MONDAY, JUNE 18
Benefit: “Block Party 2012,” at the Arsenal in Central Park
The Horticulture Society of New York (“The Hort”) hosts a silent auction and meet-and-greet with artists, in support of its GreenHouse program, which provides horticultural therapy and vocational training for inmates on Riker’s Island. In support of the cause, artists Barry McGee, Sue Kwon, Chris Johanson and Steve Powers have all donated works, and graffiti artist KAWS has produced something specifically for this event. Photographer Lawrence Schiller has donated one of the just-published photographs of Marilyn Monroe featured in Vanity Fair. The event is free and open to the public. —Rozalia Jovanovic
The Arsenal in Central Park, Fifth Avenue and East 64th Street, New York, 6-10 p.m.
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 20
Discussion: “The Radical Art of Bill Bollinger” at SculptureCenter
In conjunction with the retrospective it is hosting of pioneering post-minimalist Bill Bollinger, SculptureCenter invites four heavy hitters to discuss his art: curator Christiane Meyer-Stoll, who spent a decade organizing the show, artist Gary Kuehn, MoMA Associate Curator of Drawings Christian Rattemeyer and art dealer Mitchell Algus. SculptureCenter’s director, Mary Ceruti, moderates. —Andrew Russeth
SculptureCenter, 44-19 Purves Street, Long Island City, Queens, 7–9 p.m.
Opening: “Context Message” at Zach Feuer
Stop by Zach Feuer for this terrific and diverse-sounding group show, featuring Michael Riedel, Reena Spaulings, Martin Kippenberger and Bjarne Melgaard, among others. Sounds like there’ll be great art, market critique and, if the press release is to be believed, “quilts from a particularly rustic area of America (some might even characterize it as “flyover country”) which, about 10 years ago, were celebrated for their coincidental relationship to museum-worthy paintings.” Cozy! —Dan Duray
548 West 22nd Street, New York, 6–8 p.m.
Opening: Jan Vercruysse, “Works 1990-2011,” at Gladstone
Gladstone Gallery will present an exhibition by Belgian artist Jan Vercruysse, his first in New York since 2009, curated by Anne Pontégnie. Mr. Vercruysse started out as a poet, but abandoned writing in 1974 to concentrate on visual art. The show will follow the major periods of the artist’s career. —Michael H. Miller
Gladstone Gallery, 515 West 24th Street, New York, 6-8 p.m.
THURSDAY, JUNE 21
Opening: “Vision Quest” at Klagsbrun
Amanda Friedman and Taylor Trabulus helm this exhibition, which takes as its jumping-off point the spiritual sojourn that 20th-century artist Marjorie Cameron Parsons Kimmel, a k a Cameron (famed for her role in Kenneth Anger’s Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome), made into the California desert. The curators have lined up an impressive group of artists, including Sam Falls, Amy Granat, Yugi Agematsu, Matt Hoyt and Jimmie Durham. —A.R.
Nicole Klagsbrun, 532 West 24th Street, New York, 6–8 p.m.
Opening: “Sculpted Matter” at Paul Kasmin
Paul Kasmin opens an impressive double-space sculpture show featuring Arman, Carl Andre, Anthony Caro, Saint Clair Cemin, Tara Donovan, Dan Flavin, Tom Friedman, Katharina Grosse, Richard Hughes, Deborah Kass, Jim Lambie, Sol LeWitt, Jill Magid, Matthew Monahan, Iván Navarro, Anthony Pearson, Will Ryman, Alyson Shotz, Keith Sonnier, Frank Stella and Bernar Venet. —D.D.
Paul Kasmin, 293 Tenth Avenue and 515 West 27th Street, New York
Opening: Sol LeWitt, “Works On Paper (1983-2003)” at Waterhouse & Dodd
Waterhouse & Dodd presents a series of works on paper by Sol LeWitt, executed in the final decades of his life. Many of them have never before been seen by the public. —M.H.M.
Waterhouse & Dodd, 104 Greene Street, New York, 6-8 p.m.
Opening: “Joe Deutch,” at Marlborough Chelsea
Marlborough presents a mini-retrospective of the work of performance artist Joe Deutch, who infamously nearly got himself kicked out of UCLA for playing Russian roulette in front of a class. Mr. Deutch, whose work builds on a the tradition of Los Angeles performance artists Christ Burden and Ron Athey, went on to do other notorious stunts in the name of art, like having himself bitten by a rattlesnake, taking public transportation to the hospital and then framing the hospital receipt as ephemera. For the “Greater L.A.” show in New York, he showed a video called Boot_Reboot, in which he filmed the police struggling to remove a boot he had placed on the tire of their patrol car. —R.J.
Marlborough Chelsea, 545 West 25th Street, New York, 6-8 p.m.
