Abelardo Morell, “View of the Manhattan Bridge — April 20th / Afternoon,” pigment ink print, 2010 (© 2010 by Abelardo Morell)
Wandering through Chelsea galleries can often be a long, hit-or-miss affair, but you can make a direct strike right now by taking advantage of the excellent shows along 24th St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves. Abelardo Morell’s “The Universe Next Door” continues through December 11 at Bryce_Wolkowitz (505 West 24th St.), consisting of the Cuban photographer’s latest camera obscura pigment ink prints in which he turns rooms into pinhole cameras, projecting the outside world onto interior walls, resulting in such beautiful, unique images as “View of the Manhattan Bridge — April 20th / Afternoon” and “View of Florence Looking Northwest Inside Bedroom.” (Morell’s concurrent “Groundwork” exhibition, in which he utilizes a lightproof tent and periscope, is at Bonni Benrubi on East 57th St. through January 8.) Israeli-born Elad Lassry’s small C-prints of people, animals, and unusual objects in solidly painted frames will line the walls of Luhring Augustine (531 West 24th St.) through December 18, while his latest 35mm projection, of a woman and a California king snake, is shown in the back room. (Lassry is also part of MoMA’s current New Photography 2010 installation, through January 11.) German photographer Michael Wolf takes on issues of privacy and surveillance in “iseeyou,” at Bruce Silverstein (535 West 24th St.) through December 24, blowing up pixelated images he appropriated from Google Street Views and showing them along with such previous series as “Transparent City,” “Architecture of Density,” and “Tokyo Compression”; in the back gallery, Wolf has curated “City Views,” eleven voyeuristic shots of people on rooftops and in windows taken by André Kertész in the 1960s and 1970s.
Mika Rottenberg, “Squeeze” (video still), single-channel video installation, 2010 (courtesy Mary Boone Gallery)
For her latest immersive video environment, Argentine native Mika Rottenberg has installed “Squeeze” at Mary Boone (541 West 24th St.) through December 18, a usually crowded white room showing a twenty-minute film loop of a bizarre Rube Goldberg-like global factory of lettuce workers, misted butts, wall tongues, a large oracle, red ponytails, and other oddnesses creating a work of art that will never be seen by the public (be sure to read the document on the wall). And German artist Anselm Kiefer revisits his controversial 1969 show, “Occupations,” a series of photographs of him giving the Hitlergruß in historic sites throughout Europe, in “Next Year in Jerusalem” at the Gagosian Gallery (555 West 24th St.) through December 18, a massive new exhibit of vitrines of all sizes containing myriad elements that together appear to have gone through intense devastation, including clothing, typewriters, pieces of an airplane and a boat, broken glass, thorn bushes, snakeskin, burned books, metal cages, and other items. Several of the vitrines refer to such Bible stories, locations, and characters as Jacob’s Ladder, Lilith, and Mount Tabor. It’s a dizzying and overwhelming sight that evokes powerful emotions and memories.