Andrea Zittel's A-Z Homestead Unit (2001).    (Photo: Christopher Dawson)

8. Andrea Zittel, at the New Museum
Why aren’t there more museum surveys of mid-career female artists? This one, an approachable presentation of Zittel’s podlike furniture, felted-wool dresses, and other neo-Bauhaus lifestyle experiments, appealed to bourgeois design fetishists and radical conceptualists alike. It made quite a few museumgoers wish for a trip out to A-Z West, the Mojave Desert Taliesin where the artist tests her creations on a varying cast of young art pilgrims. It also ginned up the anticipation for the New Museum’s debut on the Bowery next year.