this week in art

RIVER TO RIVER 2017

Maria Hassabi presented an informal preview of her latest work this summer on the High Line (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

The latest iteration of Maria Hassabi’s Staged series will move be performed in City Hall Park as part of the River to River Festival (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

Multiple locations downtown
June 14-25, free
www.rivertorivernyc.com
lmcc.net

The best free multidisciplinary arts festival of the summer, River to River packs a whole lot into a narrow amount of time. Sponsored by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, this year’s activities, which, as always, focus on more experimental presentations, take place June 14-25 at such locations as Governors Island, Federal Hall, the National Museum of the American Indian, the Fulton Center, City Hall Park, and other downtown areas. While everything is free, some performances require advance registration because of space considerations. In addition to the below events, Katja Novitskova’s “EARTH POTENTIAL” Public Art Fund exhibition opens June 22 in City Hall Park, photographer Kamau Ware’s “Black Gotham Experience” interactive storytelling project will pop up at various places throughout the fest, LMCC’s Open Studios allows visitors the chance to meet with dozens of artists, and Kameelah Janan Rasheed’s “A Supple Perimeter” will be on view at LMCC’s Arts Center and Movie Theater Exterior on Governors Island.

Wednesday, June 14, 6:00
Wednesday, June 21, 8:00
Sunday, June 25, 7:00
The Dance Cartel: R2R Living Rooms, with DJ Average Jo and special guests, Pier A Harbor House
One of the most energetic companies around, the Dance Cartel will host a trio of live music and dance performances at the River to River Festival hub, with plenty of audience participation.

Thursday, June 15, 3:00 & 6:00
Monday, June 19, 3:00
Netta Yerushalmy: Paramodernities #2 and #3, National Museum of the American Indian
South Carolina–born choreographer and performer Netta Yerushalmy’s “Paramodernities” series deconstructs landmark dance works within the framework of modernity. For River to River, she will present Paramodernities #2, examining Martha Graham’s Night Journey, and Paramodernities #3, investigating Alvin Ailey’s Revelations, accompanied by scholars who will take part in public discussions. The seventy-five-minute production will move around inside the National Museum of the American Indian.

Thursday, June 15, 7:00
Saturday, June 17, 7:00
Sunday, June 18, 7:00
A Marvelous Order, Fulton Center
Joshua Frankel, Judd Greenstein, Will Rawls, and Tracy K. Smith have collaborated on the multimedia opera A Marvelous Order, which delves into the famous fight between Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs over the future development of New York City. For the River to River Festival, they will present a twenty-five-minute excerpt at the Fulton Center, with Eliza Bagg, Tomás Cruz, Lucy Dhegrae, Christopher Herbert, and Dashon Burton as Robert Moses and live music by NOW Ensemble, conducted by David Bloom.

Friday, June 16, 6:00
Amir Elsaffar: Rivers of Sound — Not Two, the Plaza at 28 Liberty
American jazz trumpeter and composer Amir Elsaffar celebrates the release of his latest record, Not Two (New Amsterdam, June 16), with a two-hour performance at the Plaza at 28 Liberty featuring his seventeen-piece Rivers of Sound orchestra.

Friday, June 16, 3:30
Saturday, June 17, 3:30
Sunday, June 18, 3:30
Jodi Melnick: Moat, Fort Jay, Governors Island
Choreographer, dancer, and teacher Jodi Melnick, who has said, “I am truly, madly, deeply in love with movement,” has teamed up with visual artist John Monti for Moat, a sixty-minute site-specific performance taking place in the moat that surrounds historic Fort Jay on Governors Island.

Beth Gill’s Catacomb will be performed in Federal Hall for the River to River Festival (photo by Brian Rogers)

Saturday, June 17, 8:00
Sunday, June 18, 8:00
Monday, June 19, 8:00
Beth Gill: Catacomb, Federal Hall
In May 2016, Bessie Award–winning choreographer Beth Gill presented the site-specific Catacomb at the Chocolate Factory, a dreamlike physical and psychological exploration of what we see and who we are. For River to River, the aching sixty-minute performance moves to historic Federal Hall.

Saturday, June 17, 12 noon – 6:00
Sunday, June 18, 12 noon – 6:00
Saturday, June 24, 12 noon – 6:00
Sunday, June 25, 12 noon – 6:00
The Set-Up: Island Ghost Sleep Princess Time Story Show, the Arts Center at Governors Island
For five years, Wally Cardona and Jennifer Lacey have been collaborating with men and women from multiple dance disciplines, presenting unique performances that push the boundaries of the movement arts. Their project now culminates in a grand finale on Governors Island, with dance masters I Nyoman Catra (Balinese Topeng), Proeung Chhieng (Cambodian), Junko Fisher (Okinawan), Saya Lei (Mandalay-style, classical Burmese), Jean-Christophe Paré (French baroque), Kapila Venu (Indian Kutiyattam), and Heni Winahyuningsih (Javanese refined) and musicians Jonathan Bepler, Reiko Fueting, and Megan Schubert. “Many dances on an ISLAND, a GHOST of what they were, having lost details during a long SLEEP but nevertheless the PRINCESS of their destiny. This TIME it is one STORY, full of fortuitous meetings, grave errors, and happy misunderstandings. It’s a SHOW, folks!” Cardona and Lacey explain. You can see the complete schedule here.

Monday, June 19, 6:00
Tuesday, June 20, 2:00
Wednesday, June 21, 2:00
Faye Driscoll: Thank You for Coming: Play, Broad and Wall Sts.
At last year’s LMCC Open Studios on Governors Island, the endlessly inventive Faye Driscoll offered a work-in-progress showing of the second part of her participatory “Thank You for Coming” series, which began in 2014 with Thank You for Coming: Attendance Play later moved to the BAM Fisher. She now revisits Play, staging a forty-minute version at the intersection of Broad and Wall Sts.

Tuesday, June 20, 4:00 – 8:00
Night at the Museums
Many Lower Manhattan museums and cultural institutions will stay open late on June 20, offering free entry to historic sites along with special programs. Among the participants are the African Burial Ground National Monument, China Institute, Federal Hall National Memorial, Fraunces Tavern Museum, Museum of American Finance, Museum of Jewish Heritage — A Living Memorial to the Holocaust, National Archives at New York City, National Museum of the American Indian, National September 11 Memorial Museum (advance RSVP required), 9/11 Tribute Center, NYC Municipal Archives, Poets House, the Skyscraper Museum, and the South Street Seaport Museum.

Wednesday, June 21, 5:00
Thursday, June 22, 3:00
Friday, June 23, 3:00
Marjani Forté-Saunders: Memoirs of a . . . Unicorn, Melville Gallery, South Street Seaport Museum
Pasadena-born, Harlem based dancer and choreographer Marjani Forté-Saunders, who previously was in the Urban Bush Women Dance Company, brings her solo Memoirs of a . . . Unicorn to the South Street Seaport Museum, a collaboration with media designer Meena Murugesan and sound designer Everett Saunders that relates to the history of Black American magic.

Thursday, June 22, 7:00
Friday, June 23, 7:00
Saturday, June 24, 7:00
Sunday, June 25, 5:00
En Garde Arts: Harbored, Winter Garden, Brookfield Place, 230 Vesey St.
En Garde Arts, which was founded by Anne Hamburger to “catalyze social change” through immersive theater, will stage the sixty-minute site-specific collage play Harbored, about Willa Cather, Lewis & Clark, and Cather’s character Ántonia. The piece, featuring more than fifty performers, is written and directed by Jimmy Maize, with an original score by Heather Christian sung by the Downtown Voices Choir and movement by Wendy Seyb. During the day, you can share your immigration story with them and it just might be incorporated into that night’s show.

Friday, June 23, 6:00
Sunday, June 25, 6:00
Maria Hassabi: Staged? (2016) — undressed, City Hall Park
Last summer, Maria Hassabi presented Movement #2 on the High Line, a dance performed by Simon Courchel, Hristoula Harakas, Molly Lieber, and Oisín Monaghan as people passed by. That morphed into Staged, which ran at the Kitchen in October. Now Hassabi is bringing Staged? (2016) — undressed to City Hall Park, where four dancers will move around Katja Novitskova’s “EARTH POTENTIAL” exhibition.

MUSEUM MILE FESTIVAL 2017

museum mile

Multiple locations on Fifth Ave. between 82nd & 105th Sts.
Tuesday, June 13, free, 6:00 – 9:00 pm
www.museummilefestival.org

The fortieth annual Museum Mile Festival will take place on Tuesday, June 13, as seven arts institutions along Fifth Avenue between 82nd and 105th Sts. open their doors for free between 6:00 and 9:00. There will be live outdoor performances by Fogo Azul Bateria Feminina, DJ Shabbakano, Carlos Jesus Martinez Dominguez & Leslie Jimenezin, Banda de lost Muertos, Silly Billy, and Sarah King and the Smoke Rings in addition to face painting, art and dance workshops, chalk drawing, and more. The participating museums (with at least one of their current shows listed here) are El Museo del Barrio (“Nkame: A Retrospective of Cuban Printmaker Belkis Ayón,” “uptown: nasty women / bad hombres”), the Museum of the City of New York (“New York at Its Core,” “AIDS at Home: Art and Everyday Activism”), the Jewish Museum (“Florine Stettheimer: Painting Poetry,” “The Arcades: Contemporary Art and Walter Benjamin”), the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum (“The Jazz Age: American Style in the 1920s,” “Esperanza Spalding Selects”), the Guggenheim (“Visionaries: Creating a Modern Guggenheim,” “The Hugo Boss Prize 2016: Anicka Yi, Life Is Cheap”), the Neue Galerie (“Austrian Masterworks from the Neue Galerie New York”), and the Metropolitan Museum of Art (“Irving Penn: Centennial,” “Lygia Pape: A Multitude of Forms”), along with presentations by the Little Orchestra Society, the New York Academy of Medicine, the 92nd St. Y, the Church of the Heavenly Rest, and Asia Society. Don’t try to do too much, because it can get rather crowded; just pick one or two exhibitions in one or two museums and enjoy.

TICKET ALERT — LEE FRIEDLANDER WITH GIANCARLO T. ROMA: PASSION PROJECTS

Lee Friedlander, who has revived his self-publishing company with his grandson, Giancarlo T. Roma, will mare a rare public speaking appearance at the New York Public Library on June 20 (photo © Lee Friedlander)

Who: Lee Friedlander, Giancarlo T. Roma
What: Live from the NYPL
Where: New York Public Library, Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, 476 Fifth Ave. at 42nd St., 917-275-6975
When: Tuesday, June 20, $40, 7:00
Why: Legendary Washington-born photographer Lee Friedlander will make an extremely rare speaking appearance on June 20, his first in more than thirty years, when he comes to the New York Public Library, sharing the stage with his grandson, Giancarlo T. Roma, who describes himself on his Twitter page as a writer, stockbroker, business partner, guitar player, and more. Now eighty-two, Friedlander’s work over the last sixty years has included such series as “America by Car,” “Mannequin,” “Letters from the People,” and “Sticks & Stones,” capturing the social landscape of the country. Roma, whose mother is Friedlander’s daughter, has been collaborating with his father, photographer Thomas Roma, since the boy was in single digits, and he has now revived his grandfather’s self-publishing company, Haywire Press. The conversation, titled “Passion Projects,” will focus on Friedlander’s life and career, which he continues to do his way, not following any conventional methods.

A CONTEMPORARY EXPLORATION

world oceans week

The Explorers Club
46 East 70th St. between Park & Madison Aves.
Monday, June 5, and Tuesday, June 6, free
212-628-8383
explorers.org
oceanconference.un.org

As part of the inaugural UN Ocean Conference, which seeks to “conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas, and marine resources for sustainable development” by supporting Sustainable Development Goal 14, the Explorers Club will be turned into an environmental wonderland, and warning bell, particularly in the wake of Donald Trump’s pulling America out of the Paris Climate Accord. The free two-day symposium, cohosted by TBA-21 Academy, features a series of short panel discussions, lectures, live performances, and exhibits with such distinguished artists, scientists, historians, and philosophers as Sylvia Earle, Walter Munk, Joan Jonas, Mark Dion, and Rosanna Raymond and representatives from such organizations as the Scripps Institute of Oceanography, the Centre Nationnal de la Recherche Scientifique, the Alligator Head Foundation, Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, OpenROV, and Mission Blue. Below is the full schedule; no advance registration is required, and you can come and go as you please. In addition, there will be a sound installation of blue whale recordings by Peter Zinovieff and an oceanic scentscape by Sissel Tolaas. The conference continues at the Explorers Club through June 9 with other ticketed presentations ($10-$50) that can be found here.

Monday, June 5

Art and Artists on the Ocean

A Poetic Pacific Introduction, with Rosanna Raymond, 2:00

The Explorers Club: Into the Future, with Ted Janulis, 2:10

The Ocean as Narrative, with Christopher Myers, 2:30

The Artist Through the History of Oceanography — In conversation: D. Graham Burnett with Mark Dion, 2:50

Scientific Discoveries and Strategies for Change

A Poetic Pacific Interlude, with Rosanna Raymond, 3:30

Implementing Strategies for Change, with Margaret Leinen, Neil Davies, Dayne Buddo, and Françoise Gaill, chaired by Dee Kyne, 3:35

Seeing the Ocean: Marine Creatures Perspective, with Dave Gruber, 4:25

Oceanic Stories and Narratives

A Poetic Pacific Interlude, with Rosanna Raymond, 4:55

Art on the Ocean, with Joan Jonas, 5:00

The Art of Exploration, with Francesca von Habsburg, 5:20

Climate Change and the Ocean, with Walter Munk, 5:40

Closing remarks by Markus Reymann, 6:00

Tuesday, June 6

Extraordinary Approaches to Explorations

Welcome, with Dee Kyne, 2:00

Ancestral Knowledge in Modern Exploration, with Dieter Paulmann, 2:10

Broadcasting from the Field, with Mark Dalio, 2:30

Citizen Science Exploration, with David Lang, 2:50

Inciting Knowledge Production, with Markus Reymann, 3:10

Exploring Hope, with Sylvia Earle, 3:30

Closing remarks by Dee Kyne, 3:55

ROLAND GARROS IN THE CITY

Brookfield Place will host special French Open-related events June 5-11

THE FRENCH OPEN FROM PARIS TO NEW YORK CITY
Brookfield Place
230 Vesey Street
June 5-11, free
212-978-1673
brookfieldplaceny.com
www.rolandgarros.com

With Donald Trump’s rejection of the Paris climate accords, France and the United States might not be on the best of terms right now. But that shouldn’t stop tennis fans from enjoying the last week of the French Open, which is well under way in the City of Light. Men’s top seed Andy Murray of Great Britain is still chugging along, but women’s top seed Angelique Kerber of Germany was dispatched in the first round in straight sets by Ekaterina Makarova. In conjunction with the major championship, Brookfield Place will be hosting special events June 5-11, with live screenings on the Terrace of all the action, from 9:00 am to 6:00 pm Monday through Thursday, followed by the semifinals on Friday, the women’s final on Saturday, and the men’s final on Sunday. Visitors can get in some action of their own by playing on a full-size clay court that has been installed on Waterfront Plaza or take tennis lessons, both of which are free. There will also be an exhibition of classic Roland-Garros posters (by Joan Miró, Vik Muniz, and others) and an interactive replica of Paris’s Bridge of Locks to make everything feel even more French.

PRIDE MONTH: QUEER CONTINUUMS

Taja Lindley will give a free preview of Bag Lady Manifesta at the Brooklyn Museum on June 3

Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway at Washington St.
Saturday, June 3, free, 5:00 – 11:00
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org

The Brooklyn Museum honors LGBTQ Pride Month for the June edition of its free First Saturday program, which continues its 2017 theme, “A Year of Yes: Reimagining Feminism.” There will be live music from the New York City Gay Men’s Chorus, SassyBlack, and Tamar-kali; a curator tour of “We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85” led by Rujeko Hockley; teen apprentice pop-up gallery talks on works by LGBTQ artists; the New York City Legacy Ball, featuring Icons, Legends, Statements, and Stars of the ballroom community, hosted by father Sydney UltraOmni; a Community Resource Fair with the Gender Empowerment Movement Program, Health and Education Alternatives for Teens, Brooklyn Zen Center, Diaspora Community Services, Percent for Green, Well Read Black Girl, Brooklyn Pride, and the Audre Lorde Project; Pop-Up Poetry with Saretta Morgan and Alysia Harris paying tribute to artists in “We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85”; a preview performance by Taja Lindley from The Bag Lady Manifesta, which comes to Dixon Place in the fall; a crown-making workshop; the Brooklyn premiere of Mike Mosallam’s Breaking Fast, part of “DisOrient: Queer Arab Film and Discussion,” hosted by Tarab NYC; and the kickoff of the museum’s Black Queer Brooklyn on Film series, with D’hana Perry performing selections from her immersive, multimedia documentary Loose and new works by Frances Bodomo, Dyani Douze, Ja’Tovia Gary, and Chanelle Aponte Pearson of the New Negress Film Society, joined by artists Lindsay Catherine Harris and Isabella Reyes and actor Ash Tai, followed by a Q&A. In addition, you can check out such exhibits as “Iggy Pop Life Class by Jeremy Deller,” “Infinite Blue,” “A Woman’s Afterlife: Gender Transformation in Ancient Egypt,” “We Wanted a Revolution: Black Radical Women, 1965–85,” and, at a discounted admission price of $12, “Georgia O’Keefe: Living Modern.”

DOUG WHEELER: PSAD SYNTHETIC DESERT III

“Doug Wheeler: PSAD Synthetic Desert III” is an immersive, meditative wonderland (photo courtesy Guggenheim Museum)

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
1071 Fifth Ave. at 89th St.
Friday – Wednesday through August 2, $18 – $25
Timed tickets through July 31 available June 1 at 10:00 am
212-423-3587
www.guggenheim.org

Don’t miss the special opportunity to experience the otherworldly “Doug Wheeler: PSAD Synthetic Desert III” at the Guggenheim, as timed tickets for twenty-minute visits go on sale June 1 at 10:00 am for the installation’s final month. The Arizona-born Light and Space artist, who lives and works in Santa Fe, has been creating immersive environments that affect visitors’ sense of equilibrium and relationship to reality for more than fifty years, in such installations as “Encasements” and “LC 71 NY DZ 13 DW.” Like fellow Light and Space artists James Turrell and Robert Irwin, Wheeler constructs rooms that stretch the imagination and challenge one’s perception of the world. Conceived in 1971, “PSAD Synthetic Desert III” is a fantastical realm in which no more than five people at a time can enter; the “semi-anechoic chamber” features a platform amid hundreds of gray foam cones spread out across a seemingly infinite landscape, on the floor and the back wall. Meanwhile, a minimized soundscape can be barely heard in the distance, with a drastic reduction in ambient noise. Visitors are strongly encouraged to be as silent as possible in order to best experience the meditative installation, with no cell phones, cameras, or even whispering. Wheeler, who was born in 1939, was inspired to create the work after flying over the Mojave Desert and landing on a dry lakebed, surrounded by emptiness in all directions. “When you’re in some place that has immensity, and it has power in that, and it’s, like, foreign, because there’s nothing human about it,” he says on the Guggenheim blog, “and there are places where I can go where there isn’t a single living thing that you can recognize, there’s not a green bud anywhere, there’s nothing moving on the ground, there’s nothing, and there’s nothing in the sky, and so when you’re in a place like that, and you become conscious of yourself, it changes a lot of your perspective of how we fit in to the mix of the whole universe, really, because we’re just so insignificant.”

Doug Wheeler oversees installation of immersive environment at the Guggenheim (photo courtesy Guggenheim Museum)

Doug Wheeler oversees first realization of immersive environment at the Guggenheim (photo courtesy Guggenheim Museum)

To get the most out of “PSAD Synthetic Desert III,” you really need to give yourself over to the installation, blocking out all other sound and noise in your head, making room to explore its gentle pleasures and not worry about texting, taking photos, or posting on social media. You can walk around, lie on the floor, or sit while absorbing the unique space. I’m not embarrassed to admit that I was certain that the cones were moving ever so slightly, as if they were alive and softly breathing, but a Guggenheim staff member assured me that was not the case. I strongly recommend the twenty-minute experience, which requires advance tickets that include museum admission; the ten-minute experience is available every day on a first-come, first-served basis, and you will get the next open time instead of being able to choose your own. But no matter how long you’re in “PSAD Synthetic Desert III” for, just let your mind go and you’re in for a real treat, a respite from the madness of the crazy world outside. “It’s something I thought would be really great for New York, because you never escape noise here,” Wheeler continues on the blog. “Just walking down the street is like sixty-seven decibels constantly, and then it goes up from there. So this’ll be a place that you can go where there won’t be any noise. There won’t be anything in there. That’s a big motivation for me to do something in this town, because [for] a lot of people here, that would definitely be a first.”