Talks / Screenings / Book Events / and Beyond

This week, three New York art institutions are expanding the scope of modern Italian art in a way never before realized. With style, grace, and a clarity that borders on perfection, the work of the Argentine-Italian artist Lucio Fontana comes into view for the first time in more than four decades.

Opening last night at the Italian Cultural Institute,  Spatial Explorations: Lucio Fontana and the Avant-garde in Milan in the 50’s and 60’s  presents four signal works by Fontana along with key works from the Intesa Sanpaolo bank’s rich collection of twentieth-century Italian art. Curated by Francesco Tedeschi,  Spatial Explorations presents artistic creation during a time when artists imagined news worlds fueled by the Space Race. This period of quantum leaps in the sciences, which culminated fifty years ago with the Apollo Mission and the first Moon landing, was a moment that reverberated through the arts in a yearning for discovery, experimentation and a call to explore the unknown.  Info

The exhibition complements  Lucio Fontana: On the Threshold, a major retrospective that opens Monday at The Met Breuer, where the legacy of this key postwar figure can be explored through a selection of the sculptures, ceramics, paintings, drawings and environments he made between 1931 and 1968.

The founder of Spatialism and one of the most innovative artists of the 20th century, Lucio Fontana (1899–1968) is widely known for his series of slashed paintings from 1958 known as the Cuts (Tagli) that became symbols of the postwar era. The exhibition at The Met Breuer, curated by Iria Candela, and assisted by Aime Iglesias Lukin, presents extraordinary examples of this iconic series, and will also explore Fontana’s beginnings as a sculptor and his pioneering work with environments, contextualizing the radical nature of the Cuts within the artist’s broader practice. The exhibition is featured on the The Met website, as well as on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter using the hashtag #MetLucioFontana.

Coinciding with the exhibition at The Met Breuer, El Museo del Barrio is presenting Fontana’s last environment Spatial Environment at Documenta 4, in Kassel (1968). Info All photos this page from the preview of Lucio Fontana: On the Threshold at The Met Breuer, © and Courtesy Marco Palli

Thursday, January 24

Joel Meyerowitz / NYC-Arts Interview, 8 pm, WNET/Channel 13. Watch now.

Friday, January 25

Artist and Curator talk | Julie Barratt, Clyde McGill, Ann Kalmbach, Tatana Kellner with Monica Oppen and Aexander Campos, curators, 6:30 pm. Center for Book Arts, 28 West 27^th Street, NY, NY Info

Friday, January 25-Sunday, January 27

Animation First | Festival of French Animation, honoring Michel Ocelot. French Institute/Alliance Francais, 22 East 60^th Street, NY, NY Info

Planning Ahead

Legal Issues in Photography, February 5, 5:30-7 pm. Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, 1 East 53^rd Street, NY, NY Register

In Galleries / Lens-based art

Ulrike Ottinger, 6-8 pm. Bridget Donahue, 99 Bowery, NY, NY Info

Thursday, January 24

Katherine Wolkoff | The Critical Zone, 6-8 pm. Benrubi Gallery, 521 West 26^th Street, NY, NY Info

The City (And a Few Lonely People|, Nan Goldin, Michael Massaia, Daido Moriyama, Mark Morrisroe, Lori Nix/Kathleen Gerber, Jack Pierson, Richard Renaldi, Laura Stevens, David Wojnarowicz, Frank Yamrus, and Marc Yankus, 6-8 pm. ClampArt, 247 West 29th Street, NY, NY Info

In Galleries

Wednesday, January 23, 19

Silas Boros | Souvenirs,  6-8 pm. New York Studio School, 8 West 8^th Street, NY, NY Info

Thursday, January 24

Rasmus Nilausen | Eye Dialect, 6-8 pm. Team Gallery, 83 Grand Street, NY, NY Info

Elin Rodsetj | Amblers, 6-8 pm. Owen James Gallery, 59 Wooster Street, NY, NY Info

Adrift: Cao Yi, Li Qing, Yi Xin Tong, Zhao Zhao, 6-8 pm. Chambers Fine Art, 522 West 19^th Street, NY, NY Info

Rene Ricard | but you love me…you said so, 6-8 pm. Half Gallery, 43 East 78^th Street, NY, NY Info

Carol Rama| Eye of Eyes. Levy Gorvy, 909 Madison Avenue, NY, NY Info

Friday, January 25

David Rhodes, Untitled; Gary Stephan, Untitled 48, 6-8 pm. Hionas Gallery, inaugurating new space at 356 Broadway, lower level, NY, NY Info

Tuesday, January 29

Kyle Staver | Printed Matters 2001-2018, 6-8 pm. The National Arts Club, 15 Gramercy Park, NY, NY Info

Continuing

Andy Warhol | By Hand.  New York Academy of Art, 111 Franklin Street, NY, NY Info

In Museums

Wednesday, January 23, 19

Lucio Fontana: Spatial Environment (1968). El Museo del Barrio, 1230 Fifth Avenue, NY, NY Info

Thursday, January 24

Spatial Explorations| Lucio Fontana and the Avant-garde in Milan, 1950s and ‘60s | presented by Intesa Sanpaolo and Italian Cultural Institute, Francesco Tedeschi, Curator.  Italian Cultural Institute, 868 Park Avenue, NY, NY Info

Monday, January 28

Lucio Fontana: On the Threshold. The Met Breuer, 945 Madison Avenue, NY, NY Info

Jasper Spicero | Centinel, 6-8 pm. Swiss Institute, 38 St Marks Place, NY, NY Info
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