With the Met Breuer set to open next week on Madison Avenue at the former Whitney bastion, New York’s Upper East Side is polishing up for a breath of fresh air. Storefronts in the formerly drab Whitney Townhouses are being refashioned into two-story glass galleries fronting the luxury condo development within.

All along Madison Avenue and its side streets in the ‘70s, new retail attractions have been gradually moving in, such as the Apple Store, which opened last summer in a Beaux Arts bank building across from the Breuer building. There seem to be more places to stop for an espresso these days, including the newly renovated Shakespeare & Company Bookstore/Cafe on Lexington and 68^th Street, where Hunter profs share the wifi with students and screenwriters. But the most distinctive shift, perhaps, is the arrival of more contemporary art in galleries north of 57^th Street.

Gladstone Gallery, which quietly moved in to two floors of the Edward Durrell Stone townhouse last fall, brings the cutting edge to this Modernist legacy building (left). Opening next week is Philippe Parreno | If This Then Else, an installation by an artist most recently seen in New York when he took over the Drill Hall of the Park Avenue Armory last summer (below). Gladstone Gallery, 130 East 64^th Street, NY, NY. Info  

On the same block is Marianne Boesky, where the shag paintings of Donald Moffett are on view, together with small sculptures by Pino Pascali, through February 27^th. Marianne Boesky | Uptown, 118 East 64^th Street, NY, NY. Info

Franklin Parrasch, a block to the west, presents a thought-provoking group show, Burning Small Fires, with works in various mediums by Rita Ackermann, Peter Alexander, Frank Gohlke, Joe Goode, and Daniel Turner on view until February 27^th. Franklin Parrasch Gallery, 53 East 64^thStreet, NY, NY. Info

Above: Philippe Parreno, H {N)Y P N(Y} OSIS’ at the Park Avenue Armory, 2015

Hauser & Wirth’s townhouse is devoted to Larry Bell | From the ‘60s, with works on paper, canvas, and small glass pieces on the ground floor. The upper floors are filled with his modular eight-foot-high cubic glass works, whose shimmering surfaces are embedded with subtle interference colors, as well as one large work on paper from his series of Vapor Drawings, on view through April 9^th. Hauser & Wirth | Uptown (below), 980 Madison Avenue, NY, NY. Info 

At Higher Pictures are two large photo-based tapestries by Brassaï (1899-1984), woven in Paris in 1968, and based on his photographs of graffiti scratched into the walls of Paris, which he made in the 1930s. They are accompanied by a group of photographs that preceded, and are on view until March 5^th. Higher Pictures, 980 Madison Avenue, NY, NY. Info

Opening on Friday, Venus presents Fétiche, a group show juxtaposing historic African and Oceanic objects with contemporary Western art, including works by Huma Bhabha, Bernard Buffet, Alexander Calder, Maurizio Cattelan, Jean Dubuffet, Jimmie Durham, Llyn Foulkes, Damien Hirst, Francis Picabia, Richard Prince, Lucas Samaras, and Andra Ursuta, among others. Venus Over Manhattan, 980 Madison Avenue, NY, NY. Info

With Drawing Then | Innovation and Influence in American Drawings of the Sixties, Dominique Lévy, relatively new to the UES, reprises—and expands upon—a seminal show at MoMA 40 years ago called Drawing Now. In a decade of radical social and political upheaval, a number of prominent artists invested energy in a fundamental reevaluation of the medium, and with untried materials and new techniques created a new understanding of what a work of art can be. Dominique Lévy, 909 Madison Avenue, NY, NY. Info

Opening Thursday at Skarstedt Gallery is Nice Weather, works by a multi-generational group of painters, curated by David Salle. Skarstedt Gallery, 20 East 79^th Street, NY, NY. Info

More, briefly:

Izumi Kato, closing February 27, at Galerie Perrotin. 909 Madison Avenue, NY, NY. Info

Marcel Broodthaers | Écriture, through March 26^th. Michael Werener, 4 East 77^th Street, NY, NY. Info

Klanja Strobert | Giant, opening February 25^th at Tilton Gallery. 8 East 76^th Street, NY, NY. Info