pointed at the heart of the art world.   Over the past five years while working at a midtown frame shop, the artist has collected snippets of sordid conversations overheard from chief art world players as well as from peers working at entry- level positions within art institutions.   The resulting works are incredibly revealing, and often baiting epitaphs of insider conversations, reified and displayed, ironically within a frame.  With a snarky, sharp wit and a healthy dose of self-deprecation, Gingrow implicates all levels of the “establishment” including Gagosian, Hirst and Warhol, the New Museum and even our own Mike Weiss Gallery.

Midsummer’s Mayhem Poetry & Pub Crawl
Just Lorraine’s Place
Saturday, August 4, 2012

Skewered Syntax returns to Harlem for the Midsummer’s Mayhem Poetry & Pub Crawl. All who want to participate, or who bear witness to one of the greatest New York City literary spectcles are invited to gather in front of Just Lorraine’s Place at 8:00 PM with poem in hand or heart. After Featured Poets April Jones, Matthew Hupert, Robert Gibbons and Zev Torres open up the ceremonies, there will be an open mic, followed by drinks. Then we’ll take a short walk to the next venue where we’ll recite more poetry, imbibe a little more and move on once again. There’s no cost to join our merry band of poetic artisans or to recite your own pieces, but everyone pays for his or her own drinks.

Rockaway Pipeline Day of Awareness Action
Jacob Riis Park
AUG 4, SAT

Please join members of the Coalition Against the Rockaway Pipeline this Saturday August, 4th at Jacob Riis Park to gather signatures on the boardwalk, and distribute information opposing this pipeline!

Lucinda Williams
The Bowery Ballroom
Mon, August 6, 2012

It’s not all that hard to find an artist who’s capable of offering a guided tour of life’s dark clouds – nor is it rare to come into contact with one who can hone in on the silver lining. But the ability to do both with equal grace, well, that’s an altogether rarer gift – and it’s one that Lucinda Williams displays with remarkable élan on her latest Lost Highway album, Blessed.

M Shanghai String Band and Friends 10th ANNIVERSARY SHOW
Jalopy
Saturday, August 4

The Red Hook Ramblers Live Music with Silent Films
Jalopy
Sunday, August 5

COMING UP: 
The Fall of the American Movie Palace

Video Weekend: My Tooth is Looth/Tooth Decay.

 

VIMEO PAGE.

An experimental piece exploring the reasons why people dream about their teeth falling out.
10 different scenario’s in the piece which are all proven reasons why people dream about their teeth falling out.
See if you can figure them out.
This was a collaboration with Ashley Wituschek, the piece also goes along with a sculpture she created of about 5000 cast teeth for an installation project.
Winner of Best editing and best experimental in the 2010 Diamond Screen Film Festival!

“Tooth Decay” Black Moth Super Rainbow from mark armes on Vimeo.

THE WEEK: Oct 24-28.

MONDAY:

BROOKLYN FOLK ARTS DAY
Brooklyn Arts Council, in partnership with The Cultural Strategies Institute invites your participation in a Folk Arts Town Hall Meeting celebrating and strengthening folk and traditional arts in Brooklyn. This first of a kind meeting will inaugurate Brooklyn Folk Arts Day, an annual gathering of Brooklyn’s traditional artists, traditional arts organizations and communities they serve, teaching artists and educators, funders, elected officials, and other friends of folk and traditional arts. Moderated by BAC Folk Arts Director Kay Turner, this gathering will address ways to preserve, sustain, encourage, and expand traditional arts practices in Brooklyn. In town hall fashion, we hope to hear ideas and concerns from a wide range of people attending. The reception provides further opportunity to meet and greet across Brooklyn folk arts communities and genres of practice.

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THE WEEK: AUGUST 22-26.

SVA Women Alumni Invite Artists Who Have Shaped Their Work

August 26 – September 21, 2011
Reception: Thursday, September 8, 6 – 8pm
Visual Arts Gallery

Panel Discussion Moderated by Lindsay Pollock
Tuesday, September 13, 7pm
SVA Theatre

School of Visual Arts (SVA) presents “The Influentials,” an exhibition featuring distinguished female alumni of the College and the diverse group of artists who have influenced their practice. “The Influentials” is both an investigation into the creative lineage between contemporary artists and a dialogue between mentors and mentees that crosses generations, gender and media. The exhibition is co-curated by independent curatorAmy Smith-Stewart and SVA Director of Development and Alumni Affairs Carrie Lincourt.

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THE WEEK: AUGUST 15-19.

PROJECT FUKUSHIMA! BENEFIT CONCERTS @ THE STONE.
8/15 Monday  8 and 10pm

PROJECT FUKUSHIMA! BENEFIT CONCERTS
John Zorn, Ned Rothenberg (sax) Uri Caine, Shoko Nagai, Karl Berger (piano) Ikue Mori (electronics) Ha Yang Kim (cello) Nels Cline, David Watson (guitar) Yuka Honda (keyboards) Satoshi Takeishi (drums) Shayna Dunkelman (percussion) Chuck Bettis, Michael Carter (electronics) Kato Hideki (bass) and many special guests!
TWO SPECIAL SETS OF IMPROVISED MUSIC AS PART OF A WORLD-WIDE INITIATIVE FOR THE LAND AND PEOPLE OF FUKUSHIMA. ALL PROCEEDS WILL GO TO PROJECT FUKUSHIMA!—TWENTY DOLLARS

THIS NIGHT WILL BE BROADCAST LIVE OVER WEBSYN RADIO BY DOMINIQUE BALAY—THE LINK http://droitdecites.org/2011/06/08/websynradio-en-direct-de-the-stone-new-york-fukushima/

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The New York International Fringe Festival
Friday, Saturday and SundayFringeNYC? The New York International Fringe Festival (FringeNYC) is the largest multi-arts festival in North America, with more than 200 companies from all over the world performing for 16 days in more than 20 venues. In addition to 1200 incredible performances, FringeNYC includes…..(READ MORE.)


Maya Zack: Living Room

The Jewish Museum
July 31, 2011 – October 30, 2011

In the installation, Living Room, artist and filmmaker Maya Zack uses large-scale computer-generated 3D images accompanied by sound to evoke a Jewish family’s apartment from 1930s Berlin. While listening to the stories and memories of Manfred Nomburg, visitors can experience the apartment visually. 3D glasses enhance the oversized images reimagining rooms in the apartment and give them immediacy and depth.

Everybody Loves the Monster!
Thursday, August 18, 2011, 10 a.m.

In 1818, when Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus was published for the first time, Mary Shelley could not have imagined the monster she was unleashing on the world. The creature in Shelley’s novel is remarkably sympathetic and an eloquent speaker, capable of measured, intelligent, and articulate argument.  But based on Boris Karloff’s 1931 film performance and confirmed by countless other films, comics, and illustrations, the general perception today is that Frankenstein’s creature is a “monster” who grunts or speaks—if he talks at all—in disjointed monosyllables.

Why has popular culture largely denied the creature his reasonable voice? This symposium brings together four scholars and the curator and bibliographer of The New York Public Library’s Carl H. Pforzheimer Collection to reflect on graphic and film representations of the “monster” from the past two centuries. The first half of the day will feature presentations on key visual adaptations of the creature, while the latter half will engage questions about what these appearances mean for understanding him as a political and historical subject.

Yana Dimitrova and Angela Washko: Cheap Paradise of Familiar Tasks and Places
Opening reception: August 19th, 6:30 pm on
Flux Factory 

Consider escaping your common, everyday tasks and places without using your common, everyday devices. Through installation, painting, drawing, and video, Yana Dimitrova and Angela Washko portray the mundane patterns and structures of everyday experience and consider models of living that exist outside of our “to-buy-is-to-gratify” mentality. Stripping fast food architecture and smart phone technology of it’s branding and context, Washko and Dimitrova present what remains – hollow monuments to consumer culture.

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THE WEEK: August 8-12th.

Social Hijinks! A screening and live action lecture night
Wednesday August 10, 7:30 pm

In conjunction with the exhibition Why Participate?, Angela Washko has organized a lineup of videos and live performative lectures by artists whose projects take place within social spaces. The works being presented and discussed are mischievous, critical, occasionally hilarious, and examine the boundaries of legality. Artists Jason Eppink, Nate Hill, Ann Hirsch, Jaime Iglehart, Action Club, Paolo Pedercini, and Jeff Stark present and talk about their works discussing surveillance, costumed public service, reality television, knock-off culture, collaboration, video game evolution, protest, and performance in public spaces.
Free + Bring your own beverages and snacks
(images courtesy of Jeff Stark)

Gian Luigi Diana, electronics & Ben Gerstein, trombone
Wednesday, August 10, 10pm

SEEDS:Brooklyn – www.seedsbrooklyn.org
617 Vanderbilt Ave., Brooklyn (preceded at 8:30 by Jacob Garchik, trombone/computer)

All Star Poetry: A Benefit at the Bowery Poetry Club.
Tuesday, August 9

Nine poets from the First Annual New York Poetry Festival join forces to raise funds for the Festival and Bowery Arts + Science. Featured poets include Lisa Marie Basile, Jassie Harris, Meghann Plunkett, Rita Mercedes, Sarah Feeley, Ayala Sella, Nick Adamski and Bob Holman w/ Molissa Fenley.

Books will be available for purchase after the reading.
Admission: $8
The Bowery Poetry Club is located at 308 Bowery (between Houston and Bleecker)

New York Poetry Festival Afterparty at the Bowery

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The Weekend: July 29-31.

A Celebration of The Battle for Mau Mau Island

Saturday, July 30

9:30 pm – late

SWIMMING CITIES in collaboration with SEA WORTHY present: A Celebration of The Battle for Mau Mau Island with Rusty Lazer (New Orleans, Bounce.), Dirtyfinger (Black Label), Geko Jones (Que Bajo?.) and Barney Iller (Rubulad).

Last weekend the naval gangs of New York assembled to Battle for Mau Mau Island (see photos here).  Come see the fallen soldiers, harvested booty, and glorious victors at a new two-story space in Bed-Stuy. Mau Mau gangs, gladiator raft jousting, cocktail catacombs, clothing optional watergun fight, underground casino & film screenings of eerily beautiful movies set on the water, slide show and videos of the battle, and an awards presentation for the victors.  Wet & wild all night long.

$5 for gangs in matching costumes, Mau Mau vets, or before 11pm, $10 otherwise; 21+.

All proceeds go directly to the Swimming Cities India project.

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WATER LANDSCAPES/SUSPENDED ENERGY
PAUL BOBKO @ KLOTZ GALLERY.

July 7th-August 19th.

In his magnum opus, Gravity’s Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon introduces us to the German concept of Brenschluss in the telemetry of the flight of the V2 rocket. The rocket is propelled by its engines and travels along its parabolic arc.  At a certain point the engines turn off, this flameout is called brenschluss. At brenschluss the rocket’s ascendancy is checked by gravity, and before it begins to fall to its target on earth, it hesitates for just a moment.  After this moment gravity and momentum alone, not a rocket engine, define the inexorable trajectory of descent to its inevitable, calamitous  end. (READ MORE.)

CONEY ISLAND: 40 YEARS, HARVEY STEIN
KLOTZ GALLERY

July 7th-August 19th.

Harvey Stein has been a fixture on the New York photo scene for many years.  He has photographed the city from every angle with every kind of camera, at every time of day and night.  Beyond these shores he has led photographic seminars and workshops all over the world…He’s gone everywhere, and for the last 40 years he’s been going to Coney Island…where New York City flows into the Atlantic Ocean at the end of Ocean Avenue, in Brooklyn.

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The Week: June 6-10.


June 5-11

Vision Festival 16Arts For Art, Inc. presents the 16th annual Vision Festival, New York City’s premier multidisciplinary celebration of innovative jazz music, dance, poetry, and art, held for its third year at the Abrons. Critics have described it as “arguably the most important free-jazz fest in the U.S.” (Peter Margasak, Chicago Reader), and stated that “avant-garde jazz culture has no better colloquy in this country than the Vision Festival” (Nate Chinen, The New York Times).

Each year, the Vision Festival honors the achievements of one living artist who has greatly influenced the world around them and paved the way for other innovators to move forward. On Wednesday, June 8, Arts For Art and The Vision Festival will celebrate a Lifetime of Achievement by Peter Brotzmann. This great improviser was one of the first practitioners of the Free Jazz movement in Europe. Brotzmann has programmed his own evening in such a way that it would reflect his ongoing pursuit of musical innovation. This 70-year-old artist is not interested in looking back — only in looking forward and being as creative as possible in the present.

Visit visionfestival.org for more information and listings of Vision Festival events at satellite sites. (SEE FULL SCHEDULE.)

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THE WEEKEND: May 6-8.

FRIDAY MAY 6th

Umirayushchii lebed (The Dying Swan), 1917 @ THE GUGGENHEIM.

Fridays, April 22 and May 6, 13 @ 1 and 2:30 pm

Directed by Evgeni Bauer
49 minutes, 35 mm, silent with musical score

Image Courtesy Milestone Film & Video

A figure of fundamental importance in the history of silent cinema, Russian director Evgeni Bauer brings to life a chilling tale that takes a sardonic view of popular morbid obsessions in pre-Revolutionary Russia. Bauer’s film features a decadent artist obsessed with capturing the image of death on canvas, an infatuation that drives him to the brink of despair until he watches a captivating and heartbroken ballerina perform. He sees in her the masterpiece he seeks, but ultimately, the young dancer cannot live up to the artist’s ideal and suffers the disturbing consequences.


ALCHEMICALLY YOURS – A Group Art Show @ OBSERVATORY.

alchemically

Robert M. Place “Caduceus” detail 2011

Opening: Saturday, May 7th, 2011 7-10pm
On View: May 8th – June 12th, 2011
Hours: Thursdays & Fridays 3-6pm; Saturdays & Sundays 12-6pm
MAP 

Observatory and Phantasmaphile’s Pam Grossman are proud to announce ALCHEMICALLY YOURS, a group show of alchemy-themed artwork, on view from May 7th through June 12th.

Alchemy is the art of transmutation. Of taking the rough and raw, and rendering it more precious. Rather than accepting the literal “lead into gold” definition, Carl Jung believed that alchemy is a process of individuation, a symbolic and active language which guides one’s personal journey toward the realization of selfhood. An alchemist is a shape-shifter, a mystic chemist. A patient and meticulous devotee who turns the base into something resplendent.

Like dreams, alchemy speaks in pictures. At first glimpse, alchemical manuscripts from the 16th and 17th centuries look like a panoply of hallucinations. They feature images of fornicating kings and queens. Suns and moons shining in stereo. Lions and serpents and eggs, oh my. Black and white and red all over. Secret codes and effulgent iconographies teeming with meaning, yet ultimately ineffable. These pictures beget picturing. They’re signs that beg to be resignified; to be reinterpreted and refined.

The participants in ALCHEMICALLY YOURS have done just that. Varying in medium and style, each piece in this exhibition pays homage to the alchemic tradition — all the while affirming that the artist fills the role of alchemist in the present-day. For who better can elevate the mundane, turn the sub- into the sublime? From the prima materia of color and canvas comes great and vivid work.

PARTICIPATING ARTISTS

Jesse Bransford
Molly Crabapple
Ted Enik
Marina Korenfeld

Adela Leibowitz
Sara Antoinette Martin
Ann McCoy
Robert M. Place
Ron Regé, Jr.
J.L. Schnabel
Hunter Stabler
Panos Tsagaris

ABOUT THE CURATOR

Pam Grossman is the creator and editor of Phantasmaphile, the premiere online destination for art aficionados with a passion for the surreal and the fantastical. An internationally beloved art and culture blog, it features daily spotlights on artists and events, as well as interviews with such visual luminaries as Thomas Woodruff, Nils Karsten, and Richard A. Kirk. Phantasmaphile was written up two years in a row on the Manhattan User’s Guide Top 400 New York Sites list, and Grossman’s previous shows, “Fata Morgana: The New Female Fantasists” and “VISION QUEST” were featured by myriad taste-making outlets including Juxtapoz, Arthur, Upper Playground, Reality Sandwich, Urban Outfitters, Creative Time, and Neil Gaiman’s Twitter page. “ALCHEMICALLY YOURS” is her latest curatorial effort, and she is proud to have it hanging at Observatory, the art and events space she co-founded.


Idée Fixe : Drawings of an Obsessive Nature @WINKLEMAN GALLERY

WINKLEMAN GALLERY
MAP
Featuring work by Man Bartlett, Astrid Bowlby, Jacob El Hanani, Dan Fischer, Shane Hope, Joan Linder, Aric Obrosey, Michael Waugh, Daniel Zeller

May 6 – June 11, 2011

Opens May 6 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Winkleman Gallery is very pleased to present Idée Fixe: Drawings of an Obsessive Nature, a group exhibition of black and white drawings by Man Bartlett, Astrid Bowlby, Jacob El Hanani, Dan Fischer, Shane Hope, Joan Linder, Aric Obrosey, Michael Waugh, and Daniel Zeller. The drawings in Idée Fixe either build toward or seem to disintegrate away from complex systems and through what is obviously a time-consuming, perhaps even obsessive process. Running the gamut from highly photo realistic representation to abstractions that suggest imagined landscapes or fields, these works are created from intense, often repetitive gestures.


Jeff Whetstone “Seducing Birds, Snakes, Men”

at Julie Saul Gallery, Chelsea. Closed Sunday/Monday. Through May 21.
Jeff Whetstone’s second exhibition with the gallery explores the nexus of language and wilderness through narrative video, 16mm film, digital animation and photography. Hunters transcend gender, men draw with snakes, and a landscape is made from sound-waves. (READ MORE.)


BROOKLYN ART SONG SOCIETY presents MASTERWORKS: THE COMPLETE SONGS OF HENRY DUPARC




The 16 songs that comprise the French master’s entire surviving output feature some of the most moving and haunting vocal music ever written. The concert features some of New York’s finest established and up-and-coming artists: pianists Michael Brofman, Michael Rose, and Miori Sugiyama; baritones Robert Osborne and Kyle Oliver; and in her Brooklyn Art Song Society debut, soprano Eleanor Taylor. Tickets are $20\$10 for students and seniors.
WHERE: Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, 58 7th Ave. Park Slope. B or Q to 7th Ave, 2 or 3 to Grand Army Plaza
WHEN: Friday May 6, 7pm
CONTACT: 917.509.6258; www.brooklynartsongsociety.org


3
rd Ward Member Group Show
May 6, 2011, 7-10pm
195 Morgan Avenue, Brooklyn NY
MAP
FREE Admission
3rd Ward Members are some of the most creative and ground-breaking people we know. Now they’re taking their work out of the media lab, shop, and photo studios, and showing the world in our biggest 3rd Ward Member Group Show ever. 

(READ MORE.)LOST WAX CASTING @3rd WARD

Lost Wax Casting is the process in which an object, preferably wax, is turned into a metal form. The process is useful for jewelry or small scale metal fabrication.  Your object can be made out of other materials such as resin, plastic, or a variety of found objects. The exact surface that is on your initial model is going to be the surface of your metal piece.
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SATURDAY MAY 7th

7th Annual Brooklyn Peace Fair
Saturday May 7, 12 noon to 5 pm:

Location: Brooklyn College Student Center
Campus Road & E. 27th Street (near Flatbush–Nostrand Junction) (See below for how to get there)

2 pm: Keynote speaker: Juan Gonzalez, Daily News Columnist & co-host “Democracy Now”

Theme: “Peace Budget?…War Budget! How War and the Military Economy Affect YOU!!”
Workshops! Tables with information and resources by community peace and justice organizations!

4:45 pm: Peace Parade to local military recruiting station, led by Rude Mechanical Orchestra

Free admission.

Sponsor: Brooklyn For Peace
Co-Sponsors: Brooklyn College Student Center and Iraq Vets Against the War
Check out the schedule
See the Program (PDF)

How to get there:
Convenient Transportation from all over Brooklyn
Subway:
2 to Flatbush Ave/ Brooklyn College (NOTE: 5 does not run to Brooklyn College on the weekend)
Bus: B6, B103, B41, Q35, B44, B11, BM2
From 2/5 train, Flatbush Avenue Station (at Nostrand Ave)

Locate Hillel Place, direction Brooklyn College; turn right at Campus Road
Campus Road curves around to the left
Student Center is on the right, at Campus Rd & 27th Street

See a map (printable, PDF)
Learn more>>


STOREFRONT EVENTS @ FESTIVAL OF IDEAS FOR THE NEW CITY

VIEW FULL FOIFTNC listings.

PAINTING URBANISM: LEARNING FROM RIO

SATURDAY MAY 7, 2011

Haas & Hahn Opening Reception: Friday, May 13th, 7pm

Storefront is pleased to present the work of Dutch artists Haas&Hahn [Dre Urhahn and Jeroen Koolhaas] in the exhibition “Painting Urbanism: Learning from Rio”. 

The exhibition will showcase paintings, documentary footage, pictures, sketches and plans of past, present and future projects developed by Haas&Hahn. Featured past projects include the Favelapaintings in Praça Cantão in Santa Marta and “Rio Cruzeiro” on the stairs of Rua Santa Helena all in Rio de Janeiro. Present projects include proposals for two New York interventions and future projects span throughout the world.  READ MORE.

 SPACEBUSTER BY RAUMLABOR
11am-7pm at the intersection of Houston Street and the Sara D. Roosevelt Park

 

Spacebuster is a mobile inflatable structure – a portable, expandable pavilion – that is designed to transform public spaces of all kinds into points for community gathering. A new iteration of a Raumlabor project, the Küchenmonument (presented in Europe in 2006-8), the Spacebuster made its first appearance in the US in New York in 2009 and has returned for the Festival of Ideas for the New City.


Martha Colburn: Dolls vs. Dictators

at the Museum of the Moving Image, Queens. $10 general/$7.50 students and seniors. Closed Monday. Through May 15.


Urban Disorientation Game
The Urban Disorientation Game is an active, participatory journey through the City that involves map-making, exploration, homing instincts, and blindfolds. (READ MORE.)

Sublime Frequencies
Sublime Frequencies, the Seattle-based record label responsible for bringing Omar Souleyman to NYC, presents two documentaries with director Robert Millis in person. (READ MORE.)


MAY FAIR AT DING DONG


A Zine, Small Press, and Music Fair

Ding Dong Lounge
929 Columbus Ave. @ 106 St.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
1pm – 7pm

A zine, small press, and music fair. For one day, join us as we transform Ding Dong Lounge into an ephemeral bookshop, crafts fair, art gallery, speakeasy, underground music venue, cookie den, and inappropriately timed Christmas Party. This is the fifth fair of its kind over the course of three years, and it gets better each time. This year includes the rare opportunity to decorate a Christmas tree with both friends and total strangers in the middle of spring.(READ MORE.)

SUNDAY MAY 8th

Black Magic(1949) – Gregory Ratoff, stars Orson Welles
LOST ORSEN WELLS @SPECTACLE. Sun, May 8: 2:30pm
124 South 3rd Street
MAP

Blackmagicposter

Sun, May 8: 2:30pm
This movie has it all: swashbuckling action, intrigue, romance, mind control, and Orson Welles!

A curious, little-seen oddity based on an Alexander Dumas tale, Black Magic adapts the story of Cagliostro (Welles) an 18th century magician and gypsy charlatan, discovered by Doctor Anton Mesmer himself, whose hypnotic powers, derived by the sheer force of his presence, involve him in a plot to overthrow the French monarchy and an opportunity to revenge himself on the aristocrat who was responsible for the execution of his parents. (READ MORE.)