twi-ny recommended events

AD REINHARDT / DONALD JUDD

David Zwirner exhibit features thirteen of Ad Reinhardt’s black paintings

AD REINHARDT
David Zwirner
537 West 20th St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves.
Tuesday- Saturday through December 18, free, 10:00 am – 6:00 pm
www.davidzwirner.com

DONALD JUDD: STACKS
Mnuchin Gallery
45 East 78th St.
Tuesday- Saturday through December 14, free, 10:00 am – 5:30 pm
www.mnuchingallery.com

Two of the most important and influential abstract artists of the twentieth century currently have revelatory gallery shows in New York that focus on very specific aspects of their careers. Both men were fairly or unfairly associated with Minimalism, both were key posthumous inclusions in Gagosian’s 2005 group show “Imageless Icons: Abstract Thoughts,” and both handled shape, form, color, and texture in masterful, revolutionary ways. Donald Judd and Ad Reinhardt were contemporaries who defied convention and died relatively young, Reinhardt at fifty-three in 1967, Judd at sixty-five in 1994. At David Zwirner’s Twentieth St. space, thirteen of Reinhardt’s extraordinary black paintings have been brought together, the most since a 1991 retrospective at MoMA. The exhibit, being held in honor of the centennial of the Buffalo-born artist’s birth, is designed to adhere as close as possible to Reinhardt’s exacting specifications regarding such elements as light, placement, and access. At quick glance, of course, the paintings appear to be all-black squares, but upon closer examination it becomes apparent that each one is very different, containing shades of blue, red, and green, composed in cruciform configurations that emerge into smaller squares and rectangles that Reinhardt painted while the canvas lay flat on a table in his studio. The colors and shapes move in and out of focus as one’s gaze continues, every moment morphing into a new joy. It’s a whirlwind display, thrilling and alive, as if each canvas is a living, breathing object. Here’s how Reinhardt described the black paintings: “A square (neutral, shapeless) canvas, five feet wide, five feet high, as high as a man, as wide as a man’s outstretched arms (not large, not small, sizeless), trisected (no composition), one horizontal form negating one vertical form (formless, no top, no bottom, directionless), three (more or less) dark (lightless) no-contrasting (colourless) colours, brushwork brushed out to remove brushwork, a matte, flat, freedhand painted surface (glossless, textureless, non-linear, no hard edge, no soft edge) which does not reflect its surroundings — a pure, abstract, non-objective, timeless, spaceless, changeless relationless, disinterested painting — an object that is self-conscious (no unconsciousness) ideal, transcendent, aware of no thing but art (absolutely no anti-art).” The stellar exhibit also includes a slide show of hundreds of architectural photographs Reinhardt took over the years, as well as dozens of his playful cartoons, from hysterical takes on Hitler to his “How to Look” series.

(photo by om Powel Imaging, Inc. / all artword © Judd Foundation. Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY)

Mnuchin display includes eleven of Donald Judd’s “Stacks” (Tom Powel Imaging, Inc. / © Judd Foundation)

Meanwhile, uptown at Mnuchin, “Stacks” is the first show to concentrate solely on Judd’s signature oeuvre. Spread across several rooms on two floors, the exhibit features eleven stacks from 1968 to 1990, ten of which consist of ten units of equal size and color, constructed of stainless steel, anodized aluminum, galvanized iron, or copper, most often with colored Plexiglas, the units stacked one above the other from floor to ceiling, the space between as important as the physical objects themselves. The light casts intriguing shadows that extend the works, which are composed in blue, amber, yellow, violet, green, white, or black. Just as Reinhardt spoke of brushwork removing brushwork, the Missouri-born Judd said of his stacks, “Well, I am not interested in the kind of expression that you have when you paint a painting with brush strokes. It’s all right, but it’s already done and I want to do something new. I didn’t want to get into something which is played out and narrow. I want to do as I like, invent my own interests. Of course, that doesn’t mean that people who, like Newman, still paint are worn out. But I think that’s a particular kind of experience involving a certain immediacy between you and the canvass, you and the particular kind of experience of that particular moment. I think what I’m trying to deal with is something more long range than that in a way, more obscure perhaps, more involved with things that happen over a longer time perhaps. At least it’s another area of experience.” As with Reinhardt’s black paintings, Judd’s stacks are also deserving of lengthy views to absorb their full impact as they interact with the light, especially in an upstairs room with windows. The Judd show is being held in conjunction with the opening of Judd’s house at 101 Spring St. to the public. Among the works owned by the Judd Foundation and on view in the house is Reinhardt’s “Red Painting.”

LIGHTNESS OF BEING

“Lightness of Being” offers fun in City Hall Park through December 13 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

City Hall Park
Through December 13, free
www.publicartfund.org
lightness of being slideshow

There’s nothing unbearable about the Public Art Fund’s “Lightness of Being,” an airy, playful look at the lighter side of life through shape, form, and color. Continuing in City Hall Park through December 13, the exhibit, curated by Nicholas Baume and Andria Hickey, features an all-star lineup of established and emerging artists having fun with steel, bronze, marble, aluminum, concrete, and other materials. James Angus’s red-and-green “John Deere Model D” tractor lies sideways on the grass, looking like it’s been stretched out in Photoshop. Olaf Breuning’s “The Humans” is a ritualistic circle of white comic-book-like creatures, while Gary Webb’s “Buzzing It Down” is a childlike four-part totem. Be sure to get up close to check out the detail on Evan Holloway’s “Willendorf Wheel.” Stand on the platform in Daniel Buren’s “Suncatcher” to see how the circuslike top transforms the light shining through it and right onto your body. Don’t trip over David Shrigley’s “Metal Flip Flops,” which look more out of place than ever now that the cold weather is here. No, that bicycle is not twisted into a circle as the result of a bad accident but instead is Alicja Kwade’s “Journey without Arrival (Raleigh).” Franz West’s untitled pastel pieces form a set of exclamation points on his career, as these were finished after his death last year. Grab a seat on Sarah Lucas’s cast concrete vegetable benches named “Florian and Kevin.” Cristian Andersen’s “Inverse Reverse Obverse” totem melds cubism with surrealism. And you don’t need to be scared of that clown sitting on the bench; it’s actually Ugo Rondinone and Victoria Bartlett’s “Dog Days Are Over,” a performance piece that takes place Fridays from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm.

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF MARINA ABRAMOVIC

Marina Abramović’s life — and death — takes center stage with the help of Willem Dafoe, Antony, Robert Wilson, and others

Park Avenue Armory, Wade Thompson Drill Hall
643 Park Ave. at 67th St.
December 13-21, $135, 7:30
212-933-5812
www.armoryonpark.org

Performance artist extraordinaire Marina Abramović has been undergoing a career renaissance this century, highlighted by an exciting, vibrant 2010 MoMA retrospective, “The Artist Is Present,” and the 2012 documentary about the making of the exhibition. The Serbian-born, New York-based Abramović is a regular at fancy galas, and she even recently performed at Pace Gallery with Jay-Z. So what does the sixty-seven-year-old artist do, just as her life and career have become rejuvenated? Well, she stages her own funeral, of course. Actually, Abramović has decided to hand her biography over to experimental theater maestro Robert Wilson, the man behind such innovative and unique collaborations as The Black Rider with William S. Burroughs and Tom Waits, Einstein on the Beach with Philip Glass and Lucinda Childs, and The Temptation of Saint Anthony with Bernice Johnson Reagon and Geoffrey Holder. In The Life and Death of Marina Abramović, the woman behind the “Rhythm” series and so many other cutting-edge works plays herself and her mother, with Willem Dafoe serving as narrator and songs by Antony Hegarty. Conceived and directed by Wilson, it is another audiovisual spectacle that has already had a documentary made about its creation; “Marina is the landscape, Bob the mind, Antony the heart, Willem the body,” director Giada Colagrande explains. The Life and Death of Marina Abramović will fill the Park Ave. Armory’s Wade Thompson Drill Hall December 12-21; on December 15 at 6:15, armory artistic director Alex Poots will moderate an artist talk with Abramović and Dafoe in the Veterans Room as part of the Malkin Lecture Series.

RICHIE’S FANTASTIC FIVE — KUROSAWA, MIZOGUCHI, OZU, YANAGIMACHI & KORE-EDA: LATE AUTUMN

Nobuo Nakamura, Ryuji Kita, and Shin Saburi play a trio of matchmaking yentas in Ozu’s LATE AUTUMN

LATE AUTUMN (AKIBIYORI) (Yasujirō Ozu, 1960)
Japan Society
333 East 47th St. at First Ave.
Thursday, December 12, $12, 7:00
Series runs monthly through February
212-715-1258
www.japansociety.org

Yasujirō Ozu revisits one of his greatest triumphs, 1949’s Late Spring, in the 1960 drama Late Autumn, the Japanese auteur’s fourth color film and his third-to-last work. Whereas the black-and-white Late Spring is about a widowed father (Chishu Ryu) and his unmarried adult daughter (Setsuko Hara) contemplating their futures, Late Autumn deals with young widow Akiko Miwa (Hara again) and her daughter, Ayako (Yoku Tsukasa). At a ceremony honoring the seventh anniversary of Mr. Miwa’s death, several of his old friends gather together and are soon plotting to marry off both the younger Akiko, whom they all had crushes on, and twenty-four-year-old Ayako. The three businessmen — Soichi Mamiya (Shin Saburi), Shuzo Taguchi (Nobuo Nakamura), and Seiichiro Hirayama (Ryuji Kita) — serve as a kind of comedic Greek chorus, matchmaking and arguing like a trio of yentas, while Akiko and Ayako maintain creepy smiles as the men lay out their misguided, unwelcome plans. Mamiya makes numerous attempts to fix Ayako up with one of his employees, Shotaru Goto (Keiji Sada), but Ayako wants none of it, preferring the freedom and independence displayed by her best friend, Yoko (Yuriko Tashiro), who represents the new generation in Japan. At the same time, their matchmaking for Akiko borders on the slapstick. Based on a story by Ton Satomi, Late Autumn, written by Ozu with longtime collaborator Kôgo Noda, is a relatively lighthearted film from the master, with sly jokes and playful references while examining a Japan that is in the midst of significant societal change in the postwar era. Kojun Saitô’s Hollywood-esque score is often bombastically melodramatic, but Yuuharu Atsuta’s cinematography keeps things well grounded with Ozu’s trademark low-angle, unmoving shots amid carefully designed interior sets.

Japan Society series honors Donald Richie (l.) with screening of film by Yasujiro Ozu (c.)

Late Autumn is downright fun to watch, and you can see it on December 12 — Ozu’s 110th birthday, as well as the 50th anniversary of his death — at 7:00 at Japan Society, introduced by director, writer, and producer Atsushi Funahashi, as part of the monthly tribute series “Richie’s Fantastic Five: Kurosawa, Mizoguchi, Ozu, Yanagimachi & Kore-eda,” which honors Ohio-born writer, critic, scholar, curator, and filmmaker Donald Richie, who died in February at the age of eighty-eight. Richie was a tireless champion of Japanese culture and, particularly, cinema, and the series features six works by five of his favorite directors. Here’s what Richie said about Late Autumn: “A daughter is reluctant to leave her widowed mother, even though it is time for her to marry. The story could be seen as a ‘remake’ of Late Spring — and though more autumnal, it is just as moving.” The Late Autumn screening will also be followed by a special Ozu birthday reception. The series continues in January with Mitsuo Yanagimachi’s Himatsuri and concludes in February with Hirokazu Kore-eda’s After Life, appropriately on the one-year anniversary of Richie’s passing.

COSMOPOLIS: 49 WALTZES FOR THE WORLD

Roberta Friedman and Daniel Loewenthal follow John Cage’s advice and take a waltz around the world in COSMOPOLIS

A VIDEO INSTALLATION BY ROBERTA FRIEDMAN + DANIEL LOEWENTHAL
Baryshnikov Arts Center, Studios 4A + 4B
450 West 37th St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
December 11-15, free, times vary
866-811-4111
www.bacnyc.org

In 1977, avant-garde composer John Cage published the graphic score 49 Waltzes for the Five Boroughs: For Performer(s) or Listener(s) or Record Maker(s), a map of forty-nine triangles marking locations in New York City where people were encouraged to go to experience, take part in, or record the natural, everyday sounds there. The score also offered the following enticement: “Transcriptions may be made for other cities (or places) by assembling through chance observations a list of 147 addresses and then, also through chance operations, arranging these in 49 groups of three.” Experimental filmmaker Roberta Friedman and documentarian Daniel Loewenthal have done just that to create the video installation Cosmopolis: 49 Waltzes for the World, on view December 11-15 at Baryshnikov Arts Center. Friedman and Loewenthal visited such cities as Cairo, Beijing, Graz, Detroit, and New York, filming street scenes, capturing pure, unadulterated human life, then bringing them all together in an installation designed for BAC by Andrew Matusik that immerses the viewer into multiple cultures, sort of a day in the life of the world. Also on display will be Friedman and Loewenthal’s 49 Waltzes for the Gated City, 49 Waltzes for Graz, 49 Waltzes for the Motor City, the work-in-progress 49 Waltzes for Al-Qahira, and the original 49 Waltzes for the Five Boroughs. Admission is free, and no advance reservations are required.

OZU AND HIS AFTERLIVES: STILL WALKING

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s STILL WALKING is a special film about a dysfunctional family that should not be missed

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s STILL WALKING is a special film that honors such Japanese directors as Mikio Naruse, Yasujiro Ozu, and Shohei Imamura

STILL WALKING (ARUITEMO ARUITEMO) (Hirokazu Kore-eda, 2008)
Film Society of Lincoln Center
144 and 165 West 65th St. between Eighth Ave. & Broadway
Wednesday, December 11, Francesca Beale Theater, 8:30
Thursday, December 12, Walter Reade Theater, 1:30
Series runs December 4-12
212-875-5050 / 212-875-5166
www.filmlinc.com
www.aruitemo.com

Flawlessly written, directed, and edited by Hirokazu Kore-eda (Maborosi, Nobody Knows), Still Walking follows a day in the life of the Yokoyama family, which gathers together once a year to remember Junpei, the eldest son who died tragically. The story is told through the eyes of the middle child, Ryota (Hiroshi Abe), a forty-year-old painting restorer who has recently married Yukari (Yui Natsukawa), a widow with a young son (Shohei Tanaka). Ryota dreads returning home because his father, Kyohei (Yoshio Harada), and mother, Toshiko (Kirin Kiki), are disappointed in the choices he’s made, both personally and professionally, and never let him escape from Junpei’s ever-widening shadow. Also at the reunion is Ryota’s chatty sister, Chinami (You), who, with her husband and children, is planning on moving in with her parents in order to take care of them in their old age (and save money as well). Over the course of twenty-four hours, the history of the dysfunctional family and the deep emotions hidden just below the surface slowly simmer but never boil, resulting in a gentle, bittersweet narrative that is often very funny and always subtly powerful. The film is beautifully shot by Yutaka Yamazaki, who keeps the camera static during long interior takes — it moves only once inside the house — using doorways, short halls, and windows to frame scenes with a slightly claustrophobic feel, evoking how trapped the characters are by the world the parents have created. The scenes in which Kyohei walks with his cane ever so slowly up and down the endless outside steps are simple but unforgettable. Influenced by such Japanese directors as Mikio Naruse, Yasujiro Ozu, and Shohei Imamura, Kore-eda was inspired to make the film shortly after the death of his parents; although it is fiction, roughly half of Toshiko’s dialogue is taken directly from his own mother. Still Walking is a special film, a visual and psychological marvel that should not be missed. It’s screening December 11-12 as part of the Film Society of Lincoln Center festival “Ozu and His Afterlives,” which honors the 110th anniversary of the master filmmaker’s birth and the 50th anniversary of his death; he died on his birthday at the age of sixty in 1963. The series features Ozu’s Equinox Flower and An Autumn Afternoon in addition to seven works that were either directly or indirectly inspired by Ozu and his unique style, including Hou Hsiao-hsien’s Café Lumiere, Jim Jarmusch’s Stranger Than Paradise, Aki Kaurismäki’s The Match Factory Girl, Claire Denis’s 35 Shots of Rum, Pedro Costa’s In Vanda’s Room, and Wim Wenders’s Tokyo-Ga.

AUGUST WILSON’S HOW I LEARNED WHAT I LEARNED

Ruben Santiago-Hudson was August Wilson’s personal choice to take over one-man show (photo by Joan Marcus)

The Pershing Square Signature Center
The Alice Griffin Jewel Box Theatre
480 West 42nd St. between Tenth & Eleventh Aves.
Extended through December 29, $55
212-244-7529
www.signaturetheatre.org

August Wilson’s one-man show, How I Learned What I Learned, has arrived in New York at last, and like any Wilson work, it’s a very welcome event. When the two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright passed away from cancer at the age of sixty in 2005, plans were already under way for a season of his works as part of the fifteenth anniversary celebration of the Signature Theatre. For that 2005 season, Wilson was going to present the New York premiere of his own one-man show and personal memoir, How I Learned What I Learned, which he premiered in Seattle in 2002. Following his death, the season turned into a tribute to Wilson’s vast legacy, with productions of Seven Guitars, Two Trains Running, and King Hedley II. Seven years later, How I Learned What I Learned is finally making its New York debut, in an intimate, intoxicating version running at the Signature through December 29, directed by Todd Kreidler, who conceived the project with Wilson and directed the original. Ruben Santiago-Hudson, Wilson’s personal choice to take over the play, gets to step into Wilson’s shoes and put on his hat and coat — the costumes were chosen by Wilson’s widow, Constanza Romero — for eighty thrilling minutes, sharing fascinating tidbits from Wilson’s life growing up as Frederick August Kittel Jr. in Pittsburgh’s Hill District.

HOW I LEARNED WHAT I LEARNED celebrates the genius of August Wilson (photo by Joan Marcus)

Longtime Wilson set designer David Gallo arranged the sparse stage, featuring just a desk, a chair, and a coat rack set against a backdrop of hundreds of pieces of paper dangling from the ceiling. Santiago-Hudson, who won a Tony as Canewell in Seven Guitars and directed last year’s stellar Signature revival of Wilson’s 1990 Pulitzer Prize winning The Piano Lesson, portrays Wilson with an easygoing, natural grace as he talks poignantly about episodes from his past, including quitting numerous jobs to preserve his dignity, meeting people who would help shape his future, and getting locked up in jail. He strolls amiably across the stage, sits on the desk, and watches as the title of each new section is projected onto the papers behind him, each letter accompanied by the sound of a typewriter stroke. As always, Wilson’s words shine; he doesn’t go out of his way to connect the dots, get heavy-handed about the racism and poverty he experienced, or lament what could have been. Instead, he lets the stories create a path for the viewer to follow to his majestic body of work, which he never brings up, as the play ends prior to his writing his first play. Everything about How I Learned What I Learned feels just right, a labor of love from his friends and colleagues that is a gift to the rest of us.