Alexandros Vasmoulakis Figures @ LeBasse Projects

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LeBasse Projects presents a solo exhibition by multi-disciplinary artist Alexandros Vasmoulakis. The exhibition will feature muralist and installation artist Vasmoulakis' new series, entitled Figures, comprised of compelling figural work partly inspired by the tradition of portraiture. Vasmoulakis’ paintings contain many layersβ€”physically, in terms of their thick impasto and textural buildup of paint, and also metaphorically. At the outset, the figures are smiling, a nod to the traditional purpose of portraiture as a showcase of one’s ideal or idealized comportment. However, the grinning and laughing expressions are menacingly exaggerated and recall the distorted visages of tortured souls in Francis Bacon’s deeply psychological portraits and self-portraits. In the case of Vasmoulakis’ personas, the turmoil does not come from an inner psyche, but from the outside influences of contemporary society, consumer culture and the media machine as the figures vapidly laugh, pose and posture. Alexandros Vasmoulakis Figures will be on view until February 23, 2013 at Le Basse Projects, 6023 Washington Blvd, Culver City, CA

Set Pieces @ Cardi Black Box in Milan, Italy

Deviating from the standard white box of exhibiting shows, curators Lauren Mackler and Andrew Berardini invited four Los Angeles-based artists to create sets for showcasing other artists’ works. At once puzzling and defusing, some sets interweave consciousness with their assigned works while others sweep pieces into a bizarre narrative. Barely lit up by gel-filtered stage lights, the show reads part Universal Studios, part journey into a TV-fueled collective subconscious. Sets by Sarah Cain, Liz Glynn, Samara Golden, and Mateo Tannatt and works by the likes of Raymond Pettibon. Set Pieces, curated by Andrew Berardini and Lauren Mackler will be on view until April 2015, at Cardi Black Box Corso di Porta Nuova, 38 Milano. Text and photographs by Yanyan Huang 

Cyprien Gaillard The Crystal World @ MOMA PS1

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Cyprien Gaillard's (b. 1980, Paris) work navigates geographical sites and psychological states, addressing the relationship between architecture and nature, and evolution and erosion. Using a variety of artistic mediums ranging from painting and sculpture to photography, film, and video, Gaillard juxtaposes pictorial beauty and the atmospherically lush with elements of sudden violence, destruction, and idiosyncrasy culled from popular culture, pointing to the precarious nature of public space, social ritual, and the very viability of the notion of civilization. Cyprien Gaillard The Crystal World is on view until March 18, 2013 at MOMA PS1, 4601 21st St  Long Island City, NY

Regarding Warhol: Sixty Artists, Fifty Years

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For decades, critics have observed that Andy Warhol exerted an enormous impact on contemporary art, but no exhibition has yet explored the full nature or extent of that influence. Through approximately forty-five works by Warhol alongside one hundred works by some sixty other artists, Regarding Warhol: Sixty Artists, Fifty Years juxtaposes prime examples of Warhol's paintings, sculpture, and films with those by other artists who in key ways reinterpret, respond, or react to his groundbreaking work. What emerges is a fascinating dialogue between works of art and artists across generations. Regarding Warhol: Sixty Artists, Fifty Years will be on view until April 28, 2013 @ The Andy Warhol Museum, 117 Sandusky Street, Pittsburgh, PA

Skye Nicolas M*DEL F*CKR

Fashion week is almost here and for some people that means models on the runway, but for other people that means models in the bedroom. Leonardo DiCaprio, Johnny Depp, Mick Jagger, Mickey Rourke, and Madonna have all been there. It seems models just can’t resist. In fashion, film and finance it’s par for the course. New York-based artist Skye Nicolas has a knack for taking the ironic and the ridiculous and mixing it with the pure, distilled fuel of gossip (sometimes about himself) and notions of celebrity (sometimes his own), and turns it into socially poignant pieces of art. Nicolas’ new series, fittingly called M*DEL F*CKR, which includes 90's style logo tees and beanies, is a tongue-in-cheek ode to those who partake in certain dalliances with the aforementioned genetically gifted. Even Nicolas himself has been caught in the rumor mill with his own trysts caught on a webcam at The Mark Hotel in New York leaving some to call him a M*DEL F*CKR. Transforming the colloquial term into a recognizable logo graphic playfully de-stigmatizes its instinctively incendiary context and replacing it with affectionate banter intended to praise, becoming the ultimate compliment promising unabated adulation. It's no surprise that a handful of top agency girls have already gotten hold of the merchandise, and have been spotted at New York Fashion Week castings wearing M*DEL F*CKR tees and beanies. Head over to Induced Nostalgia and get yourself a logo tee for $30 bucks (same price for beanies). The tees are truly authentic in their 90's style cut and Loosey-Goosey Sizingβ„’, uniquely coined by the artist. Grab one now for Fashion Week before they're gone forever! 

Doug Aitken 100 YRS @ 303 Gallery

Central to Doug Aitken's "100 YRS" exhibition is a new Sonic Fountain, in which water drips from 5 rods suspended from the ceiling, falling into a concrete crater dug out of the gallery floor. The flow of water itself is controlled so as to create specific rhythmic patterns that will morph, collapse and overlap in shifting combinations of speed and volume, lending the physical phenomenon the variable symphonic structure of song. The water itself appears milky white, as if imbued and chemically altered by its aural properties, a basic substance turned supernatural. The amplified sound of droplets conjures the arrhythmia of breathing, and along with the pool's primordial glow, the fountain creates its own sonic system of tracking time. Doug Aitken 100 YRS will be on view until March 23, 2013 at 303 Gallery, 547 W 21st Street, New York, NY. 

Dabs Myla All Good Things @ Metro Gallery

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Presented in association with LRG, art duo Dabs Myla ready their All Good Things... exhibition at Metro Gallery in Melbourne. Known for their colorful abstractions that are fully realized with help and cooperation from both artists, the show promises to feature numerous new paintings, drawings and an on-site installation that will surely encapsulate the whimsy often associated with their work.Β All Good Things... will be on view until February 9, 2013 at Metro Gallery,Β 1214 High Street, Armadale, Victoria, Melbourne, Australia