Journey to the Center of Uranus

CANADA
55 Chrystie St
www.canadanewyork.com

Summer is a time to take a break from what's serious and escape into something ethereal. The concept behind Canada's group exhibition "Journey to the Center of Uranus" offers just that. Ten artists exhibit their "relics, visions and systems of mystery, ad hoc codes, cybernetic signs and/or bionic research equipment. The work carries the courage and inspiration of those willing to fly through the rings of Uranus on route to the center of the solar system's coldest gassy giant". If you can find this gem of a gallery downtown, then you're own journey of discovery has already been successful.  The exhibit includes work by Eunice Kim, Paul Slocum, Alistair Frost, Willy LeMaitre, Ida Ekblad, Bjorn Copeland, Lizzi Bougatsos, Theo Mercier, Rob Swainston, and Jessica Jackson Hutchins.

Work by Eunice Kim, Paul Slocum, Alistair Frost, Willy LeMaitre, Ida Ekblad, Bjorn Copeland, Lizzi Bougatsos, Theo Mercier, Rob Swainston, & Jessica Jackson Hutchins

David Byrne: "Play the Building"

Battery Maritime Building, 10 South St
www.creativetime.org

Best known for his role in The Talking Heads, David Byrne builds upon his artistic repertoire in his first project with Creative TIme. Playing the Building is a  9,000-square-foot, interactive, site-specific installation. Byrne has retrofitted an antique organ, placed it in the center of the building's cavernous second-floor gallery, that controls a series of devices attached to its structural features—metal beams, plumbing, electrical conduits, heating and water pipes. Visitors are invited to "play" the machines that in turn vibrate, strike, and blow across the building’s elements, triggering unique harmonics and producing finely tuned sounds.

Asako Narahashi: half awake and half asleep in the water

Yossi Milo
525 W 25th St
www.yossimilo.com

For her first solo exhibition in the United States, Japanese artist Asako Narahashi presents a series of color photographs taken at various coastal sites in her native country. Taken with a Nikon’s 35mm waterproof film camera, half submerged in the water, the works reveal a different vantage point than we are used to, creating atypical relationships between the water, land, and sky. Since 2001, the artist has visited over 50 locations to capturing these emotive images.

Pretty Ugly

Gavin Brown's Enterprise & Maccarone
620 - 630 Greenwich St
www.gavinbrown.biz
www.maccarone.net

Addressing the subjective labels of 'pretty' and 'ugly' in the context of avant garde art, curator Alison Gingeras has produced an eclectic hodgepodge-of-an-exhibition spanning two neighboring galleries and featuring works by over 70 artists. Hung unconventionally - some works crammed closely together, others unusually high, and others resting upon unconventional supports - the viewer is confronted with an array of different aesthetic choices, and a melding of the two terms, to create the cohesive term 'pretty ugly'. If time is taken to navigate around the sheer volume of all of the pieces, the viewer is rewarded with many exceptional works by a wide range of important contemporary artists.

Action/Abstraction: Pollock, de Kooning, and American Art, 1940-1976

The Jewish Museum
1109 Fifth Avenue
www.jewishmuseum.org

The critically lauded Action/Abstraction: Pollock, de Kooning, and American Art, 1940-1976, presents major paintings and sculptures by Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, Mark Rothko, Frank Stella, and others from this decisive era. The exhibit surveys the first generation of Abstract Expressionists as well as later artists who built on their achievement. Action/Abstraction is organized around the perspectives of the influential, rival art critics Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg, whose articles on Abstract Expressionism influenced the movement's reception in America and catapulted many of the artists in it into international acclaim.

Olafur Eliasson: The New York City Waterfalls

Various Locations
www.nycwaterfalls.org

Just in time to offer relief from the warm, humid summer, Danish artist Olafur Eliasson unveils "The New York City Waterfalls" his most ambitious public art project to date - and the most ambitious the city has produced since Christo's "The Gates."  For the project Eliasson has conceived of four 90 - 120 ft waterfalls that sit dotted in various locations along the East River. These monumental structures engineered from scaffolding, and other everyday industrial materials, encourage New Yorkers and tourists alike to reconnect with the city's waterfront and "reconsider their relationships to the(ir) spectacular surroundings". These impressive structures are best viewed from the water. The Circle Line offers "The Official Waterfalls"  tour, a free Governors Island Ferry runs Friday through Sunday, and if you've been dying to use the free Ikea Water Taxi, their views are comparable, and Swedish meatballs await you on shore.