Art
The Homages and Inventions of a Self-Taught Painter
Peter Shear is working through every form of abstraction, figuring out what paint can do.
Reviews
Art
The Sexual Ambiguity of Henry Darger’s Vivian Girls
An exhibition sheds new light on the Chicago recluse’s most provocative images.
Music
Trapped by Tropes: Spoon, The New Pornographers, Alt-J, Charly Bliss
New albums by four indie-rock bands recycle and repurpose decades-old sounds, sometimes striking out and sometimes succeeding.
Art
The Contested Histories of Water
Two group shows make the case that, even at its most innocuous, water still poses hidden dangers.
Art
The Open-Ended Narratives of a Small Museum
What if Abstract Expressionism never happened?
Film
A German Filmmaker Who Captured the Poetics of Labor and the Legacy of Fascism
The Film Society of Lincoln Center is presenting A Vision of Resistance: Peter Nestler , the first large retrospective dedicated to the filmmaker in the US.
Film
A Documentary on Tyrus Wong, a Long-Ignored Illustrator for Disney and Warner Bros
Wong spent 30 years in the film industry, though racial attitudes of the time kept his contributions unacknowledged until the 21st century.
Film
A Biopic Tells the Unlikely Story of Folk Artist Maud Lewis
Maudie, directed by Aisling Walsh, offers a complex portrait of a woman who resided on the literal edges of society and had no formal training, but lived and breathed her painting.
Art
An Artist’s Felt Bodega Is So Successful It Sells Out
Lucy Sparrow's 8 'till late sold all the items you'd expect from a convenience store — only each one was hand cut, stitched, and painted.
Art
A Dollar-Store Art Show Shortchanges Its Viewers
A massive group exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit was basically drawn from junk, and so it remains.
Art
The Chopped-Up Novels and Appropriation Poetry of an Artist and Bookmaker
Printed Matter’s exhibit Sally Alatalo: Narrative in Revision includes experimental magazines, printed ephemera, and newer digital works.
Art
A Critical Understanding of Edward Curtis’s Photos of Native American Culture
A massive installation at the Muskegon Museum of Art displays Edward Curtis's entire ethnographic survey of surviving Native American culture at the turn of the 20th century.