• Tazu Nishi's Living Room, Columbus Circle. Photo courtesy of Michelle Aldredge, gwarlingo.com

The September openings and the book fair and the Dumbo Arts Fest and GO and ArtPrize and have come and gone, so now’s a good time to actually see some art. Go do that. But just in case you are somehow still not satisfied, you art event whore, I added a few of those, too.

All Week: Free event to check out

Public Art: Discovering Columbus, On top of the Columbus statue at Columbus Circle

If you think dumb and accessible go hand-in-hand, this might prove you wrong. Tatzu Nishi’s built a living room around the six-storey high statue of Christopher Columbus in Columbus Circle, so you can see it as it was never meant to be seen. As you walk around a statue of Columbus, you’re overlooking the CNN sign and corporate offices like Sephora, LL Bean, et cetera. So you’ve got social commentary, and tourists seem to like it, too.
Through November 18th, 10 AM - 9 PM daily. Free with reservations. Columbus Circle, Manhattan

Monday, October 1st

Performance: Pierce Warnecke + Richard Garet, Harvestworks

Tonight, Pierce Warnecke and Richard Garet mash up light and found textures into high-speed video in real time. If you want a taste of what that looks like, check out this video, but whatever you do: do not watch with headphones. It’s really loud.
7 PM, 596 Broadway, #602, Manhattan

Tuesday, October 2nd

Preview: Global Model Village, Broome Street Gallery

Street art, in miniature! It’s not exactly my cup of tea, but whatevs. The video...well...just watch it.
An installation by Slinkachu will open alongside the release of his third book Global Model Village.
6 - 8 PM, 498 Broome Street, Manhattan

Artist Talk: Martha Rosler and Michael Arcega, International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP)

Come hear Martha Rosler talk with ISCP resident Michael Arcega. Rosler currently has work included in the Lucy Lippard “Six Years” show at the Brooklyn Museum, but will also present an installation/performance at MoMA in November. Though Arcega began working as an artist in the early 2000s, he and Rosler share similar interests in politics and social constructs; it should be interesting to hear whether the audience is as receptive to the topic as when Rosler working with it in the 70s.
6:30 PM, 1040 Metropolitan avenue, Williamsburg

Friday, October 5th

Opening: Process and Progress, Bronx River Art Center

Now’s also a good time to see what’s up in the Bronx. The Bronx River Art Center, an art space dedicated to stewardship of the Bronx River, will open a two-person show about neighborhood development. You may remember Sonya Blesofsky’s extremely well-crafted paper, foil, and tape architectural bricolage from a few shows at Mixed Greens over the past few years; we’d like to see how that translates to buildings in the Bronx. That, and the idea of development in the Bronx, should work well with Lan Tuazon’s Kirigami, inspired by Kazimir Malevich’s utopian city and abandoned housing developments.
6 - 9 PM, Bronx River Art Center, 305 East 140th Street, #1A

Ongoing exhibition: Urban Archives: The Rituals of Chaos, Bronx Museum

If you're in the area, the Bronx Museum is showing a group exhibition about urban chaos and isolation, featuring Enrique Metinides, Sophie Calle, Robin Graubard, Gordon Matta-Clark, and more. The museum is always free (!) and open Thursday - Sunday, 11 - 6 PM.

And mark your calendars! The museum will celebrate its 40th anniversary next Friday, October 12th, and it should be a big event. It’s been about six months since the Bronx Museum set a precedent for New York institutions with free admission, so let’s hope the community returns the love.
1040 Grand Concourse, Bronx

This weekend: The New Yorker Festival

Saturday, October 6th

Talk: Alison Bechdel and Judith Thurman, SVA Theater

All of the New Yorker events should be good, but I’m super-super-super-super-DUPER excited to hear from comic artist/graphic novelist Alison Bechdel. The author of Dykes to Watch Out For has not only been a trailblazer for lesbian visibility, but she’s also a trailblazer for the graphic novel medium in general, recently with her beautifully-written tragicomic memoir about her relationship with her father Fun Home. The follow-up, Are You My Mother?, was published this May.
As a warm-up, read her introduction to “Best American Comics, 2011,” (p. xiv) where she writes about how comics used to be a place safe from Artforum snobs; it’s no longer true, but she sounds happy about it.
4 PM, 333 West 23rd Street ($30)

Check out the full list of New Yorker Festival events here.

Opening: Convergences, the NARS Foundation

The Brooklyn-based New York Art Residency & Studios Foundation will present work by 35 artists from the community. So if the Dumbo Arts Festival and GO were a little overwhelming, here's a chance to see an edited version. Based on the inclusion of slower work like that of Hisao Ihara and Jacqueline Hoang Nguyen, this looks more promising.
6-8 pm. 88 35th Street, 3rd Floor, Brooklyn