ArtBeat: What To See

---

Christopher Wool: Untitled @ Art Omi, Ghent. Christopher Wool’s large-scale bronze and copper plated steel sculpture demonstrates his penchant for appropriating existing forms, deriving their structure from ranching wire found around his property in Texas. (Through December 31)

Friends and Memories @ Carmen’s Cafe, Troy. Portraiture by Suzanne Arbanas. Artist’s reception: Thursday, January 24, 5:30-8:30pm. (Through January 31)

Donna Fitzgerald: Italy & Vietnam and Mark McCarty: Skin @ Feigenbaum Center For Visual Arts, Schenectady. Solo exhibitions by two noted Nippertown photographers. Artist talk and reception: Thursday, January 24, 3:30pm. (Through March 12)

Coping: Art to Process Illness, Decay and Loss @ Greene County Council on the Arts, Catskill. A group exhibition of works by artists who are using the creative process to work through health crises, mental illness and the loss of loved ones. Opening reception: Saturday, January 26, 3-5pm. (Through April 13)

Revised Realities @ Esther Massry Gallery, Albany. Works by installation artist Isidro Blasco and painter Elise Engler. Reception: Friday, January 25, 5-7pm. Artists’ lectures: Friday, January 25, 7pm. (Through February 23)

Shape and Shadow: The Sculpture of Larry Kagan @ Albany Institute of History and Art, Albany. A retrospective exhibition featuring 50 works from three distinctive phases of noted Troy sculptor Larry Kagan’s career: the 1970s cast acrylic sculptures that reflect and refract light; the found steel works from the 1980s and 90s that play with texture, pattern and shape; and more recently, the shadow pieces that rely on strategically positioned steel rods to sculpt light. Opening reception: Friday, January 25, 5-7pm. (Through June 9)

Bejeweled and Bedazzled: Jewelry and Personal Adornment @ Albany Institute of History and Art, Albany. An exhibition focusing on the Institute’s collection of jewelry and objects of personal adornment, from precious stones and ornaments to fabric ribbons, rhinestones and even braided human hair. Opens Saturday, January 26. (Through July 28)

A Decolonial Atlas: Strategies in Contemporary Art of the Americas @ Mandeville Gallery, Schenectady. Recent works by artists from the United States and Latin America grappling with continued questions of colonialism and postcolonialism in an effort to locate “place” in contemporary society. The exhibition highlights the medium of video as a critical tool for expanded narratives and immersive imagery, in addition to painting, photography, sculpture and works on paper. Opens Saturday, January 19. Artist talk, curator talk and reception: Thursday, January 31, 5-6:30pm. (Through June 16)

Maryna Bilak: Care @ Hudson Hall, Hudson. Through charcoal drawings, fresco, sculpture and painting, artist Maryna Bilak documents what it means to be a caretaker for someone with Alzheimer’s and delves into the varied roles each person involved plays, including the patient herself. Artist’s reception: Saturday, February 2, 5-7pm. (Through March 17)

---

Brian Rego: Tiny Mirrors @ John Davis Gallery, Hudson. Landscape paintings by Brian Rego. Also on display: sculpture by Bruce Gagnier in the sculpture garden. (Through January 27)

Friends of the Gallery @ Art Associates Gallery, Albany. The second installment of this exhibition celebrating the gallery’s relocation includes works by Rafael Arenos, “Just Deb” Carpenter, Peter Guest, Rit Lastarza, Michael Melnick, Dino Petrocelli Sr., Dino Petrocelli Jr., Mick Richards, Anthony Salamone, Susan Gill Spellmeyer, Charles Szuberia, Marianne Szuberia, Mary Pat Wager and William B. Westwood. Opening reception: (Through January 28)

The Lure of the Dark @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. Over a dozen contemporary artists, including Patrick Bermingham, William Binnie, Cynthia Daignault, TM Davy, Jeronimo Elespe, Cy Gavin, Shara Hughes, Josephine Halvorson, Sam McKinniss, Wilhelm Neusser, Dana Powell, Kenny Rivero and Alexandria Smith, illustrate the ways in which the hours of darkness continue to provoke the contemporary imagination.

Natasha Bowdoin: Maneater @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. Houston, TX-based artist Natasha Bowdoin builds wall-works with words. In her largest-ever cut paper and collage installation, she investigates the intersections of the visual, the experiential, and the literary, treating language and nature as kindred phenomena.

Extreme Nature @ The Clark, Williamstown. An exhibition that explores how nature’s extremes – remote, fantastical and unpredictable – permeated artistic imagery throughout the nineteenth century. (Through February 3)

Lyrical @ Sohn Fine Art, Lenox. Recent mixed-media works by John Clarke. (Through February 3)

Our Earth, Our Bodies @ Martinez Gallery, Troy. An exhibition that explores the ways humans are linked to the natural environment featuring works by Caren Canier, Miguel Martinez-Riddle, Sara Guerric, Karen Greendale, Eduardo Abade and Emma Chan. (Through February 7)

EXIT Architecture: Speculations for the Hereafter and InConstruction @ Art Omi, Ghent. A speculative look at designing for the afterlife in all its potential architectural and design forms as well as new ways of marking our exit featuring contributions from AD-WO, Studio Ames, ANAH, BEAU Architects, Richard Ceccanti Aston, Bade Stageberg Cox, Roderick Cruz, JeongChoi Works, KONYK ARCHITECTURE, Giann Matias, Aleksandr Mergold, Michaela Metcalfe, Yongwoo Park, Jason Vigneri-Beane and Lebbeus Woods. Also on display: InConstruction: Hariri & Hariri that examines their modular, folding habitation pods. (Through February 10)

Adaptations to Extremes, An Art / Science Collaboration @ Courthouse Gallery, Lake George. An exhibition that examines how organisms adapt to environmental extremes including artists responding to scientific research and scientists responding to artworks. The exhibition is co-curated by Laura Von Rosk and scientists Dr. Joan Bernhard and Dr. Sam Bowser; artists include Elizabeth Albert, JoAnn Axford, Terry Conrad, Josh Dorman, Susan Heideman, Eva Henderson, Charlene Leary, Deanna Lee, Corwin Levi, Marilyn McCabe, Joy Muller-McCoola, Jeanne Noordsy, Shaun O’Boyle, Victoria Palermo, Rebecca Smith and Kathleen Thum. Panel talk at Bolton Historical Museum: Sunday, January 20, 3pm. (Through February 22)

Gregory Manchess: Above the Timberline @ Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge. Working in the tradition of Frank E. Schoonover and the Golden Age masters, renowned illustrator Gregory Manchess has created a lavishly painted novel about the son of a famed polar explorer searching for his stranded father, and a lost city buried under snow in an alternate future. Artist talk and book signing: Sunday, November 18, 1pm. (Through February 24)

Great Estates @ Carrie Haddad Gallery, Hudson. A two person show featuring paintings by Bill Sullivan (1942 – 2010) and Joseph E. Richards (1921 – 2007), juxtaposing Richard’s photorealistic depictions of steam locomotives and industrial machinery with the dramatically hued Hudson Valley and South American landscapes by Sullivan. (Through February 24)

Parking on Pavement @ The School, Kinderhook. A large group show that examines the paradoxes and schisms of contemporary life, featuring works by El Anatsui, Andrea Bowers, Yoan Capote, Derrick Alexis Coard, Charles Cohen, Elizabeth Crawford, Terry Evans, Till Freiwald, Kay Hassan, Magdalena Jetelova, Goshka Macuga, Kerry James Marshall, Stefana McClure, Donna Moylan, Adi Nes, Odili Donald Odita, Anila Quayyum Agha, Paul Anthony Smith, Michael Snow, Hank Willis Thomas, Padraig Timoney, Stephen Towns and Carrie Mae Weems. (Through March 2)

Turner and Constable: The Inhabited Landscape @ The Clark, Williamstown. An exhibition of more than 50 oil paintings, watercolors, drawings and prints that explore the importance of the built environment and the human figure within the landscape by contemporaries Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851) and John Constable (1776–1837), landscape painters who rose to prominence in early nineteenth–century England. (Through March 10)

Pitch @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. Allison Janae Hamilton’s photographs, videos, sculptures and installations feature environments familiar to the north Florida and Tennessee landscapes that are home to her family. (Through March 10)

Rachel Howard: Paintings of Violence (Why I am not a mere Christian) @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. In her first U.S. solo museum show, London-based painter Rachel Howard examines human cruelty; the work’s title references both C.S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity and Bertrand Russell’s “Why I am not a Christian,” texts which argue respectively for and against adherence to Christianity. (Through March 10)

Thomas Gainsborough @ The Clark, Mixed-media drawings by Thomas Gainsborough, an 18th-century artist more renowned for his portraiture. Williamstown. (Through March 17)

Two Perspective @ Good Purpose Gallery, Lee.Watercolors by Pat Hogan and oil paintings by Marcelene I. Mosca. (Through November 13)

Landmark @ Albany International Airport Gallery, Albany. The gallery celebrates its 20th anniversary with this exhibition of visual artists and writers reflecting upon a changing American landscape. (Through March 25)

From the Vault: Staff Selections @ The Hyde Collection, Glens Falls. Paintings, drawings, prints and sculpture spanning five centuries chosen by Museum staff from its 4,000-work collection. (Through March 31)

Colorama @ The Hyde Collection, Glens Falls. An exhibition that examines the massive advertisements displayed in New York’s Grand Central Station, offering insight into America and the histories of advertising, photography and technology. (Through April 14)

Frank E. Schoonover: American Visions @ Norman Rockwell Museum, Stockbridge. An exhibition of artworks by the noted Golden Age illustrator, including paintings for such classic stories as Kidnapped, Robinson Crusoe, Swiss Family Robinson, and Ivanhoe, as well as illustrations for the novels of Zane Grey. (Through May 27)

Nicholas Whitman @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. Nicholas Whitman’s 1988 documentary photographs of the abandoned Sprague Electric Company factory that would become the MASS MoCA campus.

Rafa Esparza: Staring at the Sun @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. A solo exhibition in which Rafe Esparza continues his investigation of the labor-intensive process of hand-making adobe bricks by creating a new space out of adobe, while also returning to his practice as a painter.

Come to your Senses @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. Sally Taylor, daughter of James Taylor and Carly Simon, curates this exhibit in MASS MoCA’s Kidspace gallery and art-making studio, which will include new music by both of her parents. A program of Taylor’s long-running Consenses project, the show asks visual artists, poets, dancers, musicians, perfumers, chefs and sculptors to use one another’s art as a catalyst to create their own work.

Tom Slaughter: Icon Alphabet @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. Tom Slaughter’s drawings, paintings and cut-paper illustrations examine objects and scenes from the artist’s life in New York and coastal Long Island.

Jarvis Rockwell: Us @ MASS MoCA, North Adams. A new large-scale installation in which figures from Rockwell’s massive collection of toys and figurines interact and organize themselves on glass panels, soaring over visitors’ heads in the historic light well of the newly renovated B6: Robert W. Wilson Building.

Heavy Metal: Cast Iron Stoves of the Capital Region @ Albany Institute of History and Art, Albany. During the nineteenth century, Albany and Troy manufacturers were considered to be among the largest producers of cast-iron stoves in the world. This exhibition of 25 cast stoves from the Institute’s collection showcases these utilitarian objects as both works of art and technological innovations that made the home more comfortable as well as beautiful. (Through August 18)

Back in My Day: Childhood, Play, and Schenectady @ Schenectady County Historical Society, Schenectady. An exhibition examining play and childhood in both the 20th and 21st centuries. (Through November 16)