Art Watch Weekly: March 28 – April 3

Solo Exhibition Opening: Eugene Lemay: Navigator, Mike Weiss Gallery, 520 West 24 Street, opening March 29, 6 – 8pm.

Mike Weiss Gallery presents Eugene Lemay’s first solo exhibition at the gallery.  Navigator is comprised of large-scale monochromatic works adhered directly to the gallery walls. The archival pigment prints are composed of layers of Hebrew text derived from a collection of handwritten letters never sent to the families of fallen soldiers with whom Lemay served as a navigator in the Israeli Army.  Endless marks of  digitally altered scrawl create mesmerizing and nearly abstract surfaces through which hints of landscapes emerge.

Solo Exhibition: Catherine Opie: High School Football, Mitchell-Innes & Nash Gallery, 534 West 26 Street, through April 14.

Catherine Opie’s recent series investigates themes of masculinity, ritual and community through large-format portraits of high school football players  and scenes of the sport in action. The muscle-bound young athletes express themselves with degrees of bravado, awkwardness and vulnerability. High School Football is Opie’s first exhibition with Mitchell-Innes & Nash Gallery.

Solo Exhibition: Brian Ulrich: Is This Place Great or What: Artifacts and Photographs, Julie Saul Gallery, 535 West 22 Street, through May 5.

Brian Ulrich’s exhibition at Julie Saul Gallery culminates his decade-long study of American consumerism and combines photographs of stores with artifacts, such as a vintage neon fast food sign and a row of Montgomery Ward door pulls.  One of those most striking and quietly ominous images, Steelyard Commons, Cleveland, OH, 2011, provides a detailed view looking down onto the roofs and parking lots of Wal Mart store and Home Depot stores engulfed by an industrial landscape and a toxic sky at dusk.  Brian Ulrich will speak about his work at the gallery with Penelope Umbrico on Tuesday, April 17 at 6:30pm.

Lecture: Photographers Lecture Series: Deana Lawson, School at the International Center of Photography, 1114 Avenue of the Americas at 43rd Street, March 28, 7pm.

The ICP presents a lecture by distinguished photographer and faculty member Deana Lawson who explores African American identity, sexuality and personal and social history through intimate portraits of family, friends and strangers.

– Tema Stauffer