this week in lectures, signings, panel discussions, workshops, and Q&As

LAWRENCE WEINER AND GLENN FUHRMAN IN CONVERSATION

Who: Lawrence Weiner and Glenn Fuhrman
What: Artist talk in conjunction with publication of The FLAG Art Foundation: 2008-2018
Where: Gagosian Shop, 976 Madison Ave. at 75th St., 212-796-1224
When: Tuesday, April 16, free with RSVP, 6:00
Why: In celebration of its tenth anniversary, the Chelsea-based FLAG Art Foundation has published The FLAG Art Foundation: 2008-2018, a fully illustrated catalog that looks back at its first fifty exhibitions, which has featured such artists as Louise Bourgeois, Mark Bradford, Maurizio Cattelan, Robert Gober, Félix González-Torres, Jim Hodges, Ellsworth Kelly, Charles Ray, Gerhard Richter, and Cindy Sherman. On April 16, gallery founder Glenn Fuhrman and seventy-seven-year-old Bronx-born conceptual artist Lawrence Weiner will be at the Gagosian Shop on the Upper East Side to discuss the history of FLAG as well as its current exhibition “On Board the Ships at Sea Are We,” consisting of works by Weiner, Rachel Whiteread, and Robert Therrien examining scale, materiality, and absence. The catalog includes a foreword by Fuhrman, preface by founding director Stephanie Roach, and original contributions from Ashley Bickerton, Delia Brown, Patricia Cronin, Cynthia Daignault, Lisa Dennison, Sarah Douglas, Elmgreen & Dragset, Eric Fischl, James Frey, Louis Grachos, Stamatina Gregory, Jane Hammond, Hilary Harkness, Jim Hodges, Philae Knight, Josephine Meckseper, Richard Patterson, Jack Shear, Carolyn Twersky, Lesley Vance, Rebecca Ward, and Heidi Zuckerman. Admission is free with advance RSVP.

IN PERPETUAL FLIGHT: THE MIGRATION OF THE BLACK BODY

Alvin Ailey dancer and choreographer Hope Boykin will perform at “In Perpetual Flight: The Migration of the Black Body” presentation at Schomburg Center (photo by Steve Vaccariello)

The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture
Langston Hughes Auditorium
515 Malcolm X Blvd.
Tuesday, April 16, free with advance registration, 6:30
www.nypl.org

Carnegie Hall’s wide-ranging, multidisciplinary Migrations: The Making of America festival comes to the Langston Hughes Auditorium at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture on April 16 for “In Perpetual Flight: The Migration of the Black Body.” Through dance, music, and theater, the program traces the journey toward liberation of the black body across time in the US, from the slave trade and the Great Migration to the Civil War and the Back to Africa movement, exploring its impact on contemporary American culture. The evening, held in conjunction with the fiftieth anniversary of Dr. Barbara Ann Teer’s National Black Theatre and its current NBT Beyond Walls initiative, features four live performances and presentations by Alvin Ailey dancer and choreographer Hope Boykin, screenwriter, playwright, and director Keith Josef Adkins, Obie-winning actress and singer Kenita R. Miller, composer and sound designer Justin Hicks, NBT CEO Sade Lythcott, and NBT artistic director Jonathan McCrory, utilizing works from the Schomburg Center archives from such seminal figures as James Baldwin, Harriet Powers, Marcus Garvey, Harriet Tubman, and Jacob Lawrence. “This event is allowing us to acknowledge the consistent flight, movement, and navigation black people have been engaged in within this country ever since the black body was ripped from the shores of Africa — human bodies stripped from home and forced into slavery,” McCrory said in a statement. “That perpetual flight has produced four hundred years of migration that have generated moments of agitation, acceleration, acclimation, and aspiration.” Admission is free; advance registration is strongly recommended.

INTERROGATIONS OF FORM: MUSEUM AS SANCTUARY

(image © Julio Salgado)

SUNDAY SALON
Park Ave. Armory
643 Park Ave. at 67th St.
Sunday, April 14, $25, 3:00
212-933-5812
www.armoryonpark.org

In December, Cuban artist and activist Tania Bruguera was arrested in Havana for protesting Decree 349, which criminalizes public and private art that the Ministry of Culture deems unpatriotic or does not receive government permission for commercialization. “Before there was censorship, you could play around. Now you go to jail, now they take your house. It’s not a joke. There are no more games to play,” Bruguera told the Guardian in February. “What we want is to eliminate the decree and work together to find regulations that are based on the needs of the artists and what will protect them, not only the government.” Bruguera, an artist-in-residence at Park Avenue Armory, will be at the armory on April 14 for the Sunday Salon discussing a place to seek refuge: The presentation, part of the Interrogations of Form series, is entitled “Museum as Sanctuary.” The salon kicks off at 3:00 with an introduction by Bruguera and “Make Sanctuary Not Art,” a ritual gathering on safe spaces led by Luba Cortes, Geoff Trenchard, Jackie Vimo, and Abou Farman. From 4:30 to 5:30, the pop-up exhibition “You See Me?!?” displays work by undocumented LGBTQ Mexican American artist Julio Salgado and the collective Emulsify, including the video installation “Con Cámaras y Sín Papeles.” The afternoon concludes at 5:30 with “Institutions as Sanctuary in Times of Exclusion,” a conversation with Alexandra Délano Alonso, Camilo Godoy, Sonia Guiñansaca, Bitta Mostofi, and Verónica Ramírez, moderated by Bruguera.

KAROLE ARMITAGE’S YOU TOOK A PART OF ME

Egumi Eda plays the lead role in Karole Armitage’s You Took a Part of Me at Japan Society (photo © Julieta Cervantes; Karole Armitage © Marco Mignani)

Japan Society
333 East 47th St. at First Ave.
Friday, April 12, and Saturday, April 13, $30, 7:30
212-715-1258
www.japansociety.org

Wisconsin-born, Tony-nominated choreographer Karole Armitage follows up Art of the In-Between, which debuted last October at National Sawdust in Brooklyn in the Celebrate Mexico Now festival, with the world premiere of You Took a Part of Me at Japan Society this weekend with her company, Armitage Gone! Dance. Loosely inspired by the fifteenth-century noh play Nonomiya, the kazura-mono piece features Lady Rokujō, a character from The Tale of Genji, and deals with memory, obsession, and love. Created in collaboration with MIT Media Lab and part of Carnegie Hall’s Migrations: The Making of America festival, You Took a Part of Me features a live score by Reiko Yamada played live by multi-instrumentalist Yuki Isami; longtime Armitage dancer Megumi Eda will perform the lead role. The set includes a bridge known as a hashigakari that extends into the audience. The April 12 show will be followed by a meet-the-artists reception, while the April 13 program will conclude with an artist Q&A.

ONASSIS FESTIVAL 2019: DEMOCRACY IS COMING

Lena Kitsopoulou’s is part of Onassis Festival at Public Theater

Public Theater and other venues
425 Lafayette St.
April 10-28
212-539-8500
www.publictheater.org
www.onassisfestivalny.org

The English word “democracy,” and the concept of ruling by the common people, comes from Greek classical antiquity. The Public Theater, in partnership with Onassis USA, hearkens back to those origins in the 2019 Onassis Festival: Democracy Is Coming. From April 10 to 28, the Public and such other venues as La MaMa will present live performances, discussions, and more exploring the meaning and role of democracy from its early days to the present time, as fascism rears its ugly head in America and around the world. Below are only some of the many highlights.

Wednesday, April 10
through
Saturday, April 13
Relic, solo performance by Euripides Laskaridis, examining the current Greek crisis, Shiva Theater at the Public, $35, 8:00

Wednesday, April 10
through
Sunday, April 28
Socrates, new play by Tim Blake Nelson, directed by Doug Hughes, and starring Michael Stuhlbarg, Niall Cunningham, David Aaron Baker, Teagle F. Bougere, Peter Jay Fernandez, Robert Joy, Miriam A. Hyman, and others, Martinson Hall at the Public, $85

Saturday, April 13
Brunch, Tragedy & Us, book talk with Simon Critchley interviewed by Paul Holdengräber, the Library at the Public Theater, free with advance reservation, 11:30

Choir! Choir! Choir!, community singalong created by Daveed Goldman and Nobu Adilman, free with advance reservation, Public Theater lobby, 5:00

Euripides Laskaridis’s Relic runs April 18-20 at the Public Theater (photo by Miltos Athanasiou)

Sunday, April 14
Democracy Is the City, panel discussion with Alfredo Brillembourg, Karen Brooks Hopkins, and Kamau Ware and a live performance by Morley, Shiva Theater, 2:00

Monday, April 15
Public Forum: Of, by & for the People, featuring a conversation with Oskar Eustis, Suzan-Lori Parks, and Kwame Anthony Appiah and live performances by André Holland and Diana Oh, Shiva Theater, $25, 7:00

Thursday, April 18
through
Saturday, April 20
Antigone: Lonely Planet, Lena Kitsopoulou’s comic version of Sophocles’s tragedy, Shiva Theater, $35

Monday, April 22
Public Shakespeare Presents: What’s Hecuba to Him? Tragic Greek Women on Shakespeare’s Stage, commentary and readings from Euripides and Shakespeare with Professor Tanya Pollard, Isabel Arraiza, Tina Benko, Phylicia Rashad, and Ayana Workman, Martinson Hall, $35, 7:00

TRIBECA FILM FESTIVAL 2019: SPECIAL EVENTS AT THE BEACON

Francis Ford Coppola will be at the Tribeca Film Festival screening and discussing Apocalypse Now: Final Cut

Beacon Theatre
2124 Broadway at 75th St.
Tribeca Film Festival runs April 25 – May 5
212-465-6000
www.tribecafilm.com
www.msg.com/beacon-theatre

The hottest events of the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival are taking place on the Upper West Side at the Beacon Theatre, where screenings, discussions, and live performances will feature Wu-Tang Clan, Spinal Tap, Francis Ford Coppola, the Trey Anastasio Band, and Martin Scorsese with Robert De Niro. Tickets are going fast, so act now if you want to catch any of these special presentations.

Thursday, April 25
Tribeca TV: Wu-Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men (Sacha Jenkins, 2019), followed by a live performance by Wu-Tang Clan, $116, 8:00

Friday, April 26
Movies Plus: Between Me and My Mind (Steven Cantor, 2019), followed by a live performance by the Trey Anastasio Band, 8:00

Wu-Tang Clan will play live at the Tribeca Film Festival after screening of Wu-Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men

Saturday, April 27
Anniversary Screenings: This Is Spinal Tap (Rob Reiner, 1984), followed by a discussion with Christopher Guest, Michael McKean, Harry Shearer, and Rob Reiner and a live performance by Spinal Tap, $46-$256, 8:00

Sunday, April 28
Directors Series: Martin Scorsese with Robert De Niro, 2:00

Anniversary Screenings: Apocalypse Now: Final Cut (Francis Ford Coppola, 1979), world premiere of fortieth anniversary 4K Ultra HD restored version, with special Meyer Sound VLFC, followed by a discussion with Francis Ford Coppola, $46-$116, 5:00

FIRST SATURDAYS: FRIDA KAHLO

Nickolas Muray, Frida in New York, carbon pigment, 1946 (printed 2006), © Nickolas Muray Photo Archives (photo courtesy Brooklyn Museum)

Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway at Washington St.
Saturday, April 6, free (some events require advance tickets), 5:00 – 11:00
212-864-5400
www.brooklynmuseum.org

The Brooklyn Museum celebrates Frida Kahlo in the April edition of its free First Saturday program. There will be live performances by Renee Goust, Calpulli Mexican Dance Company (Puebla: The Story of Cinco De Mayo), and Pistolera (with visuals by Screaming Horses), as well as Yas Mama!’s El Noche de las Reinas with Lady Quesa’Dilla and DJ sets by Hannah Lou and Shomi Noise, hosted by Horrorchata; pop-up poetry with Danilo Machado, Jimena Lucero, and Francisco Márquez; the community talk “Art and Disability” with Dior Vargas and Kevin Gotkin; pop-up gallery talks of “Life, Death, and Transformation in the Americas” with teen apprentices; a hands-on workshop in which participants can adorn instant photos with a Kahlo-like flourish; and an “Archives as Raw History” tour focusing on disabled artists and visitors with archivist Molly Seegers. In addition, the galleries will be open late so you can check out “Frida Kahlo: Appearances Can Be Deceiving,” “Eric N. Mack: Lemme walk across the room,” “One: Do Ho Suh,” “One: Egúngún,” “Something to Say: Brooklyn Hi-Art! Machine, Deborah Kass, Kameelah Janan Rasheed, and Hank Willis Thomas,” “Infinite Blue,” “A Woman’s Afterlife: Gender Transformation in Ancient Egypt,” “Kwang Young Chun: Aggregations,” and more.