Art

Besides being one of the coolest attractions in New York, the High Line is also of the the biggest showcases for outdoor art in the city. Every spring, the High Line picks an international roster of artists to create site-specific sculptures for the elevated structure to go along with its the views of Chelsea and the Hudson Yards.   Hannah Levy, Retainer, 2020 Photograph: Courtesy the High Line   The commissions include individual works, and as well thematically organized pieces situated throughout the park. The former includes a mural by Jordan Casteel located at 22nd Street, which has been up since the beginning of the year, and two new additions by Hannah Levy and Ibrahim Mahama, respectively. Levy's work is titled Retainer and it is just that: An oversize rendering of an orthodontic appliance made of carved marble and stainless steel; it'll be taking up a spot at 23rd Street. Mahama, meanwhile is presenting 57 Forms of Liberty, which consists of an inverted industrial tank from an old factory, sprouting a tree—an idea inspired by a rusted smokestack the artist saw in Ghana, which likewise served as a mini arboretum. You'll find it at Northern Spur Preserve by 16th Street.   Ibrahim Mahama, 57 Forms of Liberty, 2020 Photograph: Courtesy the High Line   This year's theme show is titled The Musical Brain and aims to explores "how music can be used as a tool to inhabit and understand the world." Eight artists—Rebecca Belmore,Vivian Caccuri, Raúl de Nieves, Guillermo Galin

If you pull your luggage through LaGuardia Airport's shiny, new Terminal B Arrivals and Departures Hall when it opens later this year, you'll see major installations designed by internationally-recognized artists that will "express the creative spirit of New York." The Public Art Fund on Thursday announced that it has partnered with LaGuardia Gateway Partners to commission four art installations inside the new terminal's Arrivals and Departures Hall. The Public Art Fund selected Jeppe Hein, Sabine Hornig, Laura Owens, and Sarah Sze out of a group of creatives who developed proposals for original and iconic artworks for the terminal. While the chosen artists have been featured at museums around the world, they have also all had artwork shown here in New York: Jeppe Hein, a resident of Berlin, recently had his piece, Please Touch the Art, displayed at the Brooklyn Bridge Park in 2015. Sabine Hornig, also based in Berlin, has had her work, Projects 78, featured at The Museum of Modern Art. Laura Owens from Los Angeles has been featured at the Guggenheim, MoMA, and the Whitney. Sarah Sze, who lives in NYC, is a professor of visual arts at Columbia University and recently unveiled her work at the new Second Avenue subway line's 96th Street Station called Blueprint for a Landscape. Jeppe Hein, Laura Owens, Sabine Honig and Sarah Sze Photographs: Courtesy Tom-Wagner, Noah Webb, Sabine Honig and Sarah Sze The initial portion of Terminal B (the new eastern concourse that opened in 20

If anything deserves a massive exhibition, it's love! Open now through March 31, A Romantic Comedy, showcases 50 works by 28 international and local artists all about the ambiguities of romance—and it's set across the 16,000-square-foot Williamsburg warehouse called 25 Kent. The show is curated by Sophia Sobers and Steven Pestana and told over three parts that create a narrative, pulling in topics like courtship, domesticity, online dating and workplace dynamics in a whimsical, fantastical (and sometimes confusing) way, without the Hollywood cliches. Photograph: Andrew Allison While you're there, make sure to find the following: Amanda Nedham's life-sized bathtub made of paper, a recreation of Paul Manafort's Brooklyn home foyer that's made with actual sales flyers left on his doorstep (all by Kyle Hittmeier), and Amanda Thackray's pinky-red mesh Caul Veil that echoes the webs we weave in our relationships. The show's curators, Sobers and Pestana, have exhibited art for the Rubin Museum, the Knockdown Center, the Spring/Break Art Show, BRIC, the Museum of American Art and more. You can find out more at Wallplay.com. A Romantic Comedy is at 25 Kent Avenue through March 31, Wednesdays through Sundays from 11am to 7pm.  

If there’s one thing you could say about Times Square, it's that it’s stimulating—maybe a little too stimulating. Everywhere, giant flagship stores lure shoppers with visual theatrics, while five-story high digital billboards bombard you with ads for everything from Broadway musicals to Asian news agencies (though why tourists would be interested in the latter is anyone’s guess). But it has ever been thus: Almost from the beginning, Times Square has been dominated by noise, traffic—and especially by flashing, repeated messaging. Now, a new installation by artist and architect Aaron Pexa promises to provide a break from all that sensory overload. Taking up the lobby of 10 Times Square, Pexa's work is called Garden Party and combines floral wallpaper inspired by the building’s Art Deco interior with neon and back-lit sculptures. But Garden Party's main attraction is a mesmerizing, 20-minute video titled, I Wander the Forest in Search of Mystery. A surreal sequence that looks like it's been shot through gauze, I Wander the Forest features a crystal chandelier sparkling in the midday sun as it lazily twirls above a clearing by a lake. Every now and then, billowing clouds of colored smoke pass through the frame, obscuring the dreamlike mise-én-scene. Photograph: Zdravko Cota Pexa describes his effort as an escape from the strobing, quick-cut editing of the signage environment outside, and indeed, the installation title and its 1920s-style touches evoke nothing so much as a roma

Ever wondered what's the story behind NYC's ubiquitous outdoor monuments