1. Odd Volumes: Book Art from the Allan Chasanoff Collection is open at Yale University Art Gallery until February 1, 2015.
Most people, who have some knowledge about the US, will be familiar with the Ivy League university Yale. Most people will also know that the renowned university with Alumni like Paul Newman, Bill and Hilary Clinton and Lupita Nyong’O is not in New York. But its new exhibition Odd Volumes: Book Art from the Allan Chasanoff Collection is so relevant to Visionaire that we couldn’t leave it out. Drawn from a major collection given to the Gallery by Allan Chasanoff, B.A. 1961, Odd Volumes showcases a selection of experimental and innovative works of book art from the 1960s to the present. So rent a Zipcar and make a day out of it. While you’re in Connecticut, go see Fujiko Nakaya veiling Philip Johnson’s Glass house in a beautiful layer of fog.
2. Disturbing Innocence is open at The FLAG Art Foundation until January 31, 2015.
The iconic image of Kirsten shot by Inez Van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin first appeared in Visionaire 19 BEAUTY. The young girl, made up by our own James Kaliardos, is lit “to the gods” and appears stunningly angelic. Yet, there’s something haunting about the image: although her eyes aren’t completely closed, only the white of her eyeballs shows. The 1997 image is part of The FLAG Art Foundation’s new exhibition Disturbing Innocence. Featuring over 50 historical and contemporary artists whose use of dolls, toys, mannequins, robots, and other surrogates forms a deep and powerfully expressive genre, the exhibition poses profound questions surrounding social constructs of youth, beauty, transformation, violence, sexuality, gender, identity, and loneliness.
3. Franz West is open at David Zwirner until December 13, 2014.
Known for his homely and rough-surfaced materials, Franz West created work that embodied a kind of friendly iconoclasm in which form and function were pitted against each other. His work has been displayed in Central Park and on the plaza at Lincoln Center, as well as in international exhibitions and blue-chip galleries around the world and has been a fixture in countless international survey exhibitions such as Documenta and Biennales everywhere. David Zwirner’s exhibition of the late artist—he died after a long period of illness in 2012—is a survey of his work from the 1990s, a critical period in the development for the idiosyncratic style that is West’s most famous trademark.
4. Leo Villareal: Buckyball is open at Sandra Gering until January 10, 2015.
Another Yale graduate, Leo Villareal received his BA in sculpture from the famed school in 1990 followed by a graduate degree from NYU Tisch School of the Arts’ Interactive Telecommunications Program. The artist now makes a point of working with the newest technologies and has had his pieces included in permanent collections and locations like MoMA, The Bay Lights installation and Hive. Buckyball, his newest pieces currently exhibited at Sandra Gering, is composed of 180custom-made LED microtubes. They are arranged in a series of pentagons and hexagons to give the idea of two different spheres. A special software programs the sequence of light patterns in an infinite combination and with the possibility of realizing a whopping 16 million distinct colors.
5. Gary Simmons: Fight Night is open at Metro Pictures until December 13, 2014.
Over the course of his 20+ year long career, Gary Simmons has often used boxing as a leitmotif in his work to address issues such as race, class and professional sport. His Fight Night exhibition—in which boxers such as Joe Louis, Emile Griffith and Sonny Liston are considered—at Metro Pictures is no exception. Painting and drawings alongside a 40-foot wall-installation takes over the gallery. The immense work on the gallery’s back wall comprises of 160 posters for historic boxing matches that Simmons has manipulated with saturated colors and his signature erasure technique.