This Woman's Work

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The cover image from a new book by Arthur Danto on Iranian/American photographer and filmmaker Shirin Neshat, with a foreword by Marina Abramovic. Get more info on the book at Rizzoli, and read a recent interview with Neshat here. Shirin Neshat is represented by Gladstone Gallery.

In Seattle from July 9–15, the Henry is sponsoring a screening of Shirin Neshat's first full-length feature film, Women Without Men, at Northwest Film Forum: "Set in Iran during [the] infamous 1953 CIA-backed coup, the film follows four women from different social classes as they take refuge in a metaphorical orchard." Here's the trailer:

Go to nwfilmforum.org for info and tickets

Reflection Eternal

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Anne Christensen's T blog post on Anish Kapoor's show at Barbara Gladstone reminded me that I forgot to put up this picture of Emily and me, from when we saw the show a couple weeks ago. I didn't expect to like the show that much—I thought of it as a glorified funhouse mirror—but the reflections are constantly surprising, and like the Olafur Eliasson show at MOMA right now, there's something cool about experiencing an unusual space with a group of strangers.

Mean World Blues

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Emily and I had some rare time to kill after an early party Saturday afternoon, and went to Chelsea to see Andro Wekua's Blue Mirror at Barbara Gladstone. At the same time beautiful and utterly terrifying, the Georgian-born artist's collage, painting, sculpture, and film conveyed to me a sense of underlying, almost gutteral violence in consumer culture, as seen through the eyes of someone remembering their childhood. It's as if the person, represented by several life-size, incredibly life-like female figures, retreats ever inward as incomprehensible and scary things happen around her, and then inescapably replays them all...forever. It was one of the better shows we've seen in the past several months, and there was a palpable emotional reaction from viewers in the gallery.

Blue Mirror runs March 1–29 at Gladstone Gallery, 515 W 24th Street between 10th & 11th. More info and images here.