cityArts November 17, 2009 by CityArts NYC

NOV. 17-NOV. 30, 2009 Volume 1, Issue 10

Clay Patrick McBride

All Rise You may know Wynton Marsalis the showman, the iconoclast, the humanitarian. But you must know Wynton’s music as well.

BY HOWARD MANDEL he marble halls of the Fifth Avenue center for Cultural Services of the French Embassy rang with happy blues Nov. 6, when Wynton Marsalis played trumpet with his quintet, having just been awarded the Chevalier of the Legion of Honor, France’s highest award for excellent achievement. Add it to the United States’ own National Medal of the Arts and congressional Horizon Award, a United Nations’ designation as a “Messenger of Peace,” the Netherlands’ Edison Award, honorary membership in Britain’s Royal Academy of Music, multiple Grammys, honorary doctorates, laurels from community service organizations and, oh yes, the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for Music, and it’s pretty clear: Honors crowd the shelves of the most famous jazzman of the 21st century. Who has not heard of Wynton Marsalis? He has performed in 30 countries, on every

continent except Antarctica and sold ﬁve million recordings worldwide. Artistic director, founder and indomitable spirit of Jazz at Lincoln Center, leader of its Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra (LCJO), hero of Ken Burns’ 10-part documentary Jazz, the composer-performer has collaborated with everyone from Kathleen Battle to Willie Nelson, been commissioned for the dance companies of Alvin Ailey, Peter Martins, Twyla Tharp and Zhongmei, and created the 100-minute, 12-movement All Rise for symphony, jazz band and choir. The list of his activities—musical, humanitarian and commercial (he’s been an “ambassador” for Movado watches, appeared in an iPod ad, made Brooks Brothers the ofﬁcial clothiers of the LCJO)—goes on and on. He’s played twice this year at the White House for the Obamas. Since Hurricane Katrina, he’s been an activist for reconstruction and civic improvement of New Orleans, and he’s lent his name to the Freedom Campaign for Burmese Nobel

laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. He’s a tireless educator, holding innumerable master classes and informal jam sessions as well as instituting JALC’s Essentially Ellington high school band competition, now in its 15th year. He’s got friends in high places, having played basketball with Kareem Abdul-Jabar, been photographed at society soirées with Mayor Bloomberg and applauded on his investiture as Chevalier by attendees that included police commissioner Raymond Kelly, comedian Bill Cosby, festival producer George Wein, actors Wendell Pierce and François Battiste, former and present Lincoln Center potentates and other culture machers too plentiful to mention. But have you heard his music? And do you like it? These are the key questions for evaluating the enduring reputation of Marsalis, now 48 and a force to be reckoned with since he emerged from Juilliard to join drummer Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers (with

his brother, saxophonist Branford Marsalis) back in 1980. It seems impossible that anyone could have heard it all, though maybe critic Stanley Crouch, Wynton’s intellectual consultant and chief cheerleader going on 30 years, comes close. According to his website, the trumpeter has released 40 jazz albums under his own name, 11 with the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra and 18 more categorized as “classical.” Those include Listen to the Storytellers, in which he’s a narrator; Concert for Planet Earth, where he blows with his septet as well as with Placido Domingo on the melody known in the U.S. as “Brazil,” and A Fiddler’s Tale, his “response” to Stravinsky’s A Soldier’s Story—besides several CDs of baroque trumpet repertoire. He has been ambitious—and proliﬁc. Focusing on Wynton’s jazz productions, one ﬁnds several sets with several CDs, most

MARSALIS on page 7

JACK VIERTEL, ARTISTIC DIRECTOR ROB BERMAN, MUSIC DIRECTOR

GIRL CRAZY MUSIC AND LYRICS BY

GEORGE GERSHWIN AND IRA GERSHWIN BOOK BY

GUY BOLTON AND JACK MCGOWAN STARRING

JEREMY BECK CHRIS DIAMANTOPOULOS ANA GASTEYER MYLINDA HULL WAYNE KNIGHT MARC KUDISCH BECKI NEWTON RICHARD POE DANIEL STEWART SHERMAN GREGORY WOODDELL FEATURING

THE ENCORES! ORCHESTRA GUEST MUSIC DIRECTOR

ROB FISHER DIRECTED BY

JERRY ZAKS

FIVE PERFORMANCES ONLY!

NOVEMBER 19 – 22 THU-FRI 8PM, SAT 2 & 8PM, SUN 6:30PM TICKETS START AT $25

2009-2010 Encores! Season Sponsors

F O U N D A T I O N

Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!

Few other distinctive American art forms are more closely related to an urban capital than jazz is to New York City. When we learned that the ubiquitous Wynton Marsalis, who is certainly one of the most recognized jazz leaders in New York, was set to receive France’s Chevalier of the Legion of Honor, we decided it was a perfect opportunity to French Ambassador Pierre Vimont conferred the Chevalier of the Legion of Honor upon celebrate his numer- Wynton Marsalis during a Nov. 6 ceremony at the Cultural Services of the French Embassy ous accomplishments in New York. as well. As Howard Mandel writes in this issue’s cover story, many may think they know Marsalis because of his commercial spots, humanitarian work or TV specials, but they should know him for the significance of his musical achievements. And if we’re going to start on the many musical achievements of an individual, it’s difficult to miss the influence of Johnny Mercer as we celebrate the 100th anniversary of his birth this year. Will Friedwald writes about the potential Mercer overload and how to appreciate the many vocalists and performers bringing his considerable body of work to area stages. And that brings us to one of the biggest issues of all: How and where to enjoy all that jazz (sorry, I couldn’t help it). David Freeland writes about the loss of so many buildings despite the fact that Manhattan evolved as the locus of the New York jazz scene in the 20th century. With the failure to preserve and savor these concert halls—where generations allowed performers to prosper creatively—we’ve lost an unimaginable part of our heritage. Luckily we have people such as Marjorie Eliot, who feels passionate about protecting jazz on her own terms. Eliot has opened her home in Harlem to performers and strangers for close to 20 years so that music and musicians may flourish. But it’s not all about the past, as we see with Ben Allison. The bassist continues to remain flexible, pushing the boundaries of what we expect, improvising and blending the boundaries between jazz and rock ’n’ roll. I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t always understand what jazz musicians are doing as they blow and strum and plunk, but there’s a power and a force to what they achieve that we can all appreciate. JERRY PORTWOOD Editor in Chief EDITOR Jerry Portwood jportwood@manhattanmedia.com MANAGING EDITOR Adam Rathe arathe@ manhattanmedia.com

ADVERTISING

MANHATTAN MEDIA

PUBLISHER Kate Walsh kwalsh@manhattanmedia.com

PRESIDENT/CEO Tom Allon tallon@manhattanmedia.com

ADVERTISING CONSULTANT

CFO/COO Joanne Harras jharras@manhattanmedia.com

EDITORIAL ASST

Adele Mary Grossman

Christine Werthman ART DIRECTOR Jessica Balaschak

agrossman@manhattanmedia.com

GROUP PUBLISHER

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVES

Alex Schweitzer

Ceil Ainsworth, Monica Conde, Lauren Wilner

aschweitzer@manhattanmedia.com

SENIOR ART CRITIC Lance Esplund

PRODUCTION PRODUCTION MANAGER

Gerry Gavin

SENIOR MUSIC CRITIC

Mark Stinson

Jay Nordlinger

ADVERTISING DESIGN

Tom Kelly

SENIOR DANCE CRITIC

Heather Mulcahey

tkelly@manhattanmedia.com

Joel Lobenthal

WEB DESIGNER

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS:

Lesley Siegel

CONTROLLER Shawn Scott

CONTRIBUTING ART DIRECTOR

Wendy Hu

Brice Brown, John Goodrich, Amanda Gordon, Howard Mandel, Mario Naves

www.cityarts.info

NEWSPAPER GROUP PUBLISHER ggavin@manhattanmedia.com MARKETING DIRECTOR

ACCOUNTS MANAGER Kathy Pollyea

Send all press releases to cityarts@manhattanmedia.com

CityArts is a division of Manhattan Media, publishers of New York Family magazine, AVENUE magazine, Our Town, West Side Spirit, New York Press, City Hall, Chelsea Clinton News, The Westsider and The Blackboard Awards. © 2009 Manhattan Media, LLC | 79 Madison Avenue, 16th Floor, New York, NY 10016 | t: 212.268.8600, f: 212.268.0577 | www.manhattanmedia.com

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

LetterFromtheEDITOR

Andrew Scwartz

InBrief

Pace Wildenstein currently leases the West 22nd Street building that Dia will relocate to.

The Dawn of a New Dia When Philippe Vergne, director of the Dia Art Foundation, announced Nov. 6 that the organization would return to Chelsea, there finally appeared to be a bright spot for the sagging fortunes of the area. The influential Dia has not had a highly visible presence or exhibition space in the city after they vacated their previous Chelsea space in 2004. After they toyed with the idea of constructing a new home along the High Line, the location was snatched up by the Whitney. Now, according to Vergne and Nathalie de Gunzburg, chairman of Dia’s board, they have decided to return to the same street they left and “build a ‘dream house’ for artists,” in Vergne’s words, at 545 West 22nd Street. According to Vergne, the new space will provide a location for commissioned artworks as well as long-term installations. They also plan to reinstall Dan Graham’s “Rooftop Urban Park Project” (1991) on Dia’s new building. As of now no architect has been chosen, but there is considerable expectation since it’s the first time in its 35-year history that the foundation has decided to construct a new building rather than renovate an existing structure. They also seem to have the full support of Bloomberg’s administration, which continues

with big plans for the Far West Side, with Kate D. Levin, the city’s commissioner of cultural affairs, issuing a statement in support of Dia’s decision. “Dia has led the way in providing a home for artists, and in demonstrating the power of cultural organizations to transform communities. In renewing its commitment to new work and to New York, Dia is playing an essential role in our city’s creative future.” Other than the excitement surrounding the idea of yet another high-end exhibition space for contemporary artists, many are left wondering what this will mean to the current tenants on the block since the address is currently occupied by the Pace Wildenstein gallery, whose lease with Dia ends in late 2011. Dia plans on breaking ground for the new construction in early 2012. After Dia, followed by the New Museum, left West 22nd, a considerable void was felt along the street. Pace Wildenstein has not publically announced their plans to move, but Andrea Glincher, director of public relations, conﬁrmed, “We’re seriously considering Chelsea. We’re looking to not only replicate our space, but also to expand.” Neighboring gallery owners said they welcome the foundation’s return because it could boost foot trafﬁc and reinforce Chelsea’s reputation as a must-see spot for art tourists.

“They were missed when they left,” said Marisa Newman, owner of Newman Popiashvili Gallery, located across the street at 504 West 22nd Street. “I think it will bring even more people to 22nd Street. I’m not sure it will have a drastic effect, but we can hope. I’m just happy they’re back.” Newman said she admires how Dia supports artists early in their careers, a rare occurrence for many institutions in the city. Of the artists Dia has nurtured, Newman adores Michael Heizer because he created “spaces that were frightening and awesome in the true sense of awesome, just awe-inspiring.” The Chelsea Art Museum, located at the corner of 11th Avenue and West 22nd, could especially beneﬁt from Dia’s pull. Dorothea Keeser, the museum’s president, said Dia’s return, “will draw even more visitors. They are known all over the world. If we want to have Chelsea be the center of art in New York, we should not miss Dia. It’s just one more factor that will make people walk across all of Chelsea, which is quite a challenge.” Some gallery owners doubt the move will affect their own business, but they still welcome the foundation’s impending return. Frederieke Taylor, whose gallery is located at 535 West 22nd Street, said her block has always had “intense” foot trafﬁc, but she appreciates the esteem Dia brings to the block. “They’ve been an anchor in Chelsea,” said Taylor, “so I’m thrilled they’re staying, whether it’s out of self-interest or not.” (Rebecca Huval)

radio program idea in which we would create radio programs that showcase our music programs—then we discovered that there are very few places in public radio that will take an eclectic mix of music like we have here,” said Elliott. “Rather than adapt our programming to ﬁt their needs, we decided to create our own channel on the Internet. That extended to taking live programs from different disciplines and using them—literary, music, family, political cabaret. The basic idea is to take what we create here and make it accessible to a wider audience.” With new programming added each week, Elliot is hoping that the site will not only bring the programming that the Upper West Side has come to expect to places where nothing similar is available, but also that it will lead to increased visibility and fundraising for Symphony Space. “There is a tremendous demand all across the country for cultural arts programming that is high-quality and meaningful, and eventually we want to be able to make this into a source of support for Symphony Space,” she said. “By getting it out to a wider audience, we’ll be able to generate more sustenance for those programs. “It will stay free until the right time comes. That’s our hope, but we’ll see. The world of the Internet, even now, is changing every day and who knows—one way or another the idea is to get exposure for the programs to the widest audience possible.” (Adam Rathe)

Space Exploration

What the Flute Knows

If you weren’t at Symphony Space Nov. 6 to catch Arturo O’Farrill and the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra, you’re not completely out of luck. On Dec. 9, O’Farrill’s work—the world premiere of a piece dedicated to Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor—will appear on Symphony Space Live, the recently launched online catalogue of the uptown institution’s performances. Currently the site features around 50 programs and, according to Executive Director Cynthia Elliott, Symphony Space plans to keep growing the collection. “We started Symphony Space Live as a

Celebrating her 40th anniversary as a stage performer, internationally recognized flutist Carol Wincenc delivered a scintillating performance Nov. 9 at the Kaufman Center’s Merkin Concert Hall near Lincoln Center. Her exquisite lyricism and effortless technique affirm that, nearly half a century after her concert debut, she is a true master of her instrument. “There are an enormous number of possibilities that you can think of in terms of color,” composer and pianist Jake Heggie said of writing flute parts. Heggie composed two of the works that he and Wincenc performed at the concert. “Carol

November 17, 2009 | City Arts

InBrief

Herbert Benkel

Flutist Carol Wincenc celebrated 40 years of performing at Merkin Hall.

is relentlessly inquisitive about how best to bring out my intentions as a composer.” Wincenc and Heggie possessed sparkling chemistry on stage. Wincenc gracefully realized the fantastical, theatrical elements of Heggie’s compositions. “There is an extraordinary exchange that occurs between the creator and the one who is recreating,” Wincenc said of collaborating with living composers. “It’s like watching the baby being born.” Wincenc on ﬂute and Heggie on piano joined mezzo soprano Elise Quagliata in a mesmerizing performance of Heggie’s composition “Deepest Desire: Four Meditations on Love,” a song cycle based on Heggie’s 2000 opera, Dead Man Walking. The opera is based on the seminal 1993 nonﬁction book, Dead Man Walking, in which author Sister Helen Prejean speaks out against the death penalty. The musicians poignantly underscored the piece’s haunting melodies with lyricism and clear articulation. Never overpowering each other, the vocalist and pianist formed a seamless musical dialogue with Wincenc. Quagliata used Heggie’s intended technique of word painting, a correlation of musical motifs with lyrics, by illuminating the

angst of her character during the dissonant passages. Quagliata created an exquisitely dreamy atmosphere at the end of song four, “Primary Colors,” when she softly sang, “I fall instantly to sleep.” Quagliata felt honored to be performing with Wincenc for the first time. “Carol is an incredibly empathetic performer,” Quagliata said. “She’s extremely soulful and she makes beautiful colors with her instrument.” Wincenc displayed her fingerwork and appassionato in the arresting world-premiere performance Heggie’s “Fury of Light,” based on contemporary American writer Mary Oliver’s poem, “Sunrise.” Interwoven in the three-part piece are enchanting melodic refrains that mimic passages from Debussy or Ravel. Heggie performed the delicate, colorful ripples of his ascending and descending piano passages with the soulfulness that he conveys in his writing of the music. Wincenc and Heggie engaged in tight counterpart during section two, which rhythmically and harmonically resembled Pachelbel’s Canon in D. The duo’s fine phrasing and articulation enhanced the dramatic final section, which included a short, disquieting solo

by Wincenc. At the end of the piece, Heggie and Wincenc exchanged a friendly glance, and the crowd greeted them with warm applause. “She’s just brimming over with passion,” Quagliata said of Wincenc. “It’s nice to have fiery personalities to connect with and then you just make fire.” Composer George Crumb’s “Voice of the Whale,” the final performance of the evening, showcased Wincenc’s facility with experimental music. Wincenc gracefully executed Crumb’s challenging instructions of flutter-tonguing, harmonics and glissando. Wincenc teaches flute and chamber music at the Juilliard School and at Stony Brook University on Long Island. Among her many accomplishments, the flutist was nominated for a Grammy Award for a 2005 recording of works by Pulitzer Prize-winning contemporary composer Yehudi Wyner. (Aline Reynolds)

Teenage Blues Graham Whitford was 13 when he fell in love with the blues. His father, Aerosmith guitarist Brad Whitford, played him a Stevie Ray Vaughan record and now, ﬁve years later, Whitford no longer considers what he feels for the blues love, but a full-blown addiction. “I can’t go more than a day without playing guitar,” he said over the phone from Los Angeles. It’s his crazy love affair with the blues that landed Whitford in L.A. for Guitar Center’s King of Blues competition, a national search for the country’s best undiscovered blues guitarist. (The contest took place Nov. 12 and Whitford did not win.) “This competition has given me a chance to be my own musician and do my own

thing,” he explained. That means delivering guitar solos worthy of a place in the competition finals and the respect of legendary blues musicians. “At the store finals in Manhattan, one of the judges was a blues player named Popa Chubby,” he said. “He loved my playing so much he invited me to play with him at B.B. Kings. We played [the Jimi Hendrix song] ‘Red House.’ It was very unexpected.” Playing with Chubby was unexpected, but it wasn’t the first time that Whitford’s guitar skills had landed him on stage. “One time when I was out in California, I was on the stage while [Aerosmith] was sound checking, noodling around on my dad’s guitar, and Steven Tyler invited me to play a song with them. I went out and played ‘Last Child,’ which was actually a song my dad wrote. That was kind of the thing that put me really over the edge, knowing that’s what I want to do every night.” Playing every night is still a future goal for the senior at Elisabeth Irwin High School, who has to balance his time playing guitar with doing homework. After graduation, he plans to trade school for the stage like his musical influences: Vaughn, Hendrix, Albert, B.B. and Freddie King, Eric Clapton, Joe Bonamassa and John Mayer. “For about 11 years I actually played the drums before I ever picked up the guitar,” he recalled. “When I moved to New York City [at 13], drums became a really inconvenient thing. The guitar became the thing I could just pick up while I was in my room and just noodle around on. It just evolved and evolved exponentially. I’ve always loved music. I’ve always known it was what I wanted to do with my life. For a while I thought I was going to be a drummer, but I ended up being a guitar player.” (Jordan Galloway)

Barnaby Conrad III

November 19, 2009 – January 16, 2010

A Special Exhibition at

M. Sutherland Fine Arts, Ltd. 55 East 80th Street, Second ﬂoor New York, New York 10021 | 212-249-0428 | info@msutherland.com Gallery Hours: Nov 19-25th, 12-5 pm; otherwise by appointment

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

2009, Oil on canvas, 60 x 48 inches

Life Aquatic

DANCE

Splendid Isolation BY JOEL LOBENTHAL Talk about going back to the source: The 92nd Street Young Men’s Hebrew Association 75th-anniversary Gala earlier this month featured works by great modern dance choreographers and performers who danced, taught or gave their first concert there. The Y’s concert hall stage is not built with dance in mind, since it’s smaller than ideal. But when a dance program was first developed a few years after the building went up, oddly enough, the then-director of education, William Kolodney, initially turned to the ballet world’s Mikhail Fokine, who wasn’t interested. After that, the aesthetic mandate changed, and the Y almost immediately became a force to be reckoned with—perhaps the most prestigious venue for modern dance in Manhattan. At the gala, works performed from these years included Martha Graham’s solo Frontier, created in 1935 and now performed by the Graham company’s Blakely White-McGuire. The music by Graham’s music director, Louis Horst, is a puckish call to arms. The dancer executes sequences of repeated steps, buoyant assertions, small sprightly jumps with the legs flying untrammeled into the air. It’s just as direct as it sounds, and yet not condescendingly so. The dancer silhouettes herself against a horizontal element that is dolmen, a horizon line, ballet barre; she is aligned with a vast sweeping vista, a historical panorama. Another highlight was Doris Humphrey’s 1931 Two Ecstatic Themes: “Circular Descent,” followed by “Pointed Ascent.” Humphrey directed the Y’s dance program in the 1940s and ’50s. Her works are less frequently performed now but in her day she was an influence comparable to Graham. Danced by Lauren Naslund, Two Ecstatic Themes is an archetypal expression of the movement studies, the unadorned formalism of much of modern dance’s focus during these years. Emotional ramifications are spun out of Humphrey’s fall and recovery technique. The 1930s work of choreographers like Graham and Humphrey was a rebuke to what they considered the fluffiness of ballet and the commercial dictates of vaudeville and musical comedy. But Katherine Dunham had one foot in academia, one in the traditions of folk and ethnic dance and a third and equally stable footing in the nitty-gritty of American vaudeville and revue. Dunham made her New York debut here at the Y back in 1937, and her work was represented at the Gala by 1941’s Los Indios, in which two load-bearing women of the Andes enjoy meeting or dreaming about a frolicking Pan. The opportunities that the Y gave to black dancers were also manifested by the inclusion of

Alvin Ailey’s Revelations, which received its ﬁrst performance here in 1960. Naturally enough, the great moderns who had dominated the Y for so long did not want to give round to the entirely different deﬂationary strokes of the post-modern choreographers of the 1960s. Rapprochement, however, has by now long been effected and

Shahpar Nili

The 92nd Street Y continues its influence on modern dance

Deborah Lohse, Monica Bill Barnes and Anna Bass in Another Parade different lines of descent were evident in the Gala. A prelude to the onstage-program

was Mark Dendy’s Ydance, made especially for the occasion and for the site. Dancers were stationed throughout the lobbies as the audience arrived, performing tasks that made them something more than tableau vivant. The space was restricted, and so you kept wanting not to get in their way. So little dance is now performed on the East Side that the 92nd Street Y exists in something of a position of splendid isolation. Removed from the dance concentrations of Downtown and the West Side, it reminds us once more of the beneﬁts of urban decentralization. Its anniversary celebration continues all season.

“A once-in-a-lifetime event” —New York Times

Through January 10

ART OF THE SAMURAI Japanese Arms and Armor, 1156–1868

metmuseum.org The exhibition is made possible by The Yomiuri Shimbun. Additional support is provided by The Jessica E. Smith and Kevin R. Brine Charitable Trust, the J.C.C. Fund, the Oceanic Heritage Foundation, and the Japan Foundation. Transportation assistance was provided by Japan Airlines. The exhibition was organized by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, the Agency for Cultural Affairs of the Government of Japan, and the Tokyo National Museum. It is supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities. Portrait of Honda Tadakatsu (detail), Edo Period, 17th century, hanging scroll. Private Collection.

November 17, 2009 | City Arts

JAZZ

Your Huckleberry Friend The quantity of Mercer is not strained. BY WILL FRIEDWALD The Johnny Mercer Centennial is well-nigh upon us (arriving Nov. 18), and thus far, I have experienced at least half a dozen cabaret shows and concerts, several new CDs and, at long last, the complete book of his lyrics—not to mention a distractingly frenetic documentary produced by Clint Eastwood. At this point, I’m surprised there isn’t a Facebook-style Johnny Mercer site where social networkers are encouraged to “huckleberry friend” each other. Yet instead of feeling Mercered to death, my reaction is precisely the opposite: It’s impossible to get enough of his songs. Best known as lyricist for “Moon River,” Mercer’s lyrics are as consistently recognizable as the work of the same poet (no less than Shakespeare’s sonnets). The lyricist collaborated with such a vast panoply of different composers and worked in so many different eras of American pop, that different singers can bring entirely different aspects of his songs to the fore. The Centennial Celebrations include highproﬁle presentations from three headlining divas in the city’s major cabaret rooms. Marilyn Maye’s mid-October run at the Metropolitan Room (she had actually already done a completely different all-Mercer set there in the spring) was, like the lady herself, bigger than life: funny, funny, funny and incredibly hard swinging. She came on with the rarely revived “Have You Got Any Castles,” forgot the words, but had us all tapping our feet (a rare sensation in cabaret) and convulsed with laughter. When Andrea Marcovicci debuts in “Skylark: Marcovicci Sings Mercer” Nov. 17 at The Oak Room (Hotel Algonquin), it’s a safe bet that

her interpretations will be by turns irrepressibly perky and wistfully romantic. In a six-night run at Feinstein’s at The Regency a couple weeks ago, Mary Cleere Haran celebrated an entirely different facet of that old Mercer magic. In songs like “When the World Was Young” and “It’s a Great Big World,” Haran stressed the introverted, even melancholy side of the huckleberry poet. As is her tradition, she loads her patter with tons of biography and autobiography, interweaving tales of the songwriter’s Savannah childhood with that of her own Catholic school upbringing, and just when you think a particular story is merely rambling, like a moon river—winding aimlessly through moon country—all of a sudden it gets somewhere. In this way, she demonstrates how the train whistles Mercer and his mother heard in the Georgia backwoods later became key icons of songs like “Blues in the Night” and “On The Atchison, Topeka and The Sante Fe.” After 20 years of these high-concept productions, Haran has grown increasingly Auntie Mame-like. This show was excessively interactive (she continually interrupted the proceedings for feedback from her audience of “well-heeled Friday night sophisticates”), so much so that she only did 11 songs in 90 minutes. Still, I could listen to her talk about Johnny Mercer and sing his songs (when she gets around to them) all night. Neither Maye, nor Marcovicci, nor Haran has produced a recording of their Mercer presentations, but there are two new 100th anniversary albums that are well worth hearing. The Turner Classic Movies cable channel has released a CD in conjunction with the Clint Eastwood documentary Johnny Mercer: The

Come Sunday Marjorie Eliot preserves the Harlem jazz scene—in her parlor BY LARA PELLEGRINELLI We live in the undisputed capital of the jazz world, it’s easy to forget that there’s a local scene. Internationally renowned hotshots overshadow the hardworking rank-and-ﬁle, ﬁercely accomplished musicians by any other standard. Fans and tourists alike get shoehorned into clubs where they pay top dollar. But it’s hard to get a buzz off of the bands—or the martinis. A trip to Harlem could be the way to spark a love for homegrown jazz without burning through the contents of your wallet. The longrunning Monday night session at St. Nick’s Pub brings out enthusiastic regulars both on and off the bandstand. Then there’s Seleno Clark’s lesser-known Hammond B-3 jam at the American Legion Post (Col. Charles

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

Young #398) every Sunday, a rite of passage for young organ players. Even further off the beaten path are the jazz parlor concerts hosted by Marjorie Eliot at her Edgecombe Avenue home. Eliot started the Sunday afternoon ritual to honor her son Phillip, who died from kidney disease. “I was out of my mind that ﬁrst year,” Eliot explained. “It was do something or go crazy.” The initial gathering took place on the lawn across the street at the Morris-Jumel Mansion—where she still programs a summer festival every August—and it became a regular event when it moved to her 200-square-foot living room. Now, 18 years later, she still never misses a week. Eliot has been honored by City

Dream’s On Me, and, thankfully, unlike in the ﬁlm itself, the performances on the album are heard in their entirety and not chopped into frustratingly tiny bits. The Dream’s on Me album further illustrates Mercer’s diversity with a varied and copacetic mix of classic and contemporary performers, including Barbra Streisand, Bobby Darin and Tony Bennett, alongside Bono and Queen Latifah, as well as junior league standardbearers like Maude Maggart and Jamie Cullum. Mercer songs continue to proliferate on current albums irrespective of the big birthday. One of the best old-school, straight-down-themiddle jazz club singers, Jackie Ryan (who will appear at Birdland Dec. 1), includes “Midnight Sun” on her new double-CD, Doozy. Her treatment of Mercer and Sonny Burke’s arctic romance is surprisingly tropical, quite warm enough to melt the polar icecaps (and totally piss off Al Gore). Where Ryan is original recipe, newcomer Kat Edmonson (who was at Jazz Standard Nov. 11) is extra crispy in the extreme. Her voice, which is similar to some contemporary pop acts but rather unique in jazz and standards, is irritating yet engaging. Both her singing itself, which is detached from the words or emotion of her lyrics, and her arrangements, are highly spaced out and sparse. Her reinterpretation of Mercer and Henry Mancini’s classic waltz “Charade” is highly original, pivoting around tom-toms and bass clarinet. The most notable product of the occasion is pianist-singer Daryl Sherman’s current album, Johnny Mercer: A Centennial Tribute. It’s also the most festive: The program unfolds like an all-star concert, with no shortage of guest stars, notably trombonist-singer Wycliffe Gordon (who Lore as a “neighborhood landmark.” Eliot’s Sugar Hill address has always kept her in good company. Known as the “Triple Nickel,” 555 Edgecombe was once the elegant home of boxer Joe Louis, Justice Thurgood Marshall, folk singer Paul Robeson and saxophonist Johnny Hodges. Eliot grew up in Philadelphia but came to visit her great-uncle who lived in the building when she was a little girl. Bandleader Andy Kirk still lived upstairs when she moved in some 27 years ago. “When Nat King Cole came to town, he couldn’t stay in the hotels where he was playing, so he would stay with Andrew [Kirk]. They’d have jam sessions up there all the time. There were concerts under that Tiffany glass ceiling in the lobby,” she explained. “Andrew’s wife, Mary, was my children’s ﬁrst piano teacher and Charlie Parker’s.” Eliot’s son Rudel Drears, whose father is drummer Al Drears, plays at the jazz parlor most weekends. It’s not the kind of place that attracts

Daryl Sherman performs Nov. 18 at 92nd St. Y. joins her in “The Bathtub Ran Over Again”— splish, splash!) and pianist Barbara Carroll (who plays beautiful chords behind Sherman on “I Thought About You”). This is also a party for song scholars in that she’s included a number of rare Mercer songs both early (the nursery rhyme variation “Peter Piper”) and late (“Little Ingenue”). The playing and singing of Sherman, who performed two of these songs in October at the Cabaret Convention (and will likely do so again at 92nd Street Y’s Mercer concert, on the actual birthday, Nov. 18), are eternally incandescent. As the album approaches its conclusion, the songs start getting darker and moodier, with three rather surreal texts about things not being what they seem: “Charade” (not as far out as Edmonson’s but no less effective), “Dream” and the jewel of the album, “Twilight World.” This 1971 rara avis was written by Mercer to a melody by Marian McPartland, who accompanies Sherman here. Heard together, they seem to suggest the state of reality gradually slipping away into an alcoholic haze. Johnny Mercer knew all about that, too. trendy talent or musicians who thrive on bench-pressing chord changes. Eliot’s crew, which includes herself on piano, tends to have a more modest approach, but it’s impossible to feel disconnected when the music is performed so personally among friends and well-wishers. (Also trained as an actress, Eliot appeared in original cast for Charles Gordone’s No Place to Be Somebody, the ﬁrst play by an African American to win the Pulitzer.) “The club scene has changed,” Eliot observed. “Everybody is ﬁghting for the same dollar. I think those of us who really care about jazz must foster the truth of it—what it is, its origins, what has happened to it. It cannot be about real estate, tall buildings where you’re paying all of this money and something else is going on.” Sundays at Marjorie Eliot’s Parlor Entertainment, 555 Edgecombe Ave., Apt. 3F (at W. 160th St.), 212-781-6595; 4, Free.

The Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra

MARSALIS from page 1 notably a seven-disc box of his septet Live at the Village Vanguard, the three-disc Blood on the Fields oratorio which won him the 1997 Pulitzer (first for any jazz musician), the two-CD Citi Movement and two-CD All Rise. He has also appeared in countless Jazz at Lincoln Center video shoots and Jazz from Lincoln Center radio programs (full disclosure: I’ve interviewed him and written scripts for that series). His latest projects are Willie Nelson and Wynton Marsalis Play the Music of Ray Charles (his second DVD with Nelson in performance at Lincoln Center, featuring Norah Jones in a guest spot); Blues Symphony, selected movements of which will be premiered by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Nov. 19-22 (the complete work has been scheduled for the ASO’s annual King Celebration at Morehouse College on Jan. 14, 2010), and his Christmas Jazz Jam, sold exclusively in Target stores and via iTunes. I first heard Wynton live Sept. 2, 1981, at the Chicago Jazz Festival, in pianist Herbie Hancock’s stellar quartet with bassist Ron Carter and drummer Tony Williams. As I dimly recall, Wynton was an 18-year-old in full possession of fine chops, able to hold his own in the company of his hip elders, already a powerful voice. There was nothing compromised about what he played; he addressed complicated melodies without faltering and explored them in solos appropriate to the 25year-old conventions of hard bop. Columbia issued both Hancock’s Quartet featuring Wynton and Wynton’s eponymous debut album in 1981. Two more records followed in ’82, including Fathers and Sons, which informed listeners that Wynton’s dad, Ellis Marsalis, was a respected modern jazz pianist based in dismissive New Orleans, and put forth Branford as a worthy tenor sax contender. But Wynton really scored with his 1983 releases Think of One (named after a Thelonious Monk composition) and Trumpet Concerts (Haydn, Mozart, Hummel). In ’84 those albums snared him two Grammys, for Best Jazz Instrumental Solo and Best Instrumental Soloist Performance, respec-

tively. The first musician ever to be rewarded for both jazz and classical performances, Wynton Marsalis, at age 22, was all set. Handsome, smart, outspoken and welldressed (he reinstated the business suit as onstage attire-of-choice), Wynton was the allbut-anointed leader of a jazz movement dubbed the Young Lions right around the same time Ronald Reagan was named Time Magazine’s Man of the Year and announced he’d seek reelection. His crisp, boldly conservative attitude (Wynton’s) about the need to re-affirm the basic values of acoustic jazz reflected a strain of American thought that was believed as far as black music went; Marvin Gaye’s Midnight Love, Michael Jackson’s Thriller, Prince’s Purple Rain and certainly Ice-T’s gangsta rap “Killers” went a bit too far. In jazz, first-generation fusion bands had run their course, and up-and-coming talents like saxophonist David Murray were tarred as avant-gardists—even when they joined established icons such as Ornette Coleman in re-emphasizing tunefulness and a strong beat. Wynton did that, sort of, but while wearing a tie and sweating a lot less. There was little argument with his technical musicianship 25 years ago, nor can there be much now. He quickly proved to be a consistently gifted instrumentalist, capable of fantastically polished execution. He can play fast and hard, soft and slow or high and tight, serving both the tradition he admires of jazz based in blues, ballads and swing, and his personal style that complicates old-school stop-times and compound rhythms, and analyzes the kinks and curlicues of twisting bebop themes. He has mastered the arcane use of mutes and vocalization of sounds, and creates spontaneous extensions of familiar themes with implacable narrative logic. I remember a single chorus of “Embraceable You” he played unaccompanied as an encore at Lincoln Center once as one of the most concise and affecting statements in my listening experience. He has persuasively interpreted Jelly Roll Morton tunes and Monk’s music, Coltrane modalism and even Coleman harmolodics, demonstrating finesse beyond his personal preferences. From the start of his career to this day,

Wynton has practiced small group improvisation with like-minded collaborators in formats that are challenging and have as many implications off the bandstand as on it. In early albums such as J Mood and Black Codes (From the Underground), he asserted a virtuosity that had upwardly mobile signiﬁcations for race-sensitive cats. If you claimed you played jazz, you had to prove yourself on Wynton’s terms—which would be easier to do if you were a brother or adopted member of the club (his predecessors, including Blakey, Max Roach, Charles Mingus and Miles, had sometimes expressed the same opinion). He let his impatience with rap, hiphop and neo-soul be known because he is convinced of the superiority of acoustic jazz and wants you to be, too. He positioned jazz as the music of romance. From his 1984 standards-with-strings album Hot House Flowers through 1990’s Resolution of Romance and 2004’s The Magic Hour to this year’s He and She, he has turned his sound to the challenges and pleasures of interpersonal relationships. If his frameworks sometimes seem over-precious, his heart is in a nice place. Then, too, he is also a big band leader who values ensemble cohesion and historical accuracy, an approach that has ups and downs. The Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, at his direction, has revived many works of merit from decades past, but has not been able to develop a compelling oeuvre of its own or graduate many musicians from its ranks into gratifying careers. Maybe that’s impossible, as there are so few Wyntons. Where Wynton stumbles worst, however, is when he goes after big game with unrelieved earnestness or indulges a fantasy of childhood that’s stuck on cute. He’s one of a half-dozen of the world’s greatest trumpet players in the jazz tradition, but he hasn’t yet demonstrated a comparable skill for large-scale composition, Pulitzer Prize notwithstanding. I heard Blood on the Fields in performance at Lincoln Center in 1994, and there were high points in his songs for vocalists Cassandra Wilson, Miles Grifﬁth and Jon Hendricks (try “Lady’s Lament,” “My Soul Fell Down,” “I

Hold Out My Hand,” “Look and See” and “Follow the Drinking Gourd”), as well as for the LCJO (“The Market Place,” “Flying High” “God Don’t Like Ugly,” “Back To Basics”). But these didn’t justify the three-and-half-hour length, the conceit of orchestra musicians serving as a Greek chorus, the muddiness of the book or the musical anachronisms (I know it was supposed to be historical drama, but still). Wynton’s awfully literal, twinkly renditions of Christmas tunes, albums devoted to Vince Guaraldi’s “Peanuts” themes and attempts to show that he can rap as well as anyone are hard to swallow, I find, or just fall flat. I remain immune to the charms of All Rise, mounted to hail the turn of the millennium but striking me as anything but festive, a bloated bore. I will not go to hear anything he does with programmatic religious overtones and hold but slight hopes for Blues Symphony. See videos Wynton posted on Facebook for his explanation and piano demonstrations of its seven movements: “Every movement uses the blues form as its basis, and each movement has a specific sound and historic period, dealing with things that exist in American folklore and Afro-American mythology,” he says. Could the music be inspired? Wynton’s writing shines when he is truly lighthearted and bounces off other’s creative endeavors. Tune In Tomorrow, his soundtrack for the uneven 1990 comedy of the same name, is witty and pretty, indebted to Ellington but moving beyond that Great Man. The Marciac Suite is an inviting tribute to a French jazz fest where he feels at home. “Citi Movement,” composed for Garth Fagan’s ballet Griot New York, is my favorite of Wynton’s expansive works, adapting some of Mingus’ jazz bravura to evoke the hustle of our town. Wynton’s in-concert albums are good, too—Live at the House of Tribes comprises typical jazz fare, but the band plays with fire and life. That’s how le Chevalier sounded in the marble halls, proud but not self-conscious, spontaneous and not taking the bestowed title too seriously. Honors can be as weighty as responsibilities. Jazz shrugs at them both. With or without props, Wynton Marsalis stands tall. November 3 , 2009 | City Arts

JAZZ

Think Free Bassist Ben Allison continues to improvise and think like a rock star BY SABY REYES-KULKARNI “Monk called it ‘ugly beauty,’” explained bassist Ben Allison, referring to the imperfection he aims for in his composition style. “He talked about a beautiful painting being hung crooked on the wall. Hopefully, that aesthetic permeates everything I do, because it’s something I think a lot about.” Allison may favor Thelonius Monk’s painting analogy, but listeners might be hardpressed to ﬁnd such blemishes or quirks on any of his nine albums as a leader, the latest, Think Free, released last month. If Allison does, in fact, seek Monk’s “crookedness,” he does so with a distinct lack of angularity. “Chick Corea is noted for putting accents all over the place,” Allison said, explaining his work from the opposite angle, “where they drive the music but they also interrupt it for a hiccup-y kind of sound. Imagine a wheel with a spoke missing, where everybody goes [makes hiccup sound] together. For me, when I sit down to write music like that, it feels contrived. It’s unconvincing when I do it.” On a typical Allison composition, various instruments might diverge in rhythm as they approach, veer away from or swerve around a melodic theme. But he is able to mesh the

complexities together so that they sound cohesive—not to mention accessible. Allison and Palmetto Records founder Matt Balitsaris—who has put out Allison’s last eight albums and has also re-issued his debut—like to mix his recordings as if they’re making rock albums. To be fair, there’s little chance of mistaking any of Allison’s work for Zeppelin or Cream. For that matter, crossover-minded, quasi-jazz groups like the Bad Plus or Medeski, Martin & Wood sound way more bombastic. Allison and Balitsaris prefer a more discreet approach to their appropriation of rock production values. But the results they achieve arguably sound more lively than typical modern jazz fare. “For some people, my music would be overly simplistic,” he said. “For others, it would be quite dense and impenetrable. People have different capacities for complexity. When I ﬁrst started drinking whiskey, for instance, I was quite easy to please. I just liked it all. And then, as the years went on, I started noticing subtle things and really delving into those subtleties. With music, I try to ﬁnd a balance.” Born in 1966, Allison was initially drawn to rock music before he discovered jazz. Like so many others who followed a similar path, his work has been energized by a re-discovery

Lost and Found Remembering why Gotham’s jazz spaces deserve more respect BY DAVID FREELAND As a spiritual force, jazz—the most distinctive of American art forms—was nurtured within Gotham’s heady mixture of artistic openness and commercial exigency. Billie Holiday, Willie “the Lion” Smith, Carmen McRae, Erroll Garner and so many others gave of their talents unreservedly, New York, however, has done little to honor its jazz spaces. Rather than being incidental, the places where these artists performed—Tenderloin joints like the Douglass Club in the 1910s, Harlem speakeasies during Prohibition (Pod’s and Jerry’s, Tillie’s Chicken Shack), West 52nd Street hotspots of the 1930s and ’40s (Leon & Eddie’s, the Famous Door), and the intellectual hives associated with bebop (Minton’s, The Royal Roost)—played an important role in shaping jazz as a social music. When human, interpersonal boundaries came down, through the dynamics created within these jazz spaces, artistic ones were free to follow. This point came home to me one day in 2007, when I toured the devastated remains of

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

the old Nest Club on West 133rd Street. Having opened in 1923, the Nest became a seminal jazz emporium, home to inﬂuential bandleaders such as Luis Russell and Sam Wooding; a place where white and black audience members mixed indiscriminately. African-American owned, dodging liquor laws with the help of police protection, the Nest offered an alternative to the Cotton Club and other segregated nightspots that characterized 1920s Harlem. But what impressed me that summer afternoon was how the physical space itself, its compactness—with dancers, performers and tipsy revelers all sharing a room no larger than most studio apartments— must have fed and inspired the art created there. In that moment it was impossible for me, examining the stamp-sized ﬂoor, to dissociate music from place. One seemed to spring out of the other. How would jazz, the most elastic and experimental of musical forms, have developed without the freedom inculcated in sites like these? This is why a consideration of place is so important when looking at the city’s jazz history; it offers an opportunity to appreciate the qualities

Ben Allison of rock’s seemingly primitive expression base. Up until Think Free, Allison’s albums regularly featured a recurring cast of elite jazz peers, including Michael Blake, Mike Sarin, Ted Nash, Jeff Ballard, Frank Kimbrough and trumpet player Ron Horton. “Rock musicians don’t feel this need to change their language or vocabulary every couple of beats,” Allison explained. “There’s periods in the history of jazz where that’s true also, like with swing. But then there was an explosion of creativity in the music. In the process, it got very diffuse and abstract.” Still, Allison’s group of mainstays showed a remarkable, almost greasy, ﬂexibility. More than the literal vocabulary of rock, they were able to harness its energy and vitality. And, by the time guitarist Steve Cardenas came into the fold for 2006’s Cowboy Justice, Allison’s band was able to

that we as New Yorkers—our warmth, spirit and open-mindedness—have brought to our public spaces, and how those same qualities have inspired the creation of great art. If we can acknowledge the value of investigating the physical remnants of our jazz culture, we must also admit that tracing those remnants is difﬁcult in an ever-changing city. The Nest, the original Birdland at 52nd and Broadway, even the ancient Douglass Club on West 28th Street, have survived the depredations of modern development (especially remarkable, considering all reside in neighborhoods that have been hit hard by the wrecking ball in recent decades), but one must know something about them in order to ﬁnd them. Cavalier in the treatment of its history, as if embarrassed by the guts and spunk of those who have spent themselves here, the city offers no easy rubric for the appreciation of our collective jazz culture, few markers to guide us through the vestiges of what was. It has been my belief that old buildings, however debilitated, possess the resources to speak to us in some way, to offer up a small shaving off their accreted humanity. Looking forward, how will our current jazz spaces be perceived by future generations? What will our descendants learn about the New York jazz world as it exists in 2009? Jazz in the modern era has become

change gears with the precision of a progressive rock band, the free-form grace of a small jazz ensemble, and the sweet succinctness of pop. “If you think about all the tunes that John Lennon and Neil Young ever wrote,” he said, “they use simple harmonies, a handful of chord changes, and simple melodies that land on key parts of the chord. And yet, I like listening to them a lot and can listen to them many times and get something new each time. Why is that?” For Think Free, which essentially grew out of violinist Jenny Scheinman’s weekly residence at the Park Slope nightclub Barbès, Allison pushes even further toward simplicity. Nonetheless, jazz fans can still sink their teeth into Allison’s forward-thinking approach to improvisation, where he and the band eschew solos in favor of improvising whole arrangements. “I would love to hear a group improvise a tune that sounds like a Carpenters recording,” he said. Allison may get what he wished for at his group’s next appearance, where they will be forced both to keep things simple and to improvise arrangements as they play the music of Neil Young. “I’m pretty irreverent when I deal with other people’s music,” he said, laughing. “But good stuff comes from putting yourself in a hole and forcing yourself to dig your way out.” Ben Allison Band performs Nov. 30 at American Folk Art Museum, 2 Lincoln Sq. (at Columbus Ave.), 212-595-9533; 6:30 & 7:30, Free.

thoroughly institutionalized. It has also lost much of its sense of fun. Long ago, jazz was considered good-time music. My guess is that more New Yorkers don’t frequent jazz clubs today precisely because they offer so little in the way of entertainment. The artists onstage treat patrons with disregard; in the wake of 1950s cool, it became bad form to interact with the audience. The spaces themselves can be uncomfortable. Decades ago the clubs of West 52nd Street were derided by jazz purists as tourist traps. With their various cover charges and minimums, these spots were viewed as little more than clip joints. That tradition continues today in the form of spots like the Blue Note, where customers (after paying a high music fee) are racked into iron maidens of chairs and hustled through all-too-brief sets. In this case, physical closeness only breeds irritation. Jazz at Lincoln Center’s elegant Allen Room offers a pleasant contrast, with sweeping views of the city. But ticket prices are out of the range of what many New Yorkers can afford. Fortunately, there are smaller, more informal clubs—along with organizations such as Jazzmobile, which emphasizes the oneness of community through free performances in neighborhood streets. Whatever form its spaces take in years to come, New York jazz will remain, without a doubt, a force to bring us together.

Photo by Basil Childers

“...a suite of ensemble dances or love duets of such natural purity that the audience is moved to roars, or simply moved. “ Anna Kisselgoff NY TImes

Congratulations to Maestro Wynton Marsalis Legion of Honor Award Recipient We knew of his brilliance and exceptional talent a long time ago, even before GRIOT NEW YORK.

Photo by Frank Stewart

“Nuff” love and respect, Garth and Garth Fagan Dance

AttheGALLERIES

“The Italian Comedians” by Antoine Watteau

Watteau, Music and Theater It’s art’s dirty little secret: All of painting— traditional or cutting-edge—is artifice. Of course, great artists found powerful means of expression within the artifice, and the paradoxes of this process make for some of the most intriguing moments of art: Mondrian uncovering exuberance in a straitened style; Rembrandt imparting tremendous gravity to sentimental subjects. Rarely is the disparity between frilly effect and momentous expression more striking than in the work of Antoine Watteau (1684-1721), the subject of the small but radiant exhibition now at the Metropolitan Museum’s European Paintings Gallery. Gathered from numerous museums and collections, the nearly two-dozen paintings and drawings by the French master all depict the actors and musicians connected with fêtes galantes, the popular musical theater of the time. Few painters enjoyed a coquettishly turned neck or the sheen on a patterned shirt as much as Watteau, and no one gave them more conviction. The installation’s first gallery contains eight of Watteau’s chalk sketches of figures—spry, incisive renderings that capture their attitudes with startlingly economic means. The paper’s expanse becomes elastic between the racing contours describing shoulders turning above a torso, or the receding planes of an upturned face. Watteau sorted through piles of such sketches to create the painted compositions in the exhibition’s

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

second and final gallery. If his line has an electric fleetness, his colors fill in with a full-bodied exuberance. The remarkably individualized faces and hands of central figures are matched only by the gleaming detail of their accessories. The artist seems equally roused by and compelled to honor his subjects; as with Bonnard, who once claimed that his motifs overwhelmed him, Watteau holds his subjects safely, admiringly at a vivacious distance. In his wistful images—so willfully realized in a formal sense—the real and fantastic ineluctably blend: landscapes become theater settings, gestures become poses, distinct characters intermingle with more generalized ones, while the stony features of statues—more generic still—stare from the backgrounds. Throughout, his hues impart not so much a natural light as a self-illumination. He boldly divides the composition of the tiny “The Adventuress” into light and dark zones amplifying the central figure’s stance. A guitar player stretches jauntily from the cascading sweep of his own cape; a female listener draws calmly, resolutely away. Details are decorous, yet vital: the tilt of a standing figure’s head is wondrously echoed by her exotic hat, and again by distant treetops; a pocket’s bright lining measures the cape’s flow. All the paintings were titled after the artist’s death. Each, though, imparts a different, specific narrative of forms. A diagonal tumble of arms and heads introduces the main character, Pierrot, in

“Italian Comedians.” The great cleft of background trees in “The Perspective” momentarily isolates a distant woman’s ruff. Two display cases of period musical instruments, some of them intricately decorated, shed light on Watteau’s motifs. A series of paintings by his lesser contemporaries, however, best illustrates the depth of his genius. While Watteau re-creates his subjects with rhythmic authority, they tend to illustrate theirs. The crowds of figures in Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Pater’s “The Fair at Bezons” open around the lone performers with little of Watteau’s luminous urgency. In Nicolas Lancret’s “La Camargo Dancing,” figures lean and trees sway according to stylistic conventions rather than color’s potential to animate. Is this gem of an exhibition—small, focused, choice—a sign of things to come at the Met? If so, we have nothing to fear, at least art-wise, in our financially constrained times. (John Goodrich) Watteau, Music and Theater, through Nov. 29. European Paintings Gallery, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 5th Ave. (at E. 82nd St.), 212-535-7710.

I Love America and America Loves Me Rarely does whimsical work achieve a profound dimension. More often it playfully swims around in our subconscious, allowing us to leave serious matters far behind. So great pleasures abound in Stephen Floyd’s ﬁrst solo exhibition in New York, as his whimsy demands that we reﬂect on our troubling

past and present. In these 60 deceptively innocent drawings, the Texas-born artist covers many current issues—race, sexuality and bigotry among them—with a light and sinister touch. Never didactic, he manages to enchant like a child, while delivering bitter truths. Lining the walls of the gallery, the drawings could as well be a haphazard social history of the United States. One shows six wigwams of varying sizes, outlined in black, on a white background. To the side, a red and white, motel-type sign reads “Americ-inn,” the letters in blue. There are a million ways to represent the country’s maltreatment of Native Americans, but he uses symbols both simple and poignant in a particularly relevant way, by referring to homes being up for rent. This same sensitivity to his subject matter comes through in drawings like “four fish” and “four rivers,” both of them simply words listed on a white background, almost like graffiti. The first reads, in shades of green: “one fish, two fish, gay fish, jew fish,” including in a game groups that are often under attack. Using blue letters in the second, he writes: “euphrates, tigris, thames and danube,” conjuring up associations with Iraq, England and Germany. That the writing looks so graceful only adds to the power of the messages. The show’s title more than hints at Floyd’s ambiguous relationship with his country, as does the work of the same name—a big map of the United States in a mirror image, so the East and

sophistication and heartfelt naiveté. (Mario Naves) Olive Ayhens: Nature/Architecture, through Dec. 23. Frederieke Taylor Gallery 525 W. 22nd St., 6th ﬂoor (betw. 10th & 11th Aves.), 646-230-2992.

Brendan Fowler at Rental

“four ﬁsh” by Stephen Floyd

West Coasts are reversed. He goes further in his condemnation of our heartlessness in three works, just words, but so effective in their simplicity: “We sell cancer,” “I love aids” and “100% real art.” But for all the works’ underlying solemnity, he displays an ingratiating sense of humor, apparent in the amusing “basic panties,” which are just that, green with pink ﬂowers and the friendly, pink dinosaur-like creature, “liccolattapus.” Artists always probe their unconscious, but he seems to invite us into his, welcoming us with all his wild and funny imaginings and dark thoughts and serious concerns, unafraid of our opinion. Such openness pays off in works that are all the more memorable for their honesty. (Valerie Gladstone)

As a popular musician on the performance art circuit, Brendan Fowler is known for writing self-reflexive numbers that scrutinize the acts of songwriting and delivery, kind of like a car enthusiast picking apart a vintage Mustang to see what makes it tick. In his solo debut at Rental, he confirms that his approach to plastic art is much the same. For the show, Fowler has restricted himself to a simple medium: framed posters, violently smashed or screwed together to create jagged sculptures. On one side of the gallery, a series of advertisements for a tour with Fowler’s one-man band, Barr, have been fixed against the wall with the word “Cancelled” stenciled across in red block letters. As explained by a fictional magazine Q&A installed in the bathroom, this functions as the artist’s creation myth: Scheduled to go on the tour, Fowler dropped out at the last minute to focus on his art, a disruptive move that he views as setting him inexorably on his chosen path. (In a second act of cancellation, the posters are on the wall where the artist last displayed work in a group show at the gallery.)

Stephen Floyd: I Love America and America Loves Me, through Dec.18. Heist Gallery, 27 1/2 Essex St. (at Hester St.), 212-253-0451

“Fall 2009 (Flowers Outside Silk Flowers Show in LA 1, Fall 2008 West Coast Tour Poster - C, Flowers on Walk With Andrea/Terry/Cindy 1, 2 Screen Flower Print)” by Brendan Fowler

“Deep Time/Malta” by Olive Ayhens Courtesy of the artist and Frederieke Taylor Gallery, NYC

Olive Ayhens: Nature/Architecture at Frederieke Eccentricity propelled by visionary force goes some way in explaining Olive Ayhens’s oddball exegeses on the confluence of encroaching architecture and nature’s beneficence. A painting of gargantuan frogs inhabiting a glass-box high rise or of notable edifices (including the Empire State Building) blithely ensconced in a mountain landscape hint at eco-political portent, but Ayhens’ sense of caprice is too deep-seated and wideranging to settle for ax-grinding. Instead, she yokes the picturesque to uncanny effect, all the while channeling Florine Stettheimer’s synthesis of abiding

So what does Fowler do with his sculptural work? The best pieces in the show feature posters rammed through other posters at an angle, making appealing, crystal-like structures. Some posters display photos of flowers, age-old signifiers of beauty (and near-misses of the artist’s surname), taken in his mother’s garden; others have an intentionally trite floral print, or photo of Fowler sending a Gmail order to have the print fabricated; still others show the artist’s assistant, Max, making the sturdy frames used in the show. Individually, as recently displayed in a threeperson show at Nicole Klagsbrun, the compositions pop. Together they become a little monotonous, their variations essentially formalistic. But what one really wishes for is more of Max, or of anything outside the works’ hermetic, process-obsessed logic—in other words, for Fowler to sometimes let his focus slip from the task immediately at hand and let the wide world in. (Andrew Goldstein) Brendan Fowler at Rental, through Dec. 6. Rental Gallery, 120 E. Broadway, 6th floor (betw. Pike & Rutgers Sts.), 212-608-6002.

Drawings From The South of France Laurie Fendrich’s suite of black-and-white drawings, on display at Gary Snyder Projects, doesn’t sacrifice structural rigor for flitting, jittery slapstick. If anything, Fendrich’s goofiness is given thematic heft by the deft way she choreographs

“Untitled #4” by Laurie Fendrich

space, motion and iconographic shapes through the patient application of Conté crayons. But that’s always been the way for a painter who channels Seurat and riffs on Malevich even as she nods, gratefully and with stern purpose, to Elmer Fudd. Fans of Fendrich’s luminous brand of geometric abstraction will have their enthusiasm confirmed by the recent work. Her lovingly impure extension of High Modernism—no De-Construction here, thank you very much—continues apace, with all requisite attributes in place: teetering compositions that nonetheless hold firm; a droll synthesis of Utopian geometry and cartoony distortion; fractured and bulbous shapes that take on a jaunty anthropomorphism; and, not least, a meticulous attention to craft. One slip-up with Conté crayons and Fendrich’s crystalline orchestrations of form would come to a smudgy halt. For a draftswoman who prizes the white of the page—there’s not a piece that doesn’t elicit its clarifying light—this must be a challenge, a headache and, when she’s in the zone, a thrill. Fendrich made the 33 drawings during a residency in the South of France—one drawing a day, in fact. Ensconced in the countryside, Fendrich took inspiration from the surrounding landscape and architecture, but what survives in the pictures isn’t a sense of locale so much as spirit: The pictures are tranquil and light-footed, calm, sober and silly. They remind you that one of this artist’s chief strengths is the inability to take herself too seriously. This is where we get to see Fendrich play. (MN) Laurie Fendrich: Drawings From The South of France, through Dec. 19. Gary Snyder Project Space, 250 W. 26th St., 4th floor (betw. 7th & 8th Aves.), 212-929-1351.

Murder in Tehran Siah Armajani’s “Murder in Tehran,” currently on view in the Project Space at Max Protech, is an instance where art and politics effectively mix. The centerpiece is a large installation of what can be perceived as a rooftop uprising in Iran. Directly inspired by the recent presidential elections in Iran, when Ahmadinejad strong-armed his way to power, this installation gives one the chills. Reproducing a corner-block building in Iran, Armajani, born in Iran in 1939, is a longtime citizen of the United States who resides in Minneapolis. Beyond his artwork, he also designed the Irene Hixon Whitney Bridge (a pedestrian walkway in Minneapolis) and a bridge on Staten Island, among other public works. Armajani takes his cue from large-scale works and ﬁlls the room with a structure that includes a shallow grave that includes casts of body parts partially buried under gravel. At the top of the 11-foot-tall structure is a dismembered, persecuted ﬁgure. Embedded on the sides of the building are texts from the poet Ahmad Shamlu. To complement this piece, Armajani has also included seven Goya-inspired pencil drawings of

“Murder in Tehran” by Siah Armajani

brutality, titled “Murder in Tehran (After Goya).” Since this sculpture is so large, being in the same room with it evokes a sense of claustrophobia that Iranians may be feeling these days. The exhibition may not change the world, but Armajani pulls no punches to get his message across. (Joe Bendik) Siah Armajani’s “Murder in Tehran,” through Dec. 23. Max Protech, 511 W. 22nd St. (betw. 10th & 11th Aves.), 212-633-6999.

Dutch New York Between East and West: The World of Margrieta van Varick To help celebrate the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s historic exploration, the Bard Graduate Center has put on view “Dutch New York Between East and West: The World of Margrieta van Varick.” Equal parts history lesson, far-flung cabinet of curiosities and intimate portrait, this exhibition functions as a window onto the cultural and artistic influence of the Dutch on New York City. The structure of the exhibition is smart, and curators Marybeth De Filippis and Deborah L. Krohn should be applauded for thinking outside the box. Using the 1686 probate inventory of Margrieta van Varick as the keystone, two intertwining narratives are told using various period decorative arts objects. The first is of Margrieta, who lived in the eastern Dutch colony of Malacca (present-day Malaysia), moved to Flatbush in 1686, opened a textile shop and put down deep familial roots. The other reflects the extensive network of the Dutch trading colonies in the east—and the variety of goods traded, such as paintings, etchings, textiles, silver, porcelain and furniture—as well as Dutch life under English rule in 17th-century New York. Aside from a handful of the approximately 170 objects on view—such as a rare blue and white Jingdezhen Chinese covered bowl, circa 1620-40, and an egg-shaped mustard pot by Margrieta’s son-in-law, Peter van Dyck, circa 1705-15—most of the works are not blockbuster examples. But that’s not the point, and rightly so, for the accumulated narrative effect of these objects carries more weight. Bard Graduate Center’s continued willingness and ability to mount challenging shows focused on the decorative arts is laudable, and, like Henry Hudson himself, it’s an invaluable asset to New York City’s cultural heritage. (Brice Brown) Dutch New York Between East and West: The World of Margrieta van Varick, through Jan. 3. Bard Graduate Center, 18 W. 86th St. (betw. Central Park West & Columbus Ave.), 212-501-3023.

November 17, 2009 | City Arts

MUSEUMS

Honestly, Abe Another look at the president who keeps on giving BY FRANCIS MORRONE in three New Yorkers was Irish-born) that braham Lincoln stepped off the the end of slavery would spur the northward ferryboat at Cortlandt Street on migration of freed slaves, who would undercut Feb. 25, 1860, after having taken the Irish in the labor market. the train to Jersey City. He walked Yet, as Lincoln and New York makes clear, to his hotel, the Astor House, on New York City was critical to Lincoln’s sucBroadway between cess. The February 1860 Barclay and Vesey visit with which the exhiStreets. This four-day bition begins was the ocvisit was not Lincoln’s casion of Lincoln’s famous first to New York, nor speech at Cooper Union. his last, but it was his New York Republicans most important—and were auditioning potential his longest. This visit presidential nominees, and is also the beginning of Lincoln’s speech catapultthe six-year narrative ed the unprepossessing recounted in Lincoln Illinois lawyer to the head and New York, a large of the list. New York may and wonderful exhibihave been overwhelmingly tion at the New-York a Democratic city, but it Historical Society on was also the national base display through March of the recently formed 25, 2010. Republican Party, whose The 16th presiorgans included such New dent’s relationship to York newspapers as the New York City was Herald, the Evening Post complicated, troubled and fascinating. For and the Times. Herald editor Horace Greeley starters, Lincoln polled less than 35 percent of and Post editor William Cullen Bryant became the New York City vote in the 1860 presidenLincoln boosters following the February tial election and slightly less than that in 1864. speech. In other words, Lincoln scored almost George The exhibition’s chief historian, Harold W. Bush-like numbers in New York. Holzer, tells us—as he did in his excellent The reasons for this were recounted in 2004 book Lincoln at Cooper Union—that the the New-York Historical Society’s superb February 1860 visit was important in several 2006-07 exhibition New York Divided: Slavother ways as well. Lincoln had his portrait ery and the Civil War. The current exhibition made at Mathew Brady’s photographic studio considerably overlaps with that one. But on Broadway at Bleecker Street. The exhibirather than seeming redundant, Lincoln and tion includes a beautiful wet-plate camera New York deepens our understanding of that owned by Brady, as well as the carte de visite most crucial juncture in American—and New The exhibition narrative is clear and York City—history. New York City resi- convincing and excellently illustrated. dents’ distrust and disAs to the last, what finally puts this like of Lincoln stemmed show over the top is its staggering from two factors. One was the city’s extensive aesthetic profusion. commercial ties to the South. (Some historians speculate that at one time as much as 50 cents that Brady’s studio made for Lincoln. The of every dollar of value of Southern cotton acimage of (clean-shaven) Lincoln helped incalcrued to New York City interests.) A civil war, culably to fix in the public mind the character many New Yorkers felt, would, by closing off of the man. The exhibition emphasizes the the lucrative Southern trade, ruin the city’s Lincoln image, as formulated by New York economy. Mayor Fernando Wood, presaging photographers, printmakers, newspapers and Norman Mailer’s mayoral campaign of a cenmagazines, first as the candidate the people tury later, seriously suggested that New York could trust to steer the Union through its City secede from the Union. The other factor crisis, and later as the martyr for the cause of was fear among the city’s vast and desperately union and human freedom. poor Irish immigrant population (in 1855, one Much is also made of the political division

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

in New York between Republican “Loyalists,” who supported and defended Lincoln’s frequently controversial and questionably constitutional policies, and the “Copperhead” Democrats, who distrusted Lincoln and at times felt him to be the devil incarnate. Historical exhibitions require a great deal of explanatory text, and a measure of their success is in how the curators and designers choose to relieve and amplify the text with graphics, multimedia and period objects. In one section of the exhibit, life-size cutouts of leading Loyalists—Frederick Law Olmsted, Henry Bellows, Frederick Douglass and George Templeton Strong—are depicted at an elegant dinner party. On the opposite wall, life-size cutouts of Copperheads—Samuel Tilden, Fernando Wood, August Belmont and Samuel Morse—are shown standing around an actual antique wooden bar. (The bar is beautiful and one wishes its provenance was noted in the exhibition.) These tableaux, however cheesy-sounding, effectively underscore the elitism ascribed to the Loyalists and the populism ascribed to the Copperheads. As in New York Divided, the July 1863 draft riots make a major appearance. Lincoln mandated the draft in his March 1863 Conscription Act. A provision of the act allowed a draftee to buy a $300 exemption. Many laborers earned only $600 a year. New York Irish rampaged for four days through the streets of Manhattan, targeting (and lynching) African Americans, attacking the homes and ofﬁces of Loyalists, and trashing Union symbols (such as Brooks Brothers, manufacturer of Union Army uniforms and tailor to the president). By the end, 120 people had died. A minor cavil I have with the exhibition is that it leaves the visitor with the impression that the draft riots were responsible for increased anti-Irish sentiment in the city, with the establishment and expansion of assimilationist social-services charities, and with increasing upper-class insularity (“insulate,

insulate,” as in the mantra of Tom Wolfe’s Sherman McCoy some 120 years later). Yet all of those trends had formed in the decades—marked by much intermittent civil unrest—leading up to the war. In fact, in the wake of the Civil War New York’s Irish attained considerable political power in the city. The exhibition narrative is clear and convincing and excellently illustrated. As to the last, what finally puts this show over the top is its staggering aesthetic profusion. A gallery is dedicated to images of Lincoln, including oil paintings by Francis P. Carpenter, a New York artist invited in 1864 to live for six months in the White House so he could record its domestic life and state occasions. These paintings include an affecting portrait of the Lincoln family gathered around the dining table. In a section on the Metropolitan and Brooklyn Sanitary fairs of 1864 we find an extraordinary flag designed by the German immigrant artist Emanuel Leutze for Tiffany & Company. Presented at the fair to General John Dix (who had helped put down the draft riots), the flag features a tapestry rendering of the strong, vital, sporting woman—who was coming to symbolize America to the world—in a brilliantly billowing skirt. Leutze (whose “Washington Crossing the Delaware” is a treasure of the Metropolitan Museum of Art) shows up again at the exhibition’s end, with a marvelous oil portrait of Lincoln, made in 1865, shown with the Capitol colonnade behind him. The show begins with Lincoln’s campaign imagemaking and ends with his posthumous image as America’s secular saint. Lincoln and New York shows us, thrillingly, what happens when you place side by side the greatest, most compelling figure of America’s political history and the steam-powered, ever-churning factory of fancies and images that New York had already become. Lincoln and New York runs through March 25, 2010 at the New-York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West (betw. W. 76th & 77th Sts.), 212-873-3400

MoMA’s stunning exhibit of the influential school’s work is a vital source of inspiration

László Moholy-Nagy, “Lichtrequisit einer Elektrischen Bühne” (Light prop for an electric stage). 1930 BY LANCE ESPLUND After milling around the more than 400 works in Bauhaus 1919-1933: Workshops for Modernity, which opened recently at the Museum of Modern Art, I realized that I was not the only person moving in circles—as if in an upscale boutique—within the loosely chronological show. I found myself returning to objects, comparing one thing from late in the exhibit—a textile, a light fixture, a photograph, a piece of furniture or graphic design—to something exhibited earlier. It is not that this exhibition, which covers only 14 years (albeit the most vital, innovative and influential 14 years in Modernism), presents us with huge shifts from beginning to end. Far from it. Instead, the show is familiar, yet oddly distant. It is somewhere between past and present; somewhere among time capsule, museum exhibition and Ikea/Moss showroom floor. The show, which appeals to

our good taste and consumer culture, is of a time—our time. Organized by MoMA newcomers Barry Bergdoll, who joined the museum in 2007 as the Philip Johnson Chief Curator of Architecture and Design, and Leah Dickerman, who became a curator in the department of painting and sculpture in 2008, Bauhaus cuts a broad and elegant path through its subject. And it reminds us—forcefully so—that the Bauhaus, whose chief goal was to make art out of industry, was diverse in both body and spirit. And how could it not be? The German Bauhaus school, under three directors (architects Walter Gropius, Hannes Meyer and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe) and at three locations (Weimar, Dessau and, briefly, Berlin, until the Nazis finally closed its doors for good) brought together some of the greatest 20th-century artists, as faculty members and students, in the fields of painting, sculpture,

architecture, film, photography, textiles, ceramics chrome armatures of Marcel Breuer’s classic and industrial and graphic design. These furniture, but that kind of cross-pollination is include Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Oskar not fully explored in MoMA’s show, where the Schlemmer, Anni Albers, Herbert Bayer and emphasis is on the school’s experimentation, László Moholy-Nagy. But also can be felt the crossing of boundaries and supposed breaks with strong influence of Mondrian, who never taught tradition—the seeds of Postmodernism. at the Bauhaus but whose art and thought made But I suppose we have to take the good a huge impact on the school’s teachers. with the bad. This is an important show The Bauhaus, forging ahead on so many with much to teach us—and much to inspire fronts—from the mystical to the inventive to the us—even if in areas it feels less like a museum practical—was a many-headed creature. And if exhibit and more like a museum gift shop. If anything is a problem in MoMA’s exhibition, it moving through the Bauhaus galleries motivates is that—although experimentation and diversity viewers to comparison shop (I overheard one are all well and good in an art school—that woman, referring to Breuer’s “Club Chair” same eclecticism can tend to clash (not unlike (1925), say to her boyfriend, “I always wanted an end-of-the-year art school show) when all of to get one of those”), then so be it. The show those aesthetic geniuses are reunited. The Bauhaus was This is an important show with a world made up of brilliant and talented individuals. At much to teach us—and much to MoMA, some artists and inspire us—even if in areas it feels objects fare better than others. less like a museum exhibit and This is a gorgeous show filled with gorgeous more like a museum gift shop. things, especially Annie If moving through the Bauhaus Albers’ stunning textiles. galleries motivates viewers to There is something here for comparison shop, then so be it. everyone. I lingered long over a grouping of Paul Klee’s puppets (including a self-portrait), which also inspired an art student, sketchbook in the artist made for his son Felix, whose puppet hand—standing among a superb grouping of theater good-naturedly mocked as it entertained collages by Marianne Brandt, Paul Citroën and Bauhaus students and faculty. And I was thrilled Moholy-Nagy—to remark to her friend that to see Moholy-Nagy’s mechanical contraption these works feel surprisingly contemporary. “Light Prop for an Electric Stage” (1930) and the I am not suggesting that we, or MoMA, recreation of Kandinsky’s Dessau Master House walk backwards. The world moves too fast for dining area, with furniture designed by Gropius. that. But it is good to remember that, if you The exhibition is a breath of fresh Modernist begin with Giotto (the first modern artist), it took air in an institution that, as if increasingly nearly 600 years for the Renaissance to run its embarrassed, has been working overtime course; and I know many artists today who think lately to distance itself from its Modernist as much about Titian and Michelangelo as they beginnings. Perhaps the show suggests a sea do Picasso, Mondrian, Klee and Kandinsky. change at MoMA (no other museum has been Modernism and the Bauhaus is our as influenced by the Bauhaus)—a return to the Renaissance. It is a Renaissance that has just museum’s roots. began. What Bauhaus 1919-1933: Workshops But even here, at the Bauhaus, where for Modernity makes clear is that our supposed MoMA should be most at home, something Modernist past—the one everyone, including feels not quite cozy. And I am not sure if MoMA, works so hard to convince us is dead this is a problem with the subject or with and gone—is as alive and well, as fruitful, as it the installation. ever was. This exhibition, and its unflinching Included in the exhibition is one of my aesthetic rigor, far from being merely a gathering favorite paintings, “Fire in the Evening” (1929) of period memorabilia and artifacts of a has-been by Klee, one of my favorite painters. Yet in this school and movement, is a wellspring. It reminds particular setting, Klee’s picture, along with those us that MoMA, staying close to home, still has by Kandinsky and Moholy-Nagy, fell somewhat a lot of fertile ground to till. It reminds us that flat: Surrounded by all the sleek, sexy furniture, Bauhaus is our house. lamps, photography and graphic design, the show’s paintings feel like accents to the Bauhaus 1919-1933: Workshops for Modernity exhibition’s Modernist-chic-decor environment. through Jan. 25. Museum of Modern Art, 11 W. Klee’s inimitable wiry line inspired the tubular 53rd St. (btw. 5th & 6th Aves.), 212-708-9400. November 17, 2009 | City Arts

ArtsAGENDA OPENINGS

Gallery listings courtesy of

ALEXANDRE GALLERY: Marvin Bileck: “Figurative

Etchings and Illustrations.” Opens Nov. 19. Emily Nelligan: “Recent Drawings.” Opens Nov. 19, 41 E. 57th St., 212-755-2828. BETTY CUNINGHAM GALLERY: Philip Pearlstein and Al Held: “PEARLSTEIN/HELD: Five Decades.” Opens Nov. 19, 541 W. 25th St., 212-242-2772. BRIC ROTUNDA GALLERY: “Revelatory Tension: New Assertions on the Divine Form.” Ends Dec. 18. “Heroism: Artists from the South Asian Women’s Creative Collective.” Opens Mar. 25, 33 Clinton St., Brooklyn, 718-875-4047. CHEIM & READ: Lynda Benglis: “New Work.” Opens Nov. 19, 547 W. 25th St., 212-242-7727. JACK SHAINMAN GALLERY: Richard Mosse. Opens Nov. 19, 513 W. 20th St., 212-645-1701. JEFF BAILEY GALLERY: Jered Sprecher: “Digging In the Dirt.” Opens Nov. 18, 511 W. 25th St., 212-9890156. KATHRYN MARKEL FINE ARTS: Stephen Pentak: “Vertical Landscapes.” Opens Nov. 19, 529 W. 20th St., suite 6W, 212-366-5368. M. SUTHERLAND FINE ARTS, LTD.: Barnaby Conrad III: “Life Aquatic.” Opens Nov. 19, 55 E. 80th St., 212-249-0428. SMACK MELLON: Tracey Snelling: “Woman on the Run.” Opens Nov. 21. Michael Paul Britto: “Society’s Children.” Opens Nov. 21, 92 Plymouth St., Brooklyn, 718-834-8761. SUE SCOTT GALLERY: Paola Ferrario: “Imprevisti/Unforeseen.” Opens Nov. 17, 1 Rivington St., 212-358-8767.

GALLERIES A.I.R. GALLERY: Carolyn Martin: “Unfenced.” Sylvia

Netzer: “Reticulated Forms.” Sarah Blackwelder: “Safe as Houses.” Ends Nov. 29, 111 Front St. #228, Brooklyn, 212-255-6651. AC INSTITUTE: Joseph Farbrook: “Nostalgia for Neverwas.” Ends Nov. 28. Maya Suess: “It It and the Gimme Box.” Ends Nov. 28, 547 W. 27th St., 5th Fl., no phone. ACA GALLERIES: “Eccentrics, Misﬁts and Idealists.” Ends Dec. 5, 529 W. 20th St., 212-206-8080. ALEXANDER GRAY ASSOCIATES: Regina Silveira. Ends Dec. 12, 526 W. 26th St., #1019, 212-399-2636. AMERICAS SOCIETY: Fernell Franco: “Amarrados [Bound].” Ends Dec. 12, 680 Park Ave., 212249-8950. ANA CRISTEA GALLERY: Zsolt Bodoni: “The Foundries of Ideology.” Ends Nov. 21, 521 W. 26th St., 212-904-1100. ANDREA MEISLIN GALLERY: Amy Simon. Ends Dec. 19, 526 W. 26th St., 2nd Fl., 212-627-2552. ANIMAZING GALLERY: “The Art of Stop Motion.” Ends Dec. 31, 54 Greene St., 212-226-7374. APEXART: Avant-Guide to NYC: “Discovering Absence.” Ends Dec. 19, 291 Church St., 212431-5270. ATM GALLERY: Min Kim: “New Works.” Ends Dec. 19, 542 W. 24th St., 212-375-0349. BABCOCK GALLERIES: Alan Gussow: “A Painter’s Nature.” Ends Nov. 25, 724 5th Ave., 212-7671852. BLT GALLERY: Gerald Dearing & Steve Pyke: “Matter of Fact.” Ends Dec. 19, 270 Bowery, 2nd Fl., 212-260-4129. BLUE MOUNTAIN GALLERY: Margaret Leveson: “Artists’ Places.” Ends Nov. 28, 530 W. 25th St., 4th Fl., 646-486-4730. BOWERY GALLERY: Diana Cabouli: “Landscapes.” Ends Nov. 28, 530 W. 25th St., 4th Fl., 646230-6655. BRONX RIVER ART CENTER: “Dialects 1.2.” Ends Dec. 5,

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

1087 Tremont Ave., Bronx, 718-589-5819.

27th St., suite 200, 212-268-4952.

CAUSEY CONTEMPORARY: Steven Dobbin: “Reclama-

FOXY PRODUCTION: Sterling Ruby: “The Masturba-

tion.” Ends Dec. 7, 293 Grand St., Brooklyn, 718-218-8939. CAVIN-MORRIS GALLERY: Lidia Syroka: “Nomadic Bodies.” Tim Rowan: “Stone Ridge Alchemy.” Ends Nov. 28, 210 11th Ave., 212-226-6768. CHC GALLERY: Joshua Gage: “Tragedy in Pop.” Ends Nov. 21, 511 W. 20th St., 212-741-0007. CHERYL MCGINNIS GALLERY: Susan Hamburger: “Moral Hazard.” Ends Dec. 18, 555 8th Ave., suite 710, 212-722-1144. CLAMPART: Luke Smalley: “Sunday Drive.” Ends Dec. 19. Jill Greenberg: “New Bears.” Ends Dec. 19, 521-531 W. 25th St., Ground Fl., 646-2300020. CROSSING ART GALLERY: “The Solid and The Sublime.” Ends Nov. 22, 136-17 39th Ave., Queens, 212-359-4333. CUCHIFRITOS: Benny Andrews and William Villalongo: “Liberty & The Land.” Ends Nov. 28, 120 Essex St., 212-420-9202. D’AMELIO TERRAS: Tony Fehrer: “Blossom.” Ends Dec. 23. Yoshihiro Suda: “Front Room.” Ends Dec. 23, 525 W. 22nd St., 212-352-9460. DANIEL REICH GALLERY: Amir Mogharabi and Jeffrey Perkins: “Entendement.” Ends Dec. 1, 537 W. 23rd St., 212-924-4949. DAVID FINDLAY JR. FINE ART: John Opper 1908-1994. Ends Nov. 28, 41 E. 57th St., 212-486-7660. DAVID NOLAN GALLERY: Ian Hamilton Finlay: “Camouﬂage.” Ends Dec. 12, 527 W. 29th St., 212-925-6190. DAVID ZWIRNER: Dan Flavin: “Series and Progressions.” Ends Dec. 23, 519 W. 19th St., 212-5178677. DC MOORE GALLERY: Jane Wilson: “Recent Paintings.” Ends Dec. 23, 724 5th Ave., 212-247-2111. DEAN PROJECT: “Mirror on Mirror Mirrored.” Ends Nov. 19, 45-43 21st St., Queens, 718-706-1462. DENISE BIBRO FINE ART: Sara Crisp: “Intervals and Circles.” Dec. 19. David Eisenhour: “Biophilia.” Dec. 19, 529 W. 20th St., 4th Fl., 212-647-7030. DEITCH PROJECTS: Kristin Baker: “Splitting Twilight.” Ends Dec. 19, 18 Wooster St., 212-343-7300. DEREK ELLER GALLERY: Dan Fischer: “Unique Forms of Continuity in Space.” Ends Dec. 19, 615 W. 27th St., 212-206-6411. DICKINSON: Alex Hoda: “Pipedreams.” Ends Dec. 18, 19 E. 66th St., 212-772-8083. DISPATCH: Krysten Cunningam: “Tangental.” Ends Dec. 13, 127 Henry St., 212-227-2783. DUMBO ARTS CENTER: Wade Kavanaugh and Stephen B. Nguyen: “The Experience of Green.” Ends Nov. 29, 30 Washington St., Brooklyn, 718-6940831. EDUCATIONAL ALLIANCE/ERNEST RUBENSTEIN GALLERY: “Hope Lives: Artists of the Lower East Side.” Ends Dec. 17, 197 E. Broadway, 212-780-2300, ext. 378. EDWARD THORP GALLERY: “About Face.” Ends Jan. 6, 210 11th Ave., 6th Fl., 212-691-6565. EFA PROJECT SPACE: “One Every Day.” Ends Dec. 19, 323 W. 39th St., 2nd Fl., 212-563-5855. ENGLISH KILLS ART GALLERY: Carter Davis and Andrew Hurst. Ends Nov. 22, 114 Forrest St., Ground Fl., Brooklyn, 718-366-7323. ETHAN COHEN FINE ARTS: “WHAM! POW! VROOOM!” Ends Nov. 27, 18 Jay St., 212-6251250. FAMOUS ACCOUNTANTS: “Twenty-Three.” Ends Nov. 28, 1673 Gates Ave., Queens, 917-414-7798. FIRST STREET GALLERY: Mark Gotbaum: “Paintings and Drawings.” Ends Dec. 5, 526 W. 26th St., suite 915, 646-336-8053. FLOMENHAFT GALLERY: Miriam Shapiro and Paul Brach: “Mimi and Paul.” Ends Dec. 19, 547 W.

tors.” Ends Nov. 21, 623 W. 27th St., Ground Fl., 212-239-2758. FRANKLIN 54: Sharon Bartel-Clements: “The Side of the Road.” Ends Nov. 29, 526 W. 26th St. #403, 212-821-0753 FREDERIEKE TAYLOR GALLERY: Olive Ayhens: “Nature/ Architecture.” Ends Dec. 23, 535 W. 22nd St., 6th Fl., 646-230-0992. FRONT DESK APPARATUS: Jacob Kassay, Amir Mogharabi, Sam Parker: “Jasmine.” Ends Nov. 21, 54 King St., Ground Fl., 917-475-1562. FRONT ROOM GALLERY: “10th Anniversary Exhibition.” Ends Nov. 22, 147 Roebling St., Brooklyn, 718782-2556. FUN TIMES: Kurt Dietrich Wilberding: “Pakistan Now.” Ends Dec. 4, 257 3rd Ave., Brooklyn, 718-254-9255. GALERIA RAMIS BARQUET: Rashaad Newsome: “Standards.” Ends Nov. 25, 532 W. 24th St., 212-675-3421. GALERIE LELONG: Sean Scully: “Recent Paintings.” Ends Dec. 12, 528 W. 26th St., 212-315-0470. GALLERY 456: “Reconsidering Identity.” Ends Dec. 18, 456 Broadway, 3rd Fl., 212-431-9740. GALLERY BAR: “Altoona Beer Can Museum.” Ends Nov. 30, 120 Orchard St., 212-529-2266. GALLERY HENOCH: Kim Cogan: “City and Soul.” Ends Nov. 28, 555 W. 28th St., 917-305-0003. GAGOSIAN GALLERY: Roger Ballen: “Boarding House.” Ends Dec. 23, 980 Madison Ave., 212-744-2313. GAGOSIAN GALLERY: Mike Kelley: “Horizontal Tracking Shots.” Ends Dec. 23, 555 W. 24th St., 212-741-1111. GAGOSIAN GALLERY: Richard Serra: “Blind Spot” and “Open Ended.” Ends Dec. 23, 522 W. 21st St., 212-741-1717. GEORGE BILIS GALLERY: Elizabeth O’Reilly. Ends Dec. 19, 555 W. 25th St., 2nd Fl., 212-645-2621. GALLERY SATORI: Ethan Greenbaum and David Scanavino: “Mastercraft.” Ends Nov. 29, 164 Stanton St., 718-544-6155. GLOWLAB: Alex Lucas: “The Eventuality of Daybreak.” Ends Dec. 6, 30 Grand St., 718-3885911. GRADY ALEXIS GALLERY: Andrea Arroyo, Felipe Galindo and Ric Pliego: “IMAGINaciones.” Ends Dec. 23, El Taller Latino Americano, 2710 Broadway, 3rd Fl., 212-665-9460. THE GREY MARKET: Conrad Keely. Ends Nov. 28, 252 W. 31st St., 3rd and 4th Fls., 917-744-4042. HANS P. KRAUS, JR. FINE PHOTOGRAPHS: “Silver Anniversary: 25 Photographs, 1835-1914.” Ends Dec. 18, 962 Park Ave., 212-794-2064. HESKIN CONTEMPORARY: Jason Duval, Marina Adams, Hiroshi Tachibana: “Seek & Hide.” India Evans: “Rimembri Ancora?” Ends Nov. 28, 443 W. 37th, Ground Fl., 212-967-4972. HIRSCHL & ADLER MODERN: Randall Exon: “Currents.” Ends Dec. 5, 21 E. 70th St., 212-535-8810. INVISIBLE-EXPORTS: Stephen Irwin: “Sometimes When We Touch.” Ends Nov. 29, 14A Orchard St., 212-226-5447. ICO GALLERY: “A Foot in the Grave.” Ends Nov. 25, 606 W. 26th St., 212-966-3897. JAMES COHAN GALLERY NEW YORK: Bill Viola: “Bodies of Light.” Ends Dec. 19, 533 W. 26th St., 212714-9500. JAN KRUGIER GALLERY: “Stillness.” Ends Dec. 18, 980 Madison Ave., 212-755-7288. JASON MCCOY INC.: Rachel Hovnanian: “Power and Burden of Beauty.” Ends Dec. 22, 41 E. 57th St., 212-310-1996. JOHN CONNELLY PRESENTS: Marco Boggio Sella: “Virtual America” and “New Painting from L’Atelier Rouge.” Ends Dec. 5, 625 W. 27th St.,

212-337-9563. KATE WERBLE GALLERY: “Pinch Pots and Pyramids.”

Ends Dec. 5, 83 Vandam St., 212-352-9700. KATHARINA RICH PERLOW: Yvonne Thomas: “Paintings

1950s-1960s.” Ends Dec. 10, 41 E. 57th St., 13th Fl., 212-644-7171. KLOMPCHING GALLERY: Antony Crossﬁeld: “Foreign Body.” Ends Dec. 19, 111 Front St., suite 206, Brooklyn, 212-796-2070. KNOEDLER & COMPANY: Conrad Marca-Relli: “The New York Years 1945-1967.” Ends Nov. 28. Project Space: Saul Leiter: “Paintings.” Ends Nov. 28, 19 E. 70th St., 212-794-0550. KRAVETS/WEHBY GALLERY: “The Edible Woman.” Ends Nov. 25, 521 W. 21st St., 212-352-2238. KS ART: R.M. Fischer. Ends Dec. 19, 73 Leonard St., 212-219-9918. LAST RITES GALLERY: 2nd Annual “13th Hour.” Ends Nov. 22, 511 W. 33rd St., 3rd Fl., 212-529-0666. LAVIOLABANK GALLERY: Jason McLean: “Aunt Jean’s Buns.” Ends Dec. 5, 179 E. Broadway, 917463-3901. LEILA TAGHINIA-MILANI HELLER GALLERY: “In Stitches.” Ends Dec. 19, 39 E. 78th St., 212-249-7695. LENNON, WEINBERG, INC.: “Before Again.” Ends Nov. 28, 514 W. 25th St., 212-941-0012. LEO KOENIG, INC.: Nicole Eisenman. Ends Dec. 23, 545 W. 23rd St., 212-334-9255. LEROY NEIMAN GALLERY, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY: “Hunger: New Paintings from Art Schools in Germany.” Ends Dec. 8, 310 Dodge Hall, West 116th Street and Broadway, 212-854-4065. LIKE THE SPICE: Jenny Morgan and David Mramor: “Civil Union.” Ends Dec. 13, 224 Roebling St., Brooklyn, 718-388-5388. LISA COOLEY: Erin Shirreff: “Landscapes, Heads, Drapery and Devils.” Ends Dec. 20, 34 Orchard St., 347-351-8075. LMAKPROJECTS: Harold Ancart: “Within Limits.” Ends Dec. 6, 139 Eldridge St., 212-255-9707. LOHIN GEDULD GALLERY: Joseph Santore: “Recent Work.” Ends Dec. 24, 531 W. 25th St., 212-675-2656. LOWER EAST SIDE PRINTSHOP: “New Works By Keyholder Artists In Residence.” Ends Jan. 17, 306 W. 37th St., 6th Fl., 212-673-5390. LUDLOW 38: Friedl Kubelka, Gerard Byrne, Ricardo Basbaum. Ends Dec. 13, 38 Ludlow St., 212228-6848. MARC JANCOU CONTEMPORARY: Jacques Louis Vidal: “You Are What You Look At.” Ends Dec. 21, Great Jones Alley, 212-473-2100. MARIAN SPORE: Anna Lundh: “Conveyor Loop / Löpande Bandet.” Ends Dec. 31. “Untitled (fault).” Ends Dec. 31, 55 33rd St., 4th Fl., Brooklyn, 646-620-7758. MAX PROTETCH GALLERY: Siah Armajani: “Murder in Tehran.” Ends Dec. 23, 511 W. 22nd St., 212633-6999. MCKEE GALLERY: Philip Guston: “The Small Oil Panels 1969-1973.” Ends Dec. 31, 745 5th Ave., 212-688-5951. METAPHOR CONTEMPORARY ART: “Slippery When Wet.” Ends Nov. 22, 382 Atlantic Ave., Brooklyn, 718-254-9126. METRO PICTURES: Olaf Breuning. Ends Dec. 5, 519 W. 24th St., 212-206-7100. MIXED GREENS, GLOW ROOM PROJECT SPACE: Kim Beck: “Everything Must Go!” Ends Dec. 13. Kimberley Hart: “Scout.” Ends Dec. 23, 531 W. 26th St., 212-331-8888. MOMENTA ART: “Untreated Strangeness: George Porcari, Jorge Pardo, Naomi Fisher,” organized by Chris Kraus. Ends Dec. 7, 359 Bedford Ave., Brooklyn, 718-218-8058. MORE NORTH: Hjörtur Hjartarson: “New Paintings.” End Dec. 6, 39 N. Moore St., 212-334-5541. MOUNTAIN FOLD GALLERY: Rinko Kawauchi: “Con-

densation.” Ends Nov. 28, 55 5th Ave., 18th Fl., 212-255-4304. NABI GALLERY: Nick Savides. “New York/Paris.” Ends Dec. 5, 137 W. 25th St., 212-929-6063. NEWMAN POPIASHVILI GALLERY: Chris Fennell: “In Little Place a Million.” Ends Dec. 23, 504 W. 22nd St., 212-274-9166. NEW YORK CENTER FOR ART AND MEDIA STUDIES: “Incarnational Aesthetics.” Ends Nov. 25, 44 W. 28th St., 7th Fl., 212-213-8052. NO GLOBE EXHIBITION SPACE: “Reaganography.” Ends Dec. 6, 488 Morgan Ave., 3rd Fl., Brooklyn, no phone. NOHRA HAIME GALLERY: Carol K. Brown: “Paperdolls.” Ends Dec. 5. Hugo Tillman: “Daydreams of Mine.” Ends Dec. 5, 41 E. 57th St., 212-888-3550. NORTE MAAR: Brooke Moyse: “The Other Side.” Ends Nov. 21, 83 Wyckoff Ave., Brooklyn, 646361-8512. NUMBER 35: Frederick Hayes: “Build an Empire.” Ends Dec. 6, 39 Essex St., 212-388-9311. NY STUDIO GALLERY: Eunjung Hwang: “1,3,8 Characters.” Ends Dec. 12, 154 Stanton St., 212-627-3276. NYU 80 WASHINGTON SQUARE EAST GALLERIES: “Beginningless Thought/Endless Seeing.” Ends Dec. 19, 80 Washington Square E., 212-998-5747. ON STELLAR RAYS: Tommy Hartung: “The Ascent of Man.” Ends Dec. 23, 133 Orchard St., 212598-3012. OPEN SOURCE GALLERY: Sara Ching-Yu Sun with Ethan Crenson: “A Collaborative Project on Visuals and Sound.” Ends Nov. 30, 255 17th St., Brooklyn, 646-279-3969. PACEWILDENSTEIN: David Hockney: “Paintings 20062009.” Ends Dec. 24, 534 W. 25th St. and 32 E. 57th St. 212-421-3292. PARTICIPANT INC.: Stuart Sherman: “Nothing Up My Sleeve.” Ends Dec. 20, 253 E. Houston St., 212-254-4334. PAUL RODGERS/9W GALLERY: Peter Sacks: “Paintings.” Ends Dec. 12, 529 W. 20th St., 212-484-9810. POSTMASTERS GALLERY: Spencer Finch: “The Brain Is Wider Than The Sky.” Ends Nov. 28, 459 W. 19th St., 212-727-3323. PPOW GALLERY: “Looking Forward, Feeling Backwards.” Ends Dec. 5, 511 W. 25th St., Rm. 301, 212-647-1044. PRINCE STREET GALLERY: Gina Werfel: “New Paintings.” Ends Nov. 28, 530 W. 25th St., 646-230-0246. PS122 GALLERY: “If You Lived Here…You’d Be Home.” Ends Dec. 6, 150 1st Ave., 212-288-4249. RAANDESK GALLERY OF ART: “ART2Gift.” Ends Jan. 8, 16 W. 23rd St., 4th Fl., 212-696-7432. RACHEL UFFNER GALLERY: Barb Choit: “Nagel Fades.” Ends Dec. 20, 47 Orchard St., 212-274-0064. RANDALL SCOTT GALLERY: “UNSeen: A Photographers’ Salon.” Ends Nov. 21, 111 Front St., suite 204, Brooklyn, 212-796-2190. RECESS: Corin Hewitt and Molly McFadden. Ends Nov. 28, 41 Grand St., 646-836-3765. RED TRUCK GALLERY: NYC Pop-Up: “Hard Time Mini Mall.” Ends Nov. 30, 368 Broome St. ROBERT MANN GALLERY: Robert Frank. Ends Dec. 23, 210 11th Ave., 212-989-7600. RONALD FELDMAN FINE ARTS: Vitaly Komar: “New Symbolism.” Ends Dec. 24, 31 Mercer St., 212226-3232. ROSE BURLINGHAM / LIVING ROOM GALLERY: Elisabeth Kley. Ends Dec. 15, 15 Park Row, suite 16E, 646-229-0998. SALON 94 FREEMANS: Barry X Ball: “Masterpieces.” Ends Dec. 12, 1 Freeman Alley, 646-672-9212. SLATE GALLERY: Karen Margolis: “The State of All Things.” Ends Nov. 22, 136 Wythe Ave., Brooklyn, 718-387-3921. SLOAN FINE ART: LoCurto/Outcault: “markingtime.”

Ends Dec. 12, 128 Rivington St., 212-477-1140. SPACESURPLUS: Diti Almog: “Paintings.” Ends Dec.

9, 325 Church St., 2nd Fl., 212-925-1367. SPATTERED COLUMNS: “Awakenings.” Ends Dec. 16,

491 Broadway, suite 500, 646-546-5334. SPUTNIK GALLERY: “The Journey Home.” Ends Dec.

3, 547 W. 27th St., room 518, 212-695-5747. STEVEN KASHER GALLERY: Josh Gosﬁeld: “Gigi Gaston,

The Black Flower.” Ends Nov. 25, 521 W. 23rd St., 212-966-3978. SUSAN TELLER GALLERY: Blanche Grambs. Ends Nov. 28, 568 Broadway, Room 502A, 212-941-7335. TEAM GALLERY: Slater Bradley: “if we were immortal.” Ends Dec. 19, 83 Grand St., 212-279-9219. THE PAINTING CENTER: Craig Manister: “Recent Paintings.” Ends Nov. 21, 52 Greene St., 2nd Fl., 212-343-1060. THROCKMORTON FINE ART: Ruven Afanador: “Mil Besos.” Ends Dec. 12, 145 E. 57th St., 212-223-1059. TRACY WILLIAMS, LTD.: Alyssa Pheobus: “To Have, Hold.” Ends Dec. 23, 313 W. 4th St., 212229-2757. TRIA GALLERY: “iPOP—A Mixed Media Installation by Serena Bocchino.” Ends Dec. 5, 531 W. 25th St., Ground Fl., 212-695-0021. UNDER MINERVA: “Quixotic Beast.” Ends Dec. 4, 656 5th Ave., Brooklyn, 718-788-0170. UNION GALLERY: “Space Jam.” Ends Dec. 12, 359 Broadway, 646-613-0434. VENETIA KAPERNEKAS GALLERY: “Capacity.” Ends Dec. 19, 526 W. 26th St., suite 814, 212-462-4150. WINKLEMAN GALLERY: Ivin Ballen. Ends Dec. 29, 637 W. 27th St., suite A, 212-643-3152. W.M. BRADY & CO., INC.: Henry Koehler: “Mostly Sport.” Ends Nov. 24, 22 E. 80th St., 212-249-7212. ZACH FEUER GALLERY: Sister Corita Kent. Ends Dec. 5, 530 W. 24th St., 212-989-7700. ZIEHERSMITH: Matt Stokes: “these are the days.” Ends Dec. 19, 516 W. 20th St., 212-229-1088. ZURCHER STUDIO: Katharina Ziemke: “The Thicket.” Ends Dec. 8, 33 Bleecker St., 212-777-0790.

AUCTION HOUSES AT AUCTION

CHRISTIE’S: 500 Years: Decorative Arts Europe

Including Carpets from The Corcoran Gallery of Art. Nov. 24, 10 a.m. and 2, 20 Rockefeller Plz., 212-636-2000. DOYLE NEW YORK: American Furniture and Decorative Arts. Nov. 19, 10 a.m., 175 E. 87th St., 212-427-2730. ROGALLERY.COM: Fine art buyers and sellers in online live art auctions. 800-888-1063, www.rogallery.com. SOTHEBY’S: Latin American Art. Nov. 18, 7, & 19, 10 a.m. Israeli and International Art. Nov. 24, 2, 1334 York Ave., 212-606-7414. SWANN AUCTION GALLERIES: American Art. Nov. 20, 10:30am. Contemporary Art. Nov. 20, 2:30, 104 E. 25th St., 212-254-4710.

Nov 18 at 1:30pm

Rare & Important Travel Posters Specialist: Nicholas Lowry, ext 53 • nlowry@swanngalleries.com Illustrated Catalogue: $35

Nov 20 at 10:30am & 2:30pm

American Art / Contemporary Art Specialist: Todd Weyman, ext 32 • tweyman@swanngalleries.com Illustrated Catalogue: $40 U.S./$50 Elsewhere

Dec 3 at 1:30pm Willard Frederic Elmes, color lithograph poster, Chicago, 1928. Estimate $3,000 to $4,000. At auction Nov 18.

Featuring the Abramson Family Holy Land Collection

ART EVENTS

Specialist: Gary Garland, ext 17 • ggarland@swanngalleries.com Illustrated Catalogue: $35

ART TODAY: Critic Eleanor Heartney presents the talk

“Art Today: Tales of Plastic Surgery, Genetically Altered Rabbits & Other Acts of Art” that examines the critical framework for art in an era of extreme pluralism. Nov. 17, SVA Theatre, 333 W. 23 St.; 7, Free. AVENUE ANTIQUES AND ART AT THE ARMORY: Featuring a world-class selection from 50 prominent dealers. December 3-6 at the Park Avenue Armory. Dec. 2 Opening Night Preview Beneﬁt for The American Cancer Society HOPE LODGE NYC. To purchase beneﬁt tickets, please call 646-442-1646. Lectures provided by Royal Oak Society on Dec. 3 and 5. For additional show information please visit www.avenueshows.com.

Maps & Atlases, Books with Plates, Historical Prints, Travel Books, Ephemera

Dec 8 at 10:30 & 2:30pm

Photographic Literature & Fine Photographs Specialist: Daile Kaplan, ext 21 • dkaplan@swanngalleries.com Illustrated Catalogue: $35

Dec 16 at 1:30pm

Rare & Important Art Nouveau Posters Richard Hamilton, Picasso's Meninas, etching, aquatint, roulette and drypoint, 1973. Estimate $30,000 to $50,000. At auction Nov 20.

Specialist: Nicholas Lowry, ext 53 • posters@swanngalleries.com Illustrated Catalogue: $35

Catalogue Orders and General Inquiries: 212 254 4710, ext 0.

104 East 25th Street • New York, NY 10010 View catalogues and bid online at www.swanngalleries.com November 17, 2009 | City Arts

ArtsAGENDA

MUSEUMS

Stephen Pentak November 19 — December 23 VIII.IV, 2009, Oil on panel, 64 x 40 inches

KATHRYN MARKEL FINE ARTS

212 366 5368 | markelfinearts.com 529 W. 20th St. | Tues-Fri 10-6, Sat 11-6

GINA WERFEL New Paintings November 3-28, 2009

PRINCE STREET GALLERY

530 West 25th Street, 4th Floor New York, NY 10001 Hours: Tuesday-Saturday 11am-6pm 646 230-0246 www.princestreetgallery.org

SHARON BARTEL-CLEMENTS The Side of the Road November 5-28, 2009

FRANKLIN 54 GALLERY+ PROJECTS 526 West 26th St. #403 917-821-0753 franklin54@rcn.com

Horizon’s Promise, oil on canvas

Diana Cabouli Landscapes

Nov 3 - 28, 2009 Bowery Gallery 530 W 25 St • 4th flr NY NY 10001 646.230.6655 Hours: Tues - Sat 11am-6pm

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

MUSIC & OPERA MILTON NASCIMENTO: The Brazilian pop singer, song-

JAZZ

AUSTRIAN CULTURAL FORUM: “1989: The End of His-

Vertical Landscapes

“Encounter”, 2008, oil on canvas, 6”x48”

ducts the Bruckner Orchestra Linz in the work inspired by 17th-century astronomer Johannes Kepler. Nov. 18, 20 & 21, BAM Howard Gilman Opera House, 30 Lafayette Ave., Brooklyn, 718636-4100; 7:30, $20 and up. THE PHILADELPHIA ORCHESTRA: Conductor Christoph Eschenbach leads Mahler’s Symphony No. 7 in E Minor. Nov. 19, Carnegie Hall, 881 7th Ave., 212-247-7800; 8, $37 and up. THE NEW YORK POPS: The New York Pops celebrates the centenary of the birth of lyricist and composer Johnny Mercer. Music director Steven Reineke and the orchestra are joined by Ann Hampton Callaway, James T. Lane and N’Kenge. Nov. 20, Carnegie Hall, 881 7th Ave., 212-247-7800; 8, $33 and up. LESLEY GORE: 1960s solo artist and pop star performs. Nov. 20, Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1000 5th Ave., 212-570-3949; 7, $40 and up. IL TRITTICO: Patricia Racette stars in all three one-act operas of Puccini’s ambitious operatic triptych. Opens Nov. 20, Metropolitan Opera; times vary, $20 and up. STEEL HAMMER: American new music pioneers Bang on a Can All-Stars and Scandinavian early music vocal ensemble Trio Mediaeval perform the New York premiere of Julia Wolfe’s Steel Hammer, co-commissioned by Carnegie Hall. Nov. 21, Carnegie Hall, 881 7th Ave., 212-247-7800; 7:30, $37 and up. PHILIP GLASS: Mode Records hosts a six-hour beneﬁt concert featuring very special performances by Philip Glass and John Zorn and a rare performance of John Cage’s “Concert for Piano and Orchestra” with “Aria.” Nov. 21, Abrons Arts Center, Henry Street Settlement, 466 Grand St., 212-598-0400; times vary, $30 and up. IL NOZZE DI FIGARO: John Relyea and Danielle de Niese star in this Mozart masterpiece comedy. Opens Nov. 23, The Metropolitan Opera; times vary, $20 and up. CHRISTMAS IN ITALY: Italian-American singer Cristina Fontanelli presents her annual holiday concert of Italy’s best-loved folk songs, Neopolitan songs, arias and Christmas classics. Nov. 29, Merkin Concert Hall at the Kaufman Center, 129 W. 67th St., 212-501-3330; 3, $35 and up. PAUL BADURA SKODA: The pianist plays works by Haydn, Beethoven, Brahms and Takács. Dec. 2, Carnegie Hall, 881 7th Ave., 212-632-0540; 8, $20 and up. FROM THE HOUSE OF THE DEAD: Patrice Chéreau, renowned for his legendary centennial Ring cycle at Bayreuth, directs Janácek’s drama of human resilience inside a Russian prison. Ends Dec. 5, Metropolitan Opera, West 62nd Street (betw. Columbus & Amsterdam Aves.), 212-362-6000; times vary, $20 and up. DER ROSENKAVALIER: Renee Fleming and Susan Graham reign supreme in Richard Strauss’s romantic comedy. Ends Jan. 15, Metropolitian Opera; times vary, $20 and up. TURANDOT: Franco Zefﬁrelli’s breathtaking production stars Maria Guleghina in the title role of the ruthless princess and Marcello Giordani as Calàf as Andris Nelsons conducts. Ends Jan. 28, Metropolitan Opera; times vary, $20 and up. IL BARBIERE DI SIVIGLIA: Bartlett Sher’s hit production of Rossini’s comic masterpiece. Ends Mar. 4, Metropolitan Opera; times vary, $20 and up.

tory or The Beginning of the Future?” Ends Nov. 24, 11 E. 52nd St., 212-319-5300. BARD GRADUATE CENTER: “Dutch New York Between East and West: The World of Margrieta van Varick.” Ends Jan. 3, 18 W. 86th St., 212-501-3023. BROOKLYN HISTORICAL SOCIETY: “Public Perspectives: Brooklyn Utopias?” Ends Jan. 3, 128 Pierrepont St., Brooklyn, 718-222-4111. BROOKLYN MUSEUM: “Reﬂections on the Electric Mirror: New Feminist Video.” Ends Jan. 10. “Who Shot Rock & Roll: A Photographic History, 1955 to the Present.” Ends Jan. 31, 200 Eastern Pkwy., Brooklyn, 718-638-5000. COOPER-HEWITT NATIONAL DESIGN MUSEUM: “Design for a Living World.” Ends Jan. 4, 2 E. 91st St., 212-849-8400. THE DRAWING CENTER: Ree Morton: “At the Still Point of the Turning World.” Ends Dec. 18, 35 Wooster St., 212-219-2166. THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART: “Watteau, Music, and Theater.” Ends Nov. 29. “Art of the Samurai: Japanese Arms and Armor, 1156-1868.” Ends Jan. 2010. “Eccentric Visions: The Worlds of Luo Ping (1733-1799).” Ends Jan. 2010. “Velásquez Rediscovered.” Ends Feb. 2010. “Surface Tension: Contemporary Photographs from the Collection.” Ends May 2010, 1000 5th Ave., 212-535-7710. THE MORGAN LIBRARY & MUSEUM: “William Blake’s World: New Heaven Is Begun” includes more than 100 works and two major series of watercolors. Ends Jan. 2010. “A Woman’s Wit: Jane Austen’s Life and Legacy.” Ends Mar. 2010, 225 Madison Ave., 212-685-0008. EL MUSEO DEL BARRIO: “Nexus New York: Latin/American Artists in the Modern Metropolis.” Ends Feb. 28, 1230 5th Ave., 212-831-7272. MUSEUM OF ARTS AND DESIGN: “Ghost Stories: New Design from Nendo.” Ends Jan. 2010. “Read My Pins: The Madeleine Albright Collection.” Ends Jan. 2010, 2 Columbus Cir., 212-299-7777. MUSEUM OF JEWISH HERITAGE: “Beyond Swastika and Jim Crow: Jewish Refugee Scholars at Black Colleges.” Ends Jan. 4, 36 Battery Pl., 646-437-4200. MUSEUM OF MODERN ART: “Tim Burton.” Opens Nov. 22. “Looking at Music: Side 2.” Ends Nov. 30, 11 W. 53rd St., 212-708-9400. NEW MUSEUM: “Urs Fischer: Marguerite de Ponty.” Ends Feb. 7, 235 Bowery, 212-219-1222. NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS: “Revolutionary Voices: Performing Arts in Central & Eastern Europe in the 1980s.” Opens Nov. 18. “Lincoln Center: Celebrating 50 Years.” Ends Jan. 2010, 40 Lincoln Center Plz., 212-870-1630. RUBIN MUSEUM OF ART: “The Red Book of C.G. Jung.” Ends Jan. 25. “Mandala: The Perfect Circle.” Ends Jan. 11, 150 W. 17th St., 212-620-5000. SOLOMON R. GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM: “Intervals: Kandinsky.” Ends Jan. 13, 1071 5th Ave., 212-423-3500. SKYSCRAPER MUSEUM: “China Prophecy: Shanghai.” Ends Mar. 2010, 39 Battery Pl., 212-968-1961. SOUTH STREET SEAPORT MUSEUM: “New Amsterdam: The Island at the Center of the World.” Ends Jan. 3, 12 Fulton St., 212-748-8651. STUDIO MUSEUM OF HARLEM: “30 Seconds off an Inch.” Ends Mar. 14, 144 W. 125th St., 212-864-4500.

writer and guitarist makes a rare New York City appearance in a concert. Nov. 18, Carnegie Hall, 881 7th Ave., 212-247-7800; 8, $28 and up. KEPLER: BAM presents the U.S. premiere of Kepler, a concert staging of legendary composer Philip Glass’ new opera. Dennis Russell Davies con-

DAWN CLEMENT: Jazz pianist and composer Dawn

Clement performs. Nov. 19, unWINEd, Symphony Space, 2537 Broadway, 212-864-5400; 9:30, free. JEREMIAH: Soul/jazz hybrid Jeremiah plays BAMcafé

Live. Nov. 21, BAMcafé Live, 30 Lafayette Ave., Brooklyn, 718-636-4100; 9, free. RENEE ROSNES QUARTET: Featuring Lewis Nash and Jimmy Greene. Nov. 24 through 29, The Village Vanguard, 178 7th Ave., 212-255-4037; times vary, $30 and up. SAVION GLOVER: The famed tap dancer performs with a number of special guests. Nov. 17 through 22, Blue Note, 131 W. 3rd St., 212-475-8592; times vary, table $45. MINGUS BIG BAND: Formed in 1988 as a one-time-only group, the 14-piece band has been in consistent demand ever since for concert and club appearances. Nov. 23, Jazz Standard, 116 E. 27th St., 212-576-2232; times vary, $25. JOHN FARNSWORK QUINTET: Takes the stage with special guest Jeremy Pelt. Nov. 23, Smoke Jazz and Supper Club, 2751 Broadway, 212-864-6662; times vary, $20. UPSTARTS!: New jazz composers octet plays the world premiere of “The Public Option” by David Weiss. Nov. 23, Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola, Lincoln Center, Broadway at West 60th Street, 212-721-6500; times vary, $10 and up. CAROLE BUFFORD: Bufford’s cabaret features songs of Bessie Smith, Cole Porter, Johnny Cash, Jimmy Cox and others. Nov. 19, The Metropolitan Room, 34 W. 22 St. (betw. 5th and 6th Aves.), 212-206-0440; 7:30, $15. STEVE GROSSMAN: The saxophonist performs in his ﬁrst New York engagement in more than 15 years. Nov. 19 through 22, Jazz Standard, 116 E. 27th St., 212-576-2232; times vary, $30. ROY NATHANSON AND SOTTO VOCE: Sotto Voce is a new project from gifted saxophonist/composer/songwriter Roy Nathanson, leader of the legendary Jazz Passengers and frequent collaborator with Debbie Harry, Elvis Costello, and a host of other luminaries. Nov. 28, 92Y Tribeca, 200 Hudson St., 212-601-1000; 7 pm, $12 and up.

THEATER

of Edna Walsh’s “The New Electric Ballroom.” This production is a companion piece to “The Walworth Farce,” which made its critically lauded American premiere in April 2008. Ends Nov. 22, St. Ann’s Warehouse, 38 Water St., Brooklyn, 718-254-8779. OF MICE AND MEN: Adapted by John Steinbeck from his 1937 novella of the same name. Nov. 22, Barter Theatre, Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts, 2900 Campus Rd., Brooklyn, 718-951-4500. PETER AND THE WOLF: Sergei Prokofiev’s beloved masterpiece Peter and the Wolf takes a fresh turn in the new production from U.K. company In The Wings. Ends Nov. 29, New Victory Theater, 229 W. 42nd St., 646-223-3010. THE PLAYBOY OF THE WESTERN WORLD: J. M. Synge’s eccentric, high-spirited comedy celebrates the grand poetry and reckless abandon of the Irish imagination. Ends Nov. 22, New York City Center, 130 W. 56th St., 212-581-1212. THE PRIDE: A complex love triangle, replete with conflicting loyalties and passions, jumps from 1958 to the present and back. Ends Mar. 20, MCC Theater at the Lucille Lortel Theater, 121 Christopher St., 212-279-4200. THE SUPPER CLUB OF LOST CAUSES: Jim Farmer’s new play is about that feeling of being caught in noirish, purgatorial places where the passage of time is suspended. Ends Nov. 29, Theater for the New City, 155 1st. Ave., 212-254-1109. TALK LIKE SINGING: Japanese superstar Shingo Katori makes his international stage debut in Talk Like Singing, the first-ever original Japanese musical to have its world premiere in the United States. Ends Nov. 22, New York University, Skirball Center, 566 LaGuardia Place, 212-352-3101. THE 39 STEPS: This comic take on Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 film features a cast of four portraying dozens of characters. Ends Jan. 10, Helen Hayes Theatre, 240 W. 44 St, 212-239-6200.

BROKE-OLOGY: Two African-American brothers ﬁnd

DANCE

their relationship tested over the care of their ailing father. Ends Nov. 22, Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, Lincoln Center, 150 W. 65th St., 212239-6200. THE BROTHER/SISTER PLAYS: Tarell Alvin McCraney’s play trilogy, The Brother/Sister Plays, ofﬁcially debuts. Nov. 17 through Dec. 13, Public Theater, 425 Lafayette St., 212-967-7555. FINIAN’S RAINBOW: The 1947 musical fable about a mischievous Irishman, his headstrong daughter, and a stolen pot of gold follows its well-received Encores! run with a move to Broadway. Opens run, St. James Theatre, 246 W. 44 St., 212-2396200. FUERZABRUTA: Look Up: A visual dance-rave, techno-ride, Latino walking-on-the-ceiling ﬁesta from Buenos Aires. Open run, Daryl Roth Theatre, 101 E. 15th St., 212-239-2600. LET ME DOWN EASY: Legendary performer Anna Deavere Smith addresses health care and the human body in her latest one-woman show. Ends Dec. 6, Second Stage Theatre, 305 W. 43rd St., 212-246-4422. LOVE, LOSS AND WHAT I WORE: Nora and Delia Ephron adapt Ilene Beckerman’s popular book of the same title. Ends Mar. 28, Westside Theatre, 407 W. 43rd St., 212-239-6200. MARIONETTE TWELFTH NIGHT: Vit Horejš and the Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre at La MaMa E.T.C. present a Czech Marionette version of William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, or What You Will. Ends Nov. 29, La MaMa E.T.C., 74A E. 4th St., 212-475-7710. THE NEW ELECTRIC BALLROOM: The American Premiere

PARADES & CHANGES, REPLAYS: Dance Theater

Workshop in partnership with Performa 09 presents Anna Halprin, Anne Collod and guests in the U.S. premiere of parades & changes, replays. Presented as part of Dance Theater Workshop’s Season of Returns, this work has not been staged in the United States since 1967. Nov. 18 through 21, Dance Theater Workshop, 219 W. 19th St., 212-9240077; 7:30, $20 and up. CARRIE AHERN DANCE: Carrie Ahern Dance presents the open installation dance performance and world premiere of Sensate. Attendees are free to come and go within the 3-hour performance time. Nov. 18 through 22, The Brooklyn Lyceum, 227 4th Ave., Brooklyn, 718-857-4816; times vary, $15 and up. THE LEGACY GALA: Former Bolshoi Ballet principals Valentina Kozlova and Leonid Kozlov are proud to present The Legacy Gala, commemorating the 30th anniversary of their defection to the United States. Nov. 23, The Joyce Theater, 175 8th Ave., 212-691-9741; 7:30, $35 and up. REALLY REAL: As part of the Next Wave Festival, Wally Cardona and company return with Really Real, accompanied by the Brooklyn Youth Chorus. Nov. 17, 19 through 21, BAM Harvey Theater, 651 Fulton St., Brooklyn, 718-636-4100; 7:30, $20 and up. CAVE NY BUTOH FESTIVAL: The fourth biennial Butoh Festival features performances, workshops and conversations with artists. Ends Nov. 25, various locations, www.nybf09.caveartspace.org.

NEW YORK / PARIS Paintings by Nick Savides October 22-November 28, 2009 Opening Reception Thursday, October 22, 6-8

NABI GALLERY Meatpacking District, oil on linen, 24x36, 2009

Family Day Treasures of Dutch New York Explore the culture and craft of early New York on a treasure hunt through Dutch New York Between East and West: The World of Margrieta van Varick. Make a map and design pottery inspired by your travels in the exhibition! For children ages 6 and up and their families.

Saturday December

137 West 25th Street, New York, NY 10001 212 929 6063 | www.nabigallery.com

Dutch New York Between East and West: The World of Margrieta van Varick on view through January 3, 2010

5th

1 to 4:30 pm Complimentary admission RSVP recommended 212-501-3011 or programs@bgc.bard.edu

Saltcellar. England, ca. 1673. Tin-glazed earthenware. New-York Historical Society. Gift of Mrs. Nathaniel McClean Sage.

18 West 86th Street New York, NY 10024 T 212 501 3011 W bgc.bard.edu

SUBSCRIBE to CityArts

at www.cityarts.info November 17, 2009 | City Arts

PainttheTOWN

By Amanda Gordon

TURKEY, STUFFING AND A SIDE OF MODERN ART At Performa 09’s opening dinner, held at Dia’s former home in Chelsea, Mera Rubell tasted the art, a Jeff Koons bunny made of chocolate, and Dia’s director, Philippe Vergne, hung out with Michael Stipe. A week later, with Thanksgiving around the corner, we asked the Dia crowd gathered for its annual gala celebrating 35 years of collecting and supporting large-scale minimalist art, what they’re thankful for this year. “That Dia is coming back to New York,” said Dia’s chairwoman, Nathalie de Gunzburg, of the plan to once again open a space in Chelsea. Pop artist James Rosenquist had a more reflective answer, taking into consideration the events of the past year: His house and studio burnt down in Dia chairwoman Nathalie April; last month he published a widely acclaimed a memoir, Painting Below de Gunzburg Nicolas Rohatyn and Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn Zero: Notes on a Life in Art. “If you live long enough you experience all the terrible things and all the great things,” Rosenquist said. Photographer Timothy Greenfield-Sanders was more specific: “I’m thankful for ‘F11,’” he said, referring to Rosenquist’s 1965 painting depicting weapons of war. Nicolas Rohatyn also named a work of art: “I like the busts that Barry X Ball made of my wife,” he said. “And I’m thankful that my husband commissioned them,” said Salon 94’s Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn. At the podium at the Church of the Intercession on West 155th Street and Broadway—cocktails were at the nearby Hispanic Society, dinner at the Church—Dia’s director, Vergne said he was thankful for Robert Ryman becoming the first artist to serve on Dia’s board. And it is safe to say the gala guests shared the sentiment of actor James Franco, a gala co-chairman, who said, “I’m thankful for the opportunity to engage with Dia. It’s an incredible organization.” Artist Lawrence Weiner gave an answer we can all agree on: “Let’s be thankful that we have Klaus Biesenbach, Dia director Philippe Vergne and Michael Stipe James Franco and his grandmother Mitzi Verne art to be thankful for.”

Mera Rubell

READ ALL OVER

Courtesy Big Chief Entertainment

Photos by Amanda Gordon

Lisa Gottsegen and Dustin Hoffman with Peggy Siegal

Actor John Lithgow demonstrated the power of the “human-powered search engine” (otherwise known, by its own deﬁnition, as the New York Public Library), at the library’s annual gala—but don’t even think of yawning: He did so in a hilarious skit taped the night of the gala that was on par with the best opening sketches of Saturday Night Live. In the skit, Lithgow bribes his way to the front of the line at the reference desk (with tickets to Hamlet), so he can get a quote for his remarks as gala host. “It’s a whole bunch of smart, sophisticated New Yorkers, they’re honoring a bunch of these literary geniuses, I can’t just walk in there and say, ‘how’d you do?’” The librarian suggests a quote from Plato, “Knowledge is the food of the soul. “Too platonic,” says Lithgow. The librarian suggests, “One of you will betray me,” a “famous quote from a famous supper.” “Too biblical,” says Lithgow. “Wait…JFK… welcoming all living Nobel Laureates to the White House in 1961: ‘There has never been a greater concentration of intellectual power at the White House since Thomas Carolyn Gan and Jennifer Joel Jefferson dined alone,’” the librarian says. “That’s perfect,” resounds Lithgow, who then ran up to the podium of the Rose Reading Room live and used the quote to the delight of Billy Crudup, Leighton Meester, Emma Bloomberg, Jessica Tisch and Henry Louis Gates. Lithgow’s brilliant performance aside (the library really lucked out here), we should all be so lucky to have a reference librarian so composed and helpful: and the great thing is that we do. Also proving the muscle of human-powered research: Seth Lipsky, the newspaperman who has just published The Citizen’s Constitution, which brings this seminal document of America to life in ways that vastly improve on previous print and Internet editions. The approach by Lipsky is to provide annotations to the text, which run about two-thirds the length of every page. These notes Charlie Rose and Barbara Walters give concise accounts of the key moments the document (with Frank Langella in back) has been tested, interpreted and invoked in the defense of liberty. No wonder Henry Kissinger, Sir Harold For more party coverage, visit www.cityarts.info. Evans and District Attorney Robert Morgenthau were To contact the author or purchase photos, email present at the party celebrating the book’s publication at Amanda.Gordon@rocketmail.com; bit.ly/agphotos a private club on West 44th Street.

The New York Public Library’s patrons went wild for a pre-taped skit shown at its gala, in which John Lithgow gets help with his gala remarks from a reference librarian (played by actor Andrew Sellon).

City Arts | www.cityarts.info

AVENUE Shows

Antiques & Art at the Armory

Exhibitor Images: Hollis Reh & Shariff, Donald A. Heald, Santos-London, Ophir Gallery

Defined by Quality & Design December 2, 2009

Private Preview Opening Benefit for The American Cancer Society HOPE LODGE NYC

December 3-6, 2009 Open to the Public

THE PARK AVENUE ARMORY 643 PARK AVENUE,NEW YORK CITY EXHIBITIONS AND LECTURES: Brooks Brothers presents “Generations of Style”

The Royal Oak Foundation For show information please visit: www.avenueshows.com or call 646.442.1627

Admission $20