Upon entry, Kent's "IF" (1965) lures the eye upward. The serigraph-a silkscreen print in fine art parlance-hangs high on the wall with a subtle vulnerability. Two orange letters hover toward the composition's top edge, as if pushing to transcend the picture plane. A feeling of possibility emerges through the conjunction and its visual form.
The first things that struck me about Jason Gubbiotti's paintings at RecRoom were the small dimensions of the work, the relationship of their modest size to the artist's elaborately precise, often lattice-like geometric compositions, and their brilliant beguiling color. The work is also audaciously, unapologetically beautiful, and deeply pleasurable to look at.
"Drawings at the IFPDA make great sense," said Jenny Gibbs, Executive Director of the IFPDA and IFPDA Foundation. "Museums group them together because both media represent graphic thinking and the transmutation of ideas through line and pressure."
If, like me, you'd rather be in Puerto Rico slathering mashed banana on your semi-nude body than braving the forthcoming cold front in New York City, just know you're not alone. "TROPICALIZE ME!" (2025), pictured above, was performed by Matthieu Laurette at the 3rd Gran Bienal Tropical in December, where the artist took home one of five "Golden Coconuts" along with Poncili Creación, Ángela María Domínguez, Miguel González, and Aldo Álvarez Tostado.
This is the site of the Florida state historical marker commemorating Arthur Lee McDuffie, a Black insurance broker and former US Marine whose 1979 beating death at the hands of Miami police ignited one of the most consequential uprisings in the city's history. A plaque unveiled in February 2024 at the site of his attack finally acknowledged the violence that fractured McDuffie's skull and the community-wide outrage that followed.
One recent weekday morning, the British painter Peter Doig arrived at a bonded warehouse-a cavernous brick building-about a mile south of the River Thames, but not subject to the import taxes of the United Kingdom. He buzzed through security and entered a windowless white room, where he settled in for a long day. Awaiting him were a series of etching prints that had been brought over from the United States to be signed by Doig before being put up for sale.
An exhibition of Wifredo Lam is about as safe a bet as the Museum of Modern Art can place and still plausibly say that it's a bet on expanding the canon. The Cuban artist is one of the most famous painters of the 20th century, featured in almost every single key show about Surrealism. MoMA acquired his famous painting The Jungle in 1946, a few years after he made it.
OSCAR MURILLO (b. 1986, La Paila, Colombia) has developed a multifaceted and challenging practice that spans painting, collaborative projects, video, sound and installation. Through each body of work, the artist probes ideas of collectivity and shared culture, demonstrating a commitment to the power of material presence alongside complex meditations on contemporary society. A focus on the social dimension that sits on the border between performance and events is also central to Murillo's practice.
The artists José Parlá and Claudia Hilda, his wife, live in a former fire station in Fort Greene surrounded by memories of Cuba, which Parlá's ­family fled in 1970 and where ­Hilda lived until recently. "There's a lot of magical realism here, a big mix of Cuban traditions and religion," says Parlá, pointing to an icon of la Caridad del Cobre, the island's patron saint, in the kitchen. "We cannot move her!"
The artists José Parlá and Claudia Hilda, his wife, live in a former fire station in Fort Greene surrounded by memories of Cuba, which Parlá's family fled in 1970 and where Hilda lived until recently. "There's a lot of magical realism here, a big mix of Cuban traditions and religion," says Parlá, pointing to an icon of la Caridad del Cobre, the island's patron saint, in the kitchen. "We cannot move her!"
From figures with multiple legs and noodles for arms to frolicking trees, Paco Pomet summons the absurd. Known for his uncanny oil paintings rendered mostly in monochrome and enlivened by colorful details of overly stretchy limbs or celestial objects, a sense of nostalgia greets surreal scenarios. The artist often derives his imagery from vintage black-and-white photographs, adding an absurd dimension to history.
