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Art Candy

5/ 9/08

3:15 PM

Artist Anne Hardy Depicts a Bashful Superhero's Worst Nightmare

Anne Hardy's Booth (2006)Courtesy of the artist and Bellwether, New York.

It's a slightly sad state of affairs for this retro collection of phone booths, constructed and photographed by Anne Hardy who might do well to pitch, say, Quentin Tarantino a Superman remake in which Superman is holed up with Lois in a roadside Mexican bar drinking tequila and rejoicing the distinct absence of Kryptonite in South America. Or something like that. Hardy has four more large photographs at Bellwether, New York, through May 17. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

5/ 8/08

3:00 PM

Artist Gerry Snyder Knows Where Teletubbies Go After They Die

Gerry Snyder's Limbo (2008)Courtesy of Claire Oliver.

Gerry Snyder's oil paintings are about the size of a midtown office window and portray bulbous, cuddly creatures floating and frolicking in hazy, bleeding landscapes — we see life-size gummy bears playing with sprinklers in the Garden of Eden. Be terrified at Claire Oliver gallery through May 17. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

5/ 7/08

2:30 PM

Artist Daniel Zeller's Drawings Are Whatever You Want Them to Be

Daniel Zeller’s Marginal Theory (2008)Courtesy of Pierogi Brooklyn

If you look hard enough into Daniel Zeller's knotty, tangly paper drawings, up at Pierogi Brooklyn through May 19 (take in a double show there this weekend!), you might see your apartment's stoop with a barky dog tethered to it. Or a lion napping in an African desert. Or an abandoned car in suburban Detroit. Or perhaps just a series of colorful blobs and swirls that are equally fascinating, if not more so. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

5/ 6/08

2:15 PM

Peter Garfield's Art Is Complete Garbage

Peter Garfield’s You Are So Unaware Of Your Beauty 646-607-5550 (2008)Courtesy of Pierogi Brooklyn

Sort of like those Day of the Week panties girls wear, Peter Garfield has a pile of trash for every day and mood: Sometimes it’s a neat piece of plastic pinned to the wall by wire; other times it’s these giant photographs of rubbish dumps that look more like the immaculately stocked delis we New Yorkers are blessed with than the discarded remnants of what we buy there. Pierogi Brooklyn is one big, beautiful rubbish dump through May 19. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

5/ 5/08

4:00 PM

Artist Matthew Pillsbury Spaces Out in the Park

Matthew Pillsbury's On the Phone With Bonni, Eaton Square, London (2007)Courtesy of Bonni Benrubi Gallery, Inc.

A medical trial to test the possible health benefits of LSD for patients nearing the end has recently been announced in Switzerland — it’s the first study of its kind in 35 years. We’re guessing (or hoping) those health benefits look something like this: sunny, happy, black-and-white, and so sweetly blurry around the edges. More gentle psychedelia is up at Bonni Benrubi Gallery through May 31 in a collection of luminous black-and-whites by Matthew Pillsbury. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

5/ 2/08

3:30 PM

Artist Tomma Abts Pop-ifies the Bat Signal

Tomma Abst’s Meko (2006)Courtesy of James-Keith Brown and Eric G. Diefenbach

Tomma Abts is a Turner Prize–winning painter whose mini-canvasses, fourteen of which are on view at the ever-improving New Museum, could break your brain with all the rays and zigs and zags. Sometimes, like here, all this gushing abstract paint reminds us of those POW!s in the old Batman TV show — or the Bat Signal itself; other times, layers of limes and pinks painted in tidy swirls and chunky squares evoke tasty fruit, like a drippy watermelon or gentle slices of lemon. At once pristine and unwieldy, the paintings will be on display through June 29. —Emma Pearse

More: art, new museum, tomma abts

Art Candy

5/ 1/08

3:00 PM

Artist Molly Smith Thinks Outside the Bun

Molly Smith’s untitled (2007)Courtesy of KS ART

Molly Smith doesn’t deliberately mask her highbrow erotica — one of her poster-size paintings is of a heart-shaped glob of snow nestled into a triangular-shaped branch — but you could still give one of her elegant watercolors, like this painting of … a hot dog … to your grandparents on their 50th wedding anniversary (framed in gold) and they would probably love it, despite the fact that it’s erotica. See more slightly more-disguised human bits on view at KS ART in Tribeca through May 13. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

4/30/08

3:00 PM

Icelandic Artists Build a Nest

Icelandic Love Corporation’s Hreiður (Nest) (2004)Courtesy National Gallery of Iceland

It's spring-cleaning time in this pigeons' nest, and it seems mama ain't getting much love. Is this what Woody the Woodpecker would look like, were he created by Björk? And there's more quirk (bouncy pink beanbags!) as well as very serious, important works by very serious, important Icelandic artists — no, seriously, Ólafur Elíasson and Katrín Sigurðardóttir are among them — on view at Scandinavia House throughout the summer, until August 15. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

4/29/08

3:00 PM

Artist Chris Scarborough Clouds Our Judgment

Chris Scarborough’s Ecstasy (2007)Courtesy Foley Gallery

Chris Scarborough sketches small animals and sweet, pointy, anime-inspired children who have been watching too much serious news: They emerge from beautiful clouds of smoke punctured with ever-so-dainty tools of death. The dreamiest images of war we’ve ever seen will be on view at Foley Gallery through May 31. —Emma Pearse

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Art Candy

4/28/08

3:15 PM

Artist Karin Weiner's Work Is, Frankly, a Little Stilted

Karin Weiner’s Somewhere Above the Abyss
the Clouds Are Gathering (2008).Courtesy of ZieherSmith

Something about Karin Weiner’s collage suggests her characters are skeptical of the plethora of rubber galoshes in stores now: No matter how prettily designed — with ascot-clad ducks or dancing bears! — they rarely do the trick. Instead, Weiner’s oil-painted men navigate the rainy abyss on wooden stilts that, well, also seem to be caving under the cloudy pressure. More delicately humorous collages hang at Chelsea’s ZieherSmith gallery around a life-size boat designed out of found wood: another handmade shelter from the world’s natural resources. —Emma Pearse

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