Save the date: June 29-July 2 | ICON11 in Kansas City

ICON: The Illustration Conference is a 4-day eventfeaturing paper presentations by top educators, workshops led by and for illustrators, a marketplace, an exhibition showing original works, a juried animation screening, 2-full days of mainstage presentations, opportunities to meet your heroes, reconnect with friends, and rub elbows with that special art director, and so much more.

The Mainstage is the heart and soul of ICON. This is the part of the conference when all attendees are together in one place focused on a spectacular lineup of the industries’ top talent. The ICON11 Mainstage features three keynotes and thirty speakers across two-full days. Keynotes this year are Loveis Wise on how magic and magical thinking influenced my career as an illustrator, Friday, 6:20pm; Ted Leo on the art of process, Saturday at 6:10 pm; and Aimee Mann on the art of process, Saturday at 6:10 pm. For the complete schedule of Mainstage events, go here.

If you’re ready to get your hands dirty, expand your mind, put your business on solid footing, and have a whole lot of fun, get down with ICON11 Workshops. Two days of informative and inspiring hands-on workshops, lectures, tours, and events led by an impressive roster of illustrators, educators, and creative professionals (some from our Main Stage) are designed to jump-start your ICON10 experience. Register here

And that, as they say, is just the tip of the iceberg. Info

ICON11: Everything starts at the historic Folly Theater, 300 West 12^th Street, Kansas City, Missouri

Monday, June 20, 5:30-8:30 pm: Type Lessons with Marta Bernstein at Cooper Union

For most of the 20th century decorative type was not taken seriously: Modernism with its “less is more” made it superfluous. Ornament was a crime for a long time. But now those letterforms are making a comeback in the hands of ace typographer Marta Bernstein: we see more and more display typefaces designed to be used at large sizes, mainly for titles or short sentences, and whose personality has to be apparent in just a few letters. 

In this seminar we will go back to the origin of display typefaces and investigate the wild yet systematic experimentation that generated them. And will see if there is a lesson to be learnt. In-Person at The Cooper Union & Livestreaming on YouTube
RSVP for this free event

The Cooper Union, The Rose Auditorium, 41 Cooper Square at 7^th Street and Third Avenue, New York, NY Info

June 21, 7:00-8:30 pm: Annie Liebovitz on Wonderland at the SVA Theatre

In promotion for her new book Wonderland, Liebovitz will share stories from her ambitious fashion shoots, her encounters with a wide and diverse range of luminaries, and reflections on her career spanning from the 1970s through the present day. 

Fashion has been both the subject of, and the vehicle for, many of Leibovitz’s images, which have graced the covers and interiors of countless publications and magazines around the world. In conversation, Leibovitz will share stories from her runway work—including shows by designers such Alexander McQueen, Yves Saint Laurent, and Rei Kawakubo—alongside tales of her encounters with a wide and diverse range of fashion leaders: from designers such as Stella McCartney and Karl Lagerfeld to Kate Moss, Serena Williams, politicians Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Nancy Pelosi, and cultural figures—Queen Elizabeth II, Lady Gaga, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie—to name a few.

This is a major opportunity to hear from an industry titan and grab an autographed copy of her new book. Hosted by our MPS Digital Photography department in partnership with APA-NY, this event is FREE: Register here

SVA Theatre, 333 West 23^rd Street, New York, NY Info

June 27-July 29: Life After Conflict | Finbar O’Reilly, Pete Muller, Rena Effendi at The United Nations HQ

This exhibit is part of the International Criminal Court’s support for the U.N. Sustainable Development Goal 16: «peace, justice and strong institutions». Sharing these stories helps raise awareness of the crimes, bringing them into focus, to foster global support for the ICC’s work on accountability and deterrence.

The series Life after Conflict brings to a large audience some of the stories as witnessed by outreach staff and recorded through the lenses of award-winning photographers Rena Effendi, Pete Muller, and Finbarr O’Reilly.  Additionally, a special chapter will be devoted to ‘Life in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a reportage produced by Finbarr O’Reilly (above) as part of the 11th Carmignac Photojournalism Award. Info

The United Nations Headquarters, Visitors’ Lobby, First Avenue at 46^th Street, New York, NY Info

June 23-September 5: Horror | Messaging te Monstrous at MoMA

Ten weeks of films from Psycho (1960) to the present day, including 110 features and a selection of short films that capture the horror genre’s uncanny ability to express the lurking fears of a society and the anxieties caused by social, cultural, and political change. Horror: Messaging the Monstrous is organized weekly by fluid themes that shaped how the works were conceived: Slasher, Horror of Place, the Undead, Creatures, Folk Tales, Women Make Horror, Body Horror, Eco Horror, Messaging Race, and Messaging Gender. The exhibition features films from 19 countries, including genre benchmarks from the United States, Europe, and Asia, starting with Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) and spanning the 1970s into the 1990s; 21st-century films from emerging voices in Guatemala, Ireland, Iran, Laos, Mexico, South Africa, South Korea, and Zambia; and a focused look at emerging independent women filmmakers making horror over the last decade.

MoMA, 11 West 53^rd Street, New York, NY Info

Continuing: Cecilia André | Dancing with Colors at ChaShaMa

There are few things more abstract than light, yet so dramatically objective. It creates every color on the prism as a fraction of itself. It makes the world visible. Cecilia André has spent years chasing light to create art, which has led her to develop an apparently oxymoronic vision, at once so prosaic and yet exceptional: colored shadows. By overlapping simple translucid materials against a light source, she found a way to harvest color.

Dancing with Colors is an immersive experimentation of this process and a subversion of the traditional art space. The myth of the white cube is turned on its head by presenting an installation where nothing is hanging on the walls, and yet they are fully activated. Further, the public is made into part of the work as they offer spontaneous performances amid the flowing projected colorforms. When choosing to step into the space and observe or dance, bodies become non-still life, with each gesture capable of creating a new ephemeral picture.To book a viewing through July 14, please visit the link here. 

ChaShaMa, 266 West 37^th Street, New York, NY Info

Continuing: The Male Nude | Turning the Gaze at Equity Gallery

Every human body is a thing of wonder—a naturally occurring marvel of anatomical design, a practical machine in which we live our lives, sometimes an enticing object of desire or a blank canvas that we tattoo or pierce to convey our personalities.  But in the past and present of Western art, it is usually the female body—especially when it’s unclothed—that captivates artists and viewers, primarily because it offers men a chance to take a long look without accusations of impropriety. Left: James Bidgood (1933-2022) Pink Flowers, Water Colors, ca. early 1960s

This exhibition shifts our attention toward men’s bodies, and specifically how contemporary artists working in a wide range of materials and styles see this timeless subject. Their inspirations come from all directions—from antiquity and academic classicism to modernism, the conceptual, and the digital. Some work from the live model, others entirely from imagination; some are frankly erotic and others quite chaste. Curated by Michael Gormley and Peter Trippi; featuring 40+ Artists

Equity Gallery, 245 Broome Street, New York, NY  Info