this week in art

BOOK LAUNCH FOR EL ANATSUI: THE REINVENTION OF SCULPTURE

Who: El Anatsui, Chika Okeke-Agulu, Jason Farago, Massimiliano Gioni, Julian Lucas
What: Book launch
Where: New Museum Theater, 235 Bowery
When: Thursday, September 22, $10, 6:30
Why: “The fact that El Anatsui normally expects curators and collectors of his metal sculpture to decide how to install them, but also because they are hand-wrought, flexible things, with numerous parts that can behave in infinite ways when moved, how they are installed determines their composition, affect, and phenomenological presence. Having conceived the work, and invested so much labor along with his many studio assistants to realize it in initial sculptural form, ceding its inaugural and future manifestations to whoever has custody of the work, is an extraordinary power to invest in others, without any instruction or even suggestion of his own authorial intentionality.” So write Okwui Enwezor and Chika Okeke-Agulu in their new book, El Anatsui: The Reinvention of Sculpture (Damiani, $70), about Ghanaian sculptor El Anatsui, who uses discarded items (primarily bottlecaps) in creating large-scale pieces that comment on the relationship between humans and the environment. The works are malleable, able to be displayed in various configurations that El Anatsui leaves up to whoever is showing the piece.

On September 22 at 6:30, the seventy-eight-year-old El Anatsui (“Gravity and Grace: Monumental Works by El Anatsui”), who works in Ghana and Nigeria, will be at the New Museum for the official US launch of the book, highlighted by a panel discussion with Princeton-based artist, critic, and art historian Okeke-Agulu, art critic Jason Farago, and Brooklyn-based critic and essayist Julian Lucas, moderated by New Museum director Massimiliano Gioni. Okeke-Agulu wrote the book, which features such chapters as “El Anatsui and Modern African Art,” “The Aesthetic and Rhetoric of Fragmentation,” and “The Epic and Triumphant Scale,” with beloved Nigerian curator and critic Enwezor, who passed away in 2019 at the age of fifty-five and whose spirit will be felt throughout the evening.

THE FACADE COMMISSION: AN EVENING WITH ARTIST HEW LOCKE

Who: Hew Locke, Tumelo Mosaka, Kelly Baum
What: Conversation about “The Facade Commission: Hew Locke, Gilt”
Where: Metropolitan Museum of Art, Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium, 1000 Fifth Ave. at 82nd St.
When: Thursday, September 15, free with RSVP, 6:30
Why: On September 15, Scotland-born, Guyana-raised, London-based sculptor Hew Locke will unveil his Met Museum facade commission, Gilt, which will be on view through May 23, 2023. The four-piece work references the Met collection, focusing on appropriation, power, and colonialism through a theatrical lens.

“Hew Locke creates emotionally powerful and visually striking work that will stop you in your tracks. This site-responsive commission for the museum’s facade will be informed by Locke’s deep knowledge of the Met’s collection and will reference the institution in ways both direct and indirect, recovering and connecting histories across continents, oceans, and time periods,” Met director Max Hollein said in a statement. Curator Sheena Wagstaff added, “Hew Locke uses a delirious aesthetic of abundance and excess to reflect themes of deep urgency in the past and present, including wealth, imperial power, and prestige, astutely critiquing their visual iconography through reclamation.”

The third facade commission, following Wangechi Mutu’s The NewOnes, will free Us and Carol Bove’s The séances aren’t helping, Locke’s aptly titled Gilt will be explored in a panel discussion September 15 at 6:30 with Locke, Columbia University director and curator Tumelo Mosaka, and Met curator Kelly Baum; you can attend in person at the Met’s Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium or watch the livestream online.

SUPERFUNLAND: JOURNEY INTO THE EROTIC CARNIVAL

Visitors race for the crown in the “Love & Lust Deity Derby” at the Museum of Sex (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

SUPERFUNLAND: JOURNEY INTO THE EROTIC CARNIVAL
Museum of Sex
233 Fifth Ave. at 27th St.
Through October 23, $36-$39
212-689-6337
www.museumofsex.com
www.superfunland.com

In 2015, I had super fun at the Museum of Sex’s interactive “Funland: Pleasures & Perils of the Erotic Fairground,” a kinky collection of participatory installations that reimagined booths at county fairs, with devilishly delightful twists. That theme reaches new heights in the follow-up, “Super Funland: Journey into the Erotic Carnival,” which is, as its name promises, also super fun, even more so than its predecessor.

Continuing through October 23, the exhibition features more than a dozen sensual, risqué, whimsical, and ribald games, rides, and challenges to titillate the senses. But as with most shows at MoSex, it is well curated, with ample history to accompany the bacchanalian revelry. Miniatures from the collection of Al Stencell, former president of the Circus Historical Society and the author of Seeing Is Believing: America’s Sideshows and Girl Show: Into the Canvas World of Bump and Grind, and a fanciful 180-degree short film help put the eroticism of fairs and carnivals into cultural perspective, going back to ancient Rome and Greece and celebrating the carnal boom of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

A two-floor slide ushers adventurous participants to more bawdy installations in “Super Funland: Journey into the Erotic Carnival” (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

“Stardust Lane” is a dizzying erogenous kaleidoscope lined with small dioramas playing archival footage from world’s fairs and Coney Island’s heyday. “Tunnel of Love” is a 4D journey into human orifices. “Jump for Joy” is a bouncy castle of massive mammaries, while “Glory Stall” gives visitors the opportunity to, well, “burp the worm” and “yank that plank.” You can put an image of yourself in the middle of the action at the “Porn-a-Matic” screen-test booth, see how passionate you and your partner are at the very public “Lucky Lips Make Out Challenge,” compete for prizes in the “Love & Lust Deity Derby,” get married (complete with rings) at “AutoWed,” or capture your own reward in the “Claw, Pinch, and Grab” games.

The warmly lit, mirrored “Climbx” Ecstatic Climbing Challenge leads to a steamy slide that deposits you through hot lips and out a striped bottom to a lower floor where you can get your fortune told by a superstar in “RuPaul Speaks,” reveal your G-spot skill to win a CBD love elixir in “The Siren,” and grab some “licker” at the “Carnal Carnival Bar,” including such specialty cocktails as Mosex on the Beach, Penis Colada, and several with names that are too raunchy to print here. You can become a “Pole Star” by following the prompts as you dance on a stripper pole, then engage in various positions with a companion — clothes on, please — in “Kama Ultra.”`

Boasting contributions from Bompas and Parr, Droog, Bart Hess, Rebecca Purcell, Snøhetta, and more, “Super Funland” is indeed super fun, but MoSex also has other, more serious exhibitions that are definitely worth your time. The multimedia “Porno Chic to Sex Positivity: Erotic Content & the Mainstream, 1960 till Today” looks at how the use of erotic content in mainstream culture has developed over the last sixty years, divided into “A Pornographic Avant-Garde,” “Sexualized Marketing,” “Scandalous Scenes of Cinema,” and “Music: an Erotic Form.” MoSex has reached into its permanent collection of more than fifteen thousand objects for “Artifact (xxx): Selections from Secret Collections,” comprising a wide array of items, from a blow-up doll, a lotus shoe, and an intriguing sex chair to various toys, magazines, and even a Picasso etching (10 May 1968). And “F*CK ART: the body & its absence” consists of painting, sculpture, photography, video, and installation by eighteen artists, including Coyote Park, Alina Perez, Cherry Brice Jr., Justin Yoon, Erin M. Riley, and Pixy Liao. Finally, make sure you have plenty of time to browse in the store, which is an exhibition all its own.

36.5 / A DURATIONAL PERFORMANCE WITH THE SEA: NEW YORK ESTUARY

Sarah Cameron Sunde will conclude thirteen-year durational project in New York City on September 14 (photo courtesy Sarah Cameron Sunde)

Who: Sarah Cameron Sunde
What: Conclusion of nine-year artistic environmental journey
Where: Hallet’s Cove, special viewing areas, and online
When: Wednesday, September 14, free, 7:27 am – 8:06 pm
Why: Harlem-based interdisciplinary artist and director Sarah Cameron Sunde began 36.5 / A Durational Performance with the Sea back in 2013, in which she stands in bodies of water for full twelve-plus-hour tidal cycles, with the public invited to join her in person or online. The work, which has been performed on six continents, was inspired by the damage caused by Hurricane Sandy, to the community, humanity, and artists specifically. The piece comes to its conclusion on September 14 with 36.5 / New York Estuary, when Sunde will be at Hallet’s Cove at 31-10 Vernon Blvd.; you can go in the water with her, watch the livestream at home or with others at Brookfield Place, Manhattan West, Riverside Park Conservancy, Gallatin Galleries at NYU, Mercury Store in Brooklyn, the RISE center in Far Rockaway, or the Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art at Snug Harbor in Staten Island, or check it out from viewing stations on the northern tip of Roosevelt Island or the Upper East Side. There will also be remote participants from Bangladesh, Brazil, Kenya, the Netherlands, and Aotearoa—New Zealand. In conjunction with the finale, Sunde cofounded Kin to the Cove, a community organization that hosts site-specific workshops, discussions, and other events.

The work has previously been performed in Maine, Mexico, San Francisco Bay, the Netherlands, the Bay of Bengal in Bangladesh, the Bay of All Saints in Brazil, Bodo Inlet in Kenya, and Te Manukanukatanga ō Hoturoa in Tāmaki Makaurau. Sunde explained in a statement, “36.5 / A Durational Performance with the Sea is my attempt to translate the seemingly abstract idea of climate change and sea-level rise into our bodies. It’s also about Time on many different scales: a durational work that unfolds over thirteen hours that has taken nearly a decade to complete. The tide tracks time on my body viscerally, which functions as a metaphor for the changing environment. The water is my collaborator, and the risks are real. I stay present in the sensations, attempt to embody the ocean, and find a way to endure the struggle while decentering my human experience and acknowledging potential futures. The public is invited to stand in the water with me for however long they like and to participate in a series of artistic interventions from the shore, creating a human clock that communicates to me each hour as it passes.”

On October 6 at 6:00, NYU dean for the humanities Una Chaudhuri will moderate “Standing with the Sea: Reflections on Sarah Cameron Sunde’s 36.5 / A Durational Performance with the Sea” at Gardner Commons in Shimkin Hall, followed by a screening of an updated video on the outside Bobst Library wall.

DAKOTA MODERN: THE ART OF OSCAR HOWE

Oscar Howe, Dance of the Heyoka, casein on paper, 1954 (Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, Oklahoma)

DAKOTA MODERN: THE ART OF OSCAR HOWE
National Museum of the American Indian
George Gustave Heye Center, One Bowling Green
Through Sunday, September 11, free
212-514-3700
americanindian.si.edu

In April 1958, after Oscar Howe’s work had been rejected by the Philbrook Art Center, the Yanktonai Dakota artist wrote a letter to curator Jeanne Snodgrass: “Who ever said that my paintings are not in the traditional Indian style has poor knowledge of Indian Art indeed. There is much more to Indian Art than pretty, stylized pictures. There was also power and strength and individualism (emotional and intellectual insight) in the old Indian paintings. Every bit in my paintings is a true studied fact of Indian paintings. Are we to be held back forever with one phase of Indian painting that is the most common way? We are to be herded like a bunch of sheep, with no right for individualism, dictated as the Indian has always been, put on reservations and treated like a child, and only the White Man knows what is best for him. . . . Well, I am not going to stand for it.”

Born in 1915 on the Creek Sioux Reservation in South Dakota, Howe (his tribal name was Mazuha Hokshina) had a distinguished career as an artist, teacher, advocate, and activist. His life and work are explored in the sensational exhibit “Dakota Modern: The Art of Oscar Howe,” which continues at the National Museum of the American Indian through September 11. Howe’s canvases evoke the color and angular graphic style of Jacob Lawrence, but they depict the American Indian experience, particularly his Očhéthi Šakówiŋ (Sioux) culture, instead of that of African Americans. Many of the works, in watercolor, gouache, tempera, and casein on paper, require longer viewing as their subjects emerge from an initially abstract image.

“We are finally at a point in the twenty-first century where we can recognize the impact and complexity of Oscar Howe’s incredible work as both Native American and modern American art,” curator Kathleen Ash-Milby said in a statement. “This project is a long overdue recognition of his contribution to the field that we hope will establish Howe’s place as a twentieth-century modernist.”

Sensational Oscar Howe exhibit continues through September 11 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

The show follows Howe from his high school years up to his death in 1983 at the age of sixty-eight. The paintings are supplemented with substantial biographical information, including archival film footage, highlighted by a 1960 appearance on This Is Your Life, the television series hosted by Ralph Edwards; Howe collector Vincent Price introduced the artist, who came to regret his participation because it only furthered stereotypes.

In Fleeing a Massacre, an Indian on horseback is caught within a swirling storm of ghosts and the American flag. Wounded Knee Massacre features armed American soldiers on land in the top half, with Indians flailing below in a bloody pit. At first, Fighting Bucks looks like a kind of acid trip until the antlers and bodies of two deer become evident. Dance of the Heyoka comes at you in a barrage of complex geometric shapes and bold colors.

“Dakota Modern: The Art of Oscar Howe” is an exceptional, revelatory show, arriving right on time as a reckoning is underway in the art world, reexamining work done by underrepresented and misrepresented creators. The rediscovery of Howe is nothing less than thrilling; the exhibition is accompanied by a deluxe catalog with essays by Janet Catherine Berlo, Christina Burke, Philip J. Deloria, Erika Doss, Emil Her Many Horses, John Lukavic, Inge Dawn Howe Maresh, Anya Montiel, Denise Neil, and Joyce Szabo that shed new light on this extraordinary artist.

CROSSING THE LINE FESTIVAL 2022

Fouad Boussouf’s Näss will be performed at the Joyce as part of FIAF fest (photo © Charlotte Audureau)

CROSSING THE LINE FESTIVAL
FIAF and other locations
55 East 59th St. between Madison & Park Aves.
September 9–October 28, free – $75
212-355-6100
fiaf.org

FIAF’s fifteenth annual Crossing the Line Festival is another journey into exciting, challenging, and experimental music, dance, and theater from the French-speaking world. Running September 9 through October 28, the programs take place at such venues as Abrons Arts Center, New York Live Arts, the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, the Joyce, and BAM in addition to FIAF’s Gallery, Florence Gould Hall, and Skyroom.

“For our first year curating this festival, we wanted to honor its founding principles: presenting compelling multidisciplinary art forms throughout the city, bringing acclaimed cutting-edge French and Francophone productions to our shores, and nurturing dialogue between international and New York-based artists,” curators Mathilde Augé and Florent Masse write in a program note. “The fifteenth edition of the festival features a diverse group of audacious artists engaging with the most pressing issues of our time — including gender, sexuality, human connection, race, and climate change — and exploring new territories in performing arts.”

None of the nine live performances — there were supposed to be ten but Caroline Guiela Nguyen’s FRATERNITY, A Fantastic Tale had to be canceled because of visa problems — has ever been seen before in New York, including several North American, US, and world premieres. The mix of dance, theater, art, music, and literature hails from Senegal, France, South Africa, Rwanda, the United States, and Morocco, examining societal change, Vaslav Nijinsky, science, Cheikh Anta Diop, intergenerational culture, the political views of René Char and Frantz Fanon, and a Detroit rave.

In addition, FIAF is hosting the fall open house celebration Fête de la Rentrée, highlighted by an opening reception for Omar Ba’s “Clin d’oeil” art exhibition on September 9 at 6:00 (free with RSVP) and a Sunset Soirée at Le Bain on October 12 at the Standard Hotel (free with RSVP). Below is the full Crossing the Line schedule.

Helena de Laurens stars in Marion Siéfert’s _ jeanne_dark _ at FIAF’s Crossing the Line Festival (photo © Matthieu Bareyre)

September 9 – October 28
Exhibition: “Clin d’oeil,” by Omar Ba, FIAF Gallery, free

Wednesday, September 14, and Thursday, September 15
Theater: _ jeanne_dark _, by Marion Siéfert, starring Helena de Laurens, North American premiere, FIAF Florence Gould Hall, $40, 7:30

Wednesday, September 21
Theater: Traces – Speech to African Nations, by Felwine Sarr and Étienne Minoungou, with Étienne Minoungou and Simon Winsé, New York premiere, Abrons Arts Center, $25, 8:30

Thursday, September 22, through Saturday, September 24
Dance: And so you see… our honourable blue sky and ever enduring sun… can only be consumed slice by slice…, by Robyn Orlin, performed by Albert Ibokwe Khoza, US premiere, New York Live Arts, $15-$35, 7:30

Saturday, September 24
Theater: Freedom, I’ll have lived your dream until the very last day, by Felwine Sarr and Dorcy Rugamba, featuring Marie-Laure Crochant, Majnun, Felwine Sarr, and T.I.E., North American premiere, Florence Gould Hall, $40, 7:30

Thursday, September 29, and Friday, September 30
Performance: Fire in the Head, by Christopher Myers, world premiere, Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, $20, 7:30

Thursday, October 6, through Saturday, October 8
Dance: The Encounter, by Kimberly Bartosik, performed by Kimberly Bartosik, Claude “CJ” Johnson, Burr Johnson, Joanna Kotze, Ryan Pliss, Kalub Thompson, Mac Twining, River Bartosik-Murray, Logan Farmer, and Ellington Hurd, world premiere, FIAF Skyroom, $30, 7:30

Thursday, October 13, through Saturday, October 15
Dance: CROWD, by Gisèle Vienne, US premiere, BAM Howard Gilman Opera House, $35-$75, 7:30

Tuesday, October 18, through Sunday, October 23
Dance: Näss, by Fouad Boussouf, New York premiere, the Joyce Theater, $20-$55

Thursday, October 27, and Friday, October 28
Theater: The Terrestrial Trilogy, a Performance in Three Parts: Inside, Moving Earths, and Viral, by Bruno Latour and Frédérique Aït-Touati, with special guest Bruno Latour, North American premiere, FIAF Florence Gould Hall, $40

JEPPE HEIN: CHANGING SPACES

Changing Spaces gets people wet and keeps them dry at Rockefeller Center (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

CHANGING SPACES
Rockefeller Center
Forty-Ninth to Fiftieth Sts. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Daily through September 9, free
www.rockefellercenter.com
www.jeppehein.net
changing spaces slideshow

In 2015, Jeppe Hein installed the three-part interactive Please Touch the Art across Brooklyn Bridge Park, consisting of a water sculpture, social climbing bench, and circular mirrored maze. This summer, the Berlin-based Danish artist’s Changing Spaces has been delighting adults and children of all ages in Rockefeller Center. In the plaza right above the roller skating rink, Hein has placed “liquid architecture,” four intersecting circles that shoot up water at different times and heights. Visitors are encouraged to step into the circles before the jets shoot up and stay until they go down, which will not make you get wet. However, you can get as drenched as you want to if you run through the circles willy-nilly. But unlike rAndom International’s Rain Room at MoMA, Changing Spaces is not motion activated.

The installation, in which you will certainly end up touching the art, continues through September 9; it is open seven am to eleven pm daily and till midnight on Saturday and Sunday. “My aim is to exhibit artworks that approach visitors on different levels, awaken their senses, and touch their hearts, activate various emotions, and encourage mutual exchange,” Hein said in a statement. “Ideally, my work fosters communication and empathy that people will pass on to others. The shape was meant to contrast the rectangular layout of New York, embracing people in a circle of water.”