There are many places to view contemporary art beyond the confines of white cube spaces, so today, DART offers a roundup of several that have special appeal for summer days—including seven community gardens on the Lower East Side:

Continuing through September 30: Seven Gardens, various LES community gardens

Inspired by the history of community gardens in New York City, 7 Gardens explores artistic engagement in the city’s interstitial spaces to consider the politics of public space through a communal and ecological lens. Bringing together installation and sculpture, the outdoor exhibition, spanning across these community gardens, looks to engage these sites for common life. Above: Urs Fischer | Fireman's Memorial Garden - 360 E 8th St, New York, NY

Throughout the East Village—which has the highest concentration of community gardens in the United States, intimate installations will occupy secluded plazas and seductive enclaves surrounded by indigenous plant life, brick buildings and meandering paths that are not typically devoted to contemporary art. Unique works of art by these artists will be installed in the gardens and further explored through intimate workshops, artist talks, performances, readings, and screenings throughout the summer. 

Above: Terence Koh | Green Oasis Community Garden - 370 E 8th St, New York, NY

The project features New York based artists: Ivana Baši, Urs Fischer, Robert Gober, Terence Koh, Bunny Rogers, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Kandis Williams, Marianne Vitale and will later include Ivana Baši and others. Participating gardens include: Fireman's Memorial Garden, 6BC Botanical Garden, Peach Tree Garden, La Plaza Cultural Garden, Green Oasis Community Garden, and Kenkeleba House Garden. 

7 Gardens is organized by anonymous gallery together with New York-based independent curator and writer, Lola Kramer. Info

Continuing through September 21: It’s Only Natural at Living With Art

The 2022 Summer Salon explores how nature informs the practice of six women artists who were invited to install their artwork in a Harlem brownstone. These works, by Michele Brody, Stacy Bogdonoff, Alison Cuomo, Cinzia Meneghello, Priscilla Stadler, Susan Stair, are informed by the discoveries of nature’s communication network that thrives underground and beuond of our view. Each artist takes a different approach to make the connection between the natural world and how humans shelter and survive in the urban landscape. 

Curator Connie Lee says, “If you asked an interior designer to bring the outdoors in, they might choose colors found in nature, incorporate plants, and artworks that reference the natural environment. This exhibition takes that design principle to a whole other level. One that the artist has creative license to interpret.”

Living with Art is an ongoing series of curated exhibitions presented salon style in a Harlem brownstone. The salons provide an environment that nurtures artists, arts professionals and the collectors who want to support them.

Living with Art, 17 West 121 Street #3, New York, NY Info

Continuing through October 1: Echoes in Harlem: The Artist Gardener at West 132^nd Street Community Garden

Curated by artist and co-founder of the program, Natsuki Takauji, the exhibition takes as a starting point the theme of tangible or intangible traces left in the Harlem community through personal or historical experiences. Through site-specificartworks created for this exhibition by Morgen Christie, Sarah E.Brook, Linda Ganjian, and Yvonne Shortt, it explores the bridges between now and then using personal or communal points of view that resonate with the West Harlem Community Garden or  the Harlem community at large. A series of public events including an art workshop and sound and video performances are planned for the duration of the exhibition, through October 1^st. Info: @theartistgardnernyc

West 132nd Street Community Garden, 108-114 W 132nd Street, New York, NY

Continuing through November 11: Abstracted at Ilon Gallery

The summer show at Ilon Art Gallery, which inhabits the parlor floor of a Harlem brownstone, includes work by West-coast implant, Charles Osawa. His practice is centered on collecting detritus and embedding it in cast resin. In using these discarded artifacts, he invite viewers to reassess both their perceptions about trash and, ultimately, their relationship to it as constituents of the broader social fabric. Osawa’s practice will be on full reveal in the workshop he is giving in the brownstone’s garden, on Saturday, August 27. Info

If you can’t take the workshop, you can visit the show most weekdays and Sundays; just email Loni Elfon:  loni@ilon.com or 917-270-4696 to see works by Kurt Boone, Linus Corraggio, Al Diaz, Isabelle Ewing, Anthony Haden-Guest, Gail Albert Halaban, Todd Monaghan, Charles Osawa, Konstance Patton, Judith Kaufman Weiner.

ilon Art Gallery | 204 West 123rd Street, New York, NY Info

Continuing: Lois Bender | Eucalyptus Euphoria, in Sag Harbor
If you’re heading to the East End, Sara Nightingale Gallery present significant contemporary art across all mediums in her gallery home in Sag Harbor. The program consists of solo and two-person exhibitions, curatorial projects, collaborations and special events. Currently on view in the project space is New York artist Lois Bender’s Eucalyptus Euphoria, acrylic stencil paintings on canvas.

Continuing at Sara Nightingale Gallery, 26 main Street, Sag Harbor, NY. Info  (631) 793-2256 for gallery hours.

For continuing Art in the Garden, see DART 08.10.2022

Above: "Tossed Salad" by Ruth Marshall, one of 30 tables designed by Bronx artists for "Around the Table: