“Between Worlds: The Art and Design of Leo Lionni”
November 18-May 27, 2024
The first major American retrospective of Leo Lionni, a groundbreaking modernist graphic designer and magazine art director who gained worldwide popularity as the writer and illustrator of nearly 40 children’s books explores the artist’s vision and legacy across three distinct yet interrelated domains: graphic art and design, children’s books, and personal works in various media at the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts.
“someone”
Through November 6
Three generations of black-and-white photography are presented in the current exhibit at Sohn Fine Art in Lenox. Dutch photographer Bastiaan Woudt’s photographs, replete with charcoal tones and elegant composition, feel like stepping into a modern painting. A self-described “Afromythologist,” Shawn Theodore’s work opens broad conversations regarding the role of the photographer in the shaping of agency and identity. Greg Gorman’s timeless images document our peculiar obsession with the 21st-century celebrity.
“quiet as it’s kept”
October 6–November 10
The Art Effect at the Trolley Barn Gallery in Poughkeepsie hosts an exhibition of contemporary Black art including work by Destiny Arianna, Imani Jones, London Ladd, Samantha Modder, Emmanuel Ofori, Jean-Marc Superville Sovak, and Lisa Diane Wedgeworth. The exhibition is curated by the gallery’s youth curatorial team in collaboration with Janice Bond of Art is Bond gallery in Houston and Hudson Valley artist Ransome. There will also be a series of free public events focused on arts education, placekeeping, and curatorial activism.
“Bhakti Baxter: Resident Frequencies”
Through October 21
Bhakti Baxter’s paintings simulate a virtual and untethered wilderness, animating the intimate tensions that have always been present between us but have long gone unacknowledged. The images in Baxter’s paintings being exhibited at Mother Gallery in Beacon whirl and blur like a Doppler effect gone optical—a visual glitch that causes the viewer to question perception itself.
“Myron Polenberg: Out of Many, One”
Through October 23
The inaugural exhibition of Gallery 495 in Catskill features the abstract paintings of Hudson-based artist Myron Polenberg. With a career spanning over 50 years, Polenberg’s most recent body of work invites both a visual and experiential contemplation on themes central to his artistic practice: process, revelation, and destruction.
Scorched Earth
Through November 14
Part of the immersive “Terrain Biennial Newburgh” exhibition, which places art in nongallery settings across the city, Scorched Earth at ADS Warehouse is an experiential installation by Amy Bandolik and Tom Bregman that reproduces the aftermath of a destructive wildfire. Walk through a grid of blackened trees, charred earth, ash, and debris within the confines of a seemingly lifeless forest.
“Shifting Center”
October 27-29; November 3-18
Curated by Nida Ghouse and Vic Brooks, “Shifting Center” at the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center at RPI in Troy engages in the speculative construction of premodern and Indigenous instruments and repertoires through sound and structures. Of special note is Beatriz Cortez’s sculpture Ilopango, the Volcano that Left, a steel sculpture that spent the summer at Storm King Art Center. It will travel upriver October 27-29 on a three-day performative journey along the Hudson River to Troy. The volcano can be witnessed as it sails upriver from various viewing points on both shores and online through a livestream.
“Ralph Steadman: Ride the Thunder”
Through October 31
The iconic Stockbridge, Massachusetts Red Lion Inn is host to a captivating exhibition of the work of illustrator Ralph Steadman, best known for his collaborations with gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson. Copresented with the Norman Rockwell Museum and Theory Wellness, “Ride the Thunder” showcases 50 original pieces from “The Kentucky Derby,” the seminal article that resulted from Steadman and Thompson’s experience at the 1970 Kentucky Derby, alongside “Fear and Loathing,” a psychedelic journey to the heart of the American dream.
“Portraits of Process: The American Artists’ Hand Archive”
Through December 23
The American Artists’ Hand Archive is an ongoing project of Vanessa Hoheb and Thomas Donahue to document contemporary American visual artists through their primary agent of creative process and expression: their hands. This exhibition, on display at the David Rockefeller Creative Arts Center in Tarrytown, showcases 34 expertly crafted bronze life castings, including some of the most well-known contemporary artists: Huma Bhabha, Eric Fischl, Mary Frank, Maya Lin, Judy Pfaff, Kiki Smith, and Ursula Von Rydingsvard.
“Linda Mary Montano: Art=Healing”
October 14-November 19
Saugerties is planning a big commemorative splash this fall for performance art pioneer and hometown hero Linda Mary Montano. Now 81, Montano is still making art and will perform a variety of work at locations across the village—Emerge Gallery, Lamb Center, Newberry Artisan Market, Upstate Films Orpheum Theatre, and Washburn Studios—including wearing a blindfold for a week. On November 19, Montano will embodying one of her most iconic characters, Bob Dylan, performing with musician Paul McMahon.
“Gray Thorn: Political Landscapes”
October 16-December 7
God, corporate greed, systemic racism, environmental collapse, false patriotism—the toxic brew that is contemporary American culture—are depicted in these satirical paintings by Gary Horn at Convey/er/or in Poughkeepsie. While offering a pointed commentary on the American experiment, Horn’s investigations also present a call to action to repair a failed utopia.
“Silver Linings”
Through January 28
This exhibition highlights the collection of Spelman College Museum of Fine Arts, which has a mission to uplift art by and about women of the African diaspora. “Silver Linings” shares the works of masters, pioneers, and trailblazers who anchor the Spelman collection. Among the 40 works in the exhibition there are sculptures by Beverly Buchanan, Selma Burke, and Elizabeth Catlett; paintings by Betty Blayton, Sam Gilliam, and Henry Ossawa Tanner; drawings by Herman “Kofi” Bailey, Nellie Mae Rowe, and Charles White; photographs by Amalia Amaki, Carrie Mae Weems, and Lorna Simpson; and mixed-media work by Emma Amos, Benny Andrews, and Romare Bearden.
“Zohar Lazar: Oh! Sweet Nuthin'”
Through October 30
The work of Great Barrington-based painter and illustrator Zohar Lazar is part Tex Avery mayhem, part spiritual revelation, part carnal obsession. For this show at the Hillman Jackson Gallery at the Daniel Arts Center on the campus of Simon’s Rock, curator Jacob Fossum presents a selection of Lazar’s drawings and paintings that feature his idiosyncratic characters.
“No Name | No Slogan”
October 7-November 11
The Brasiles Arts Collective presents an ambitious six-week avant-garde art exhibition at the Howland Cultural Center in Beacon curated by Brasiles founder, Madeleine DeNitto with her husband, Clayton Scales. The show will include pieces from working artists as far away as Los Angeles and Germany employing a variety of mediums ranging from painting and collage to sculpture and graffiti. In conjunction with the exhibition, there will be a series of performances, from poetry readings to dance performances.
This article appears in October 2023.
