Henry Darger Landscapes @ Ricco/Maresca Gallery

Ricco/Maresca Gallery presents Henry Darger: Landscapes. This exhibition brings together highly celebrated landscapes by the self-taught artist Henry Darger (1892-1973). Darger's sumptuous and detailed landscapes are extensively varied - from bucolic and peaceful to dark and foreboding. When Henry Darger’s work is viewed from this singular vantage, new aesthetic, conceptual, and technical discoveries surface from the vast depths of the artist's complex and mysterious oeuvre. A devout Roman Catholic, Henry Darger worked as a janitor in Catholic hospitals by day and gave expression to his private, imaginary world by night from his small rented room on Chicago’s north side. Over a 54 year period, he created his magnum opus, a more than 15,000-page illustrated saga, The Story of the Vivian Girls in What Is Known as the Realms of the Unreal or the Glandelinian War Storm or the Glandico-Abbienian Wars as Caused by the Child Slave Rebellion,(commonly referred to as In the Realms of the Unreal). The 13 volume manuscript is reenacted in nearly 300 watercolors and collages depicting the "adventures" of the seven innocent Vivian Girls as they lead the rebellion against the evil, child-enslaving, adult Glandelinians. Henry Darger: Landscapes will be on view until February 2, 2013 at Ricco/Maresca Gallery, 529 West 20th Street, 3rd Floor NYC. 

Max Snow The Lady of Shalott @ Colette in Paris

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“I am half-sick of shadows” said The Lady of Shalott - Alfred Lord Tennyson, 1842. Max Snow's newest work takes its title from Tennyson's poem: a lyric ballad adapting Arthurian Legend. Cursed to remain alone in her island fortress, The Lady of Shalott is unable to participate in the world except to view its distorted reflection in her mirror and weave those images on her loom. Both the poem and the show serve to raise questions about society and the artist's role, responding to the conflicting commands to create art inspired by the world and also to live in it. The Lady of Shalott will on view until February 2, 2013, at Colette, 213 rue Saint-Honoré 75001 Paris

Urs Fischer @ Eden Rock Gallery in St. Barths

Gagosian Gallery presents an exhibition of tables by Urs Fischer in St. Barts entitled Tables, Chairs and Arms. Continuously searching for new sculptural solutions, Fischer has built houses out of bread; enlivened empty space with mechanistic jokes; deconstructed objects and then replicated them; and transferred others from three dimensions to two and back again via photographic processes. The works to which the title alludes are tables that combine large resin-coated photomontages with multicolored steel geometric bases. The jokey surrealist montages juxtapose images both found and manipulated—a pair of sausages, a cartoon snail, a graffiti-covered wall, an open mouth, a Hong Kong supermarket. Blurring the distinctions between photography, collage, sculpture, and furniture, the tables are objects both aesthetic and useful, filling the gallery with a presence that is at once visually arresting and socially convivial. Tables, Chairs and Arms will be on view until January 31, 2013 at Eden Rock Gallery, in St. Barths. 

Trisha Baga Plymouth Rock 2 at the Whitney Museum

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Plymouth Rock 2, New York–based artist Trisha Baga’s first US solo show, is a two-channel projection compiled from a variety of found and original video and audio material. Baga projects this collaged narrative, based on the history of the Pilgrim landing site and its current state as a dilapidated tourist attraction, onto and past objects placed throughout the space that, along with the bodies of the viewers, further interrupt and disrupt the already distorted tale. Like much of her nascent practice, Plymouth Rock 2 is an adaptation and reinstallation of an earlier work, Plymouth Rock, first shown in London earlier this year.Plymouth Rock 2 will be on view until January 27, 2013 at the Whitney Museum of American Art, 945 Madison Avenue, New York

Antoni Muntadas Exhibition at Jeu de Paume

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From Antoni Muntadas' famous "limousine project" on view at  Jeu de Paume as the part of the major exhibition by the internationally recognized artist, one of the early practitioners of conceptual and media art. Antoni Muntadas Entre / Between on view until January 20, 2013 at Jeu de Paume, 1 place de la Concorde 75008, Paris

Toxic Play In Two Acts @ The South London Gallery

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For their first solo exhibition in the UK, Berlin-based artist duo Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenz present Toxic, 2012 and Salomania, 2009, alongside a program of performance, screenings and talks. Through their installations of film and archival material they upset normative historical narratives with a host of collaborators including Ginger Brooks Takahashi, Werner Hirsch, Yvonne Rainer and Wu Tsang. Toxic Play In Two Acts by Pauline Boudry and Renate Lorenze will be on view until February 24, 2013 at The South London Gallery, 65-67 Peckham Road, London

Last Chance to See The Ultravelvet Collection Sex Invaders

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Hionas Gallery TriBeCa presents the very first east coast exhibition from Los Angeles-based artist duo The Ultravelvet Collection, comprised of eight new photomontage works from their series Sex Invaders. Combining iconography from classic video games, erotic imagery, film photography and graphic design, Sex Invaders is a visual journey for a generation who grew up playing games on Atari and original Nintendo systems, yet whose base desires may have matured somewhat in the ensuing years. Sex Invaders will be on view until December 29 at Hionas Gallery, 89 Franklin Street, New York

Holton Rower Performance @ Fresh Basel

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Artist Holton Rower at the Fresh Basel exhibition as part of a live performance of one his pour paintings, curated by Kathy Grayson of The Hole gallery in New York, held at the the historic 1920′s waterfront Villa Vecchia estate during Basel Week Miami, sponsored by Playboy. photograph by Kristy Leibowitz

Neo Rauch @ the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz in Germany

German artist Neo Rauch poses in front of his work Die Abwaegung (The Consideration) during a preview of a double exhibition with works by Rauch and his wife at the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz museum in Chemnitz, eastern Germany. From December 16, 2012 to February 10, 2013, the museum will present simultaneously the show "Gravitation" with works by Rauch's wife Rosa Loy and the show "Abwaegung" (consideration) with works by Neo Rauch. photograph by Hendrik Schmidt 

Artist Francesco Vezzoli Offers First Multiple on Yoox

In collaboration with yoox.com, Italian artist Francesco Vezzoli, whose works usually start at around $80,000, has created his first multiple in aid of the areas affected by the earthquake in the Emilia region. All proceeds from the 399 pieces will go to the FAI (Italian National Trust) fund for the reconstruction of the Finale Emilia town hall damaged by the earthquake on May 20th, 2012. You can pick one up here while they last. 

The Twin Shores of Agnès Varda in Seville

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"Having filmed the seaside and the beach so much, I could be taken for a specialist. Here I show a photo of the sea and we can imagine the wind which, at that moment, whips the crest of a wave up into jets of water. I also propose that the movement which continues the image is cinema, another representation of the seaside, we hear the last wavelet that comes and flattens itself on the sand, well, the sand is real sand, it's reality," says the iconic New Wave film director Agnès Varda about her new exhibition at the Centro Andaluz de Arte Cntemporaneo in Seville, Spain. The exhibition, entitled The Twin Shores of Agnès Varda, presented in collaboration with the Sevilla Festival de Cine Europeo, shows short films, photographs and installations by the French filmmaker. The Twin Shores of Agnès Varda will be on view until March 31, 2013 at Centro Andaluz de Arte Cntemporaneo.

COCO x Love With Stranger Zine by Margaret Haines

Love With Stranger x COCO, a new publication by Los Angeles-based artist Margaret Haines, is one in a series of ‘trailers’ for her forthcoming feature-length film Coco (Fall 2012). Previous ‘trailers’ have included a performance at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE), a sound installation at the Cirrus Gallery, and a sculptural presentation at Commonwealth and Council Gallery in Los Angeles. It explores different tropes of female identity - mixing personas, identities, some parafictional, some actual. Based on the narrative structure of Don Quixote, the book revolves around three female protagonists—Coco, a character that appears in Haines’ forthcoming film; Los Angeles artist and cult figure, Cameron (1922-1995), famed for her role in Kenneth Anger’s Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome; and Haines’s own ruminations. This Thursday, January 20, Ooga Booga will be hosting a launch for the zine at their holiday pop-up shop inside Various Small Fires at 1212-B Abbot Kinney Blvd, Venice, CA 90291.

Judith Bernstein Hard @ The New Museum

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For over forty years, New York-based artist Judith Bernstein has created expressive drawings and paintings that boldly critique militarism and machismo in a manner that is at once humorous and threatening. Her exhibition, entitled Hard, at the New Museum in New York will include a selection of works ranging from the ’60s through the present, including a new site-specific rendition of Bernstein’s Signature Piece (1986/2012), painted in explosive gestural strokes directly onto the Lobby Gallery windows. Hard will be on view until January 20, at the New Museum, 235 Bowery, New York, NY

Sterling Ruby at Bonniers Konsthall in Sweden

Bonniers Konsthall invites Los Angeles based artist Sterling Ruby to present his first solo exhibition in Sweden. Sterling Ruby, whose been named one of the 2000s most interesting artists, works in a mixture of materials and genres, from glazed biomorphic ceramics to drawings in nail varnish. He takes his subject matter from a wide range of sources, including maximum security prisons, urban gangs, modernist architecture, and the mechanisms of warfare. His works can be seen as a form of assault on both materials and social power structures. The universe of Soft Work is by first look playful, soft and humorous but will soon reveal a dimensions of fear or terror. The artist transforms pillows, blankets, and quilts from objects of comfort into ominous sculptural objects that hint at the possibility that safety and security are an illusion. Here the American flag is used as material in gigantic vampire mouths and obese stuffed animals hangs from the roof like macerated cadavers. On view until March 17, 2013 at Bonniers Konsthall, Torsgatan 19, Sweden.

Daniel Arsham @ Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia

Daniel Arsham at the opening of his exhibition Reach Ruin at the Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia. Connecting the lines between art, architecture, dance, and theater, Arsham mines everyday experience for opportunities to confuse and confound our expectations of space and form. Arsham is known for subverting existing architectural structures in unconventional, playful ways: façades appear to billow in the wind, figures seem wrapped beneath the wall’s surface. His cross-disciplinary practice, historical inquiry, and satirical wit combine into an ongoing interrogation of the real and the imagined. Reach Ruin will be on view until Mid-March 2013, at Fabric Workshop and Museum. photograph by OHWOW