Photo-Illustration: Curbed; Photo: Clockwise from top left: Soobin Jeon/Allen Street Gallery, Arturo Aranda/Found Objects/Collette Home, Eric Firestone Gallery, Seth Caplan/Piscina
August in New York can often feel like a month of limbo with all the comings and goings, out-of-office replies, and galleries closed for installations. This month’s picks highlight the transient and the reemerging: A massage parlor in Chinatown is transformed into a gallery of rare decorative objects and antiques; a Lower East Side gallery run by an architecture studio returns with its first show post-pandemic; and in Red Hook, designer Piscina turns compartmentalizing into a work of art.
From left: Brian Sharrock’s carved-plywood partition. Photo: Courtesy Brian Sharrock/Allen Street GalleryCharlie Mai’s seating-and-table ensemble. Photo: Courtesy Charlie Mai/Allen Street Gallery
From top: Brian Sharrock’s carved-plywood partition. Photo: Courtesy Brian Sharrock/Allen Street GalleryCharlie Mai’s seating-and-table ensemble. Phot…
From top: Brian Sharrock’s carved-plywood partition. Photo: Courtesy Brian Sharrock/Allen Street GalleryCharlie Mai’s seating-and-table ensemble. Photo: Courtesy Charlie Mai/Allen Street Gallery
Tucked within Leroy Street Studio’s office storefront, Allen Street Gallery reopens for the first time since the start of the pandemic with a group show curated by Annie Chen Ziyao. “Living Room Rhapsody” is a pleasing jumble of nine designers’ works. You could almost miss Charlie Mai’s glass-beaded curtain hung in the front window, but not his puffy black coffee table and stools bound by braided rope and cinched with industrial straps. John Kim’s unexpectedly delicate “collage lantern” is a chandelier of discards: Metal wire, cables, pebbles, and old jewelry dangle precariously together. Other pieces have an appealing tactile quality: Brian Sharrock’s carved-plywood partition imitates a tree shedding its bark, while Soobin Jeon’s beaded ceramics look like brightly encrusted shells washed ashore a surrealist beach. Closes September 5. Contact Allen Street Gallery to view the show.
From left: Photo: Courtesy Galerie SantangeloPhoto: Courtesy Galerie Santangelo
From top: Photo: Courtesy Galerie SantangeloPhoto: Courtesy Galerie Santangelo
In Chinatown, two steps below street level in a former massage parlor, you’ll find Galerie Santangelo, a treasure chest of items that New York–based interior designer Fernando Santangelo sources personally, many from his native Uruguay. The antique selection is eclectic but leans toward the ornate; there are Baroque religious paintings and a table base made entirely of seashells and chained gothic candelabras, alongside a few modern pieces. There’s a rumor that Santangelo has signed the lease next door, making room for larger works, and based on what’s inside the sliver he now occupies on Madison Street, this is something to look forward to.
From left: Photo: Arturo Aranda/Courtesy Found Objects/Collette HomePhoto: Arturo Aranda/Courtesy Found Objects/Collette Home
From top: Photo: Arturo Aranda/Courtesy Found Objects/Collette HomePhoto: Arturo Aranda/Courtesy Found Objects/Collette Home
Furniture gallery Found Collectibles is bringing Brazil to Southampton, displaying masterworks of South American mid-century furniture in the luxury consignment store Collette Home (a store that has Bethenny Frankel’s endorsement). Some of the country’s most acclaimed designers will be on display, such as Giuseppe Scapinelli’s incredible rosewood-and-glass dining table; Jean Gillon, best known for his comfort plump leather sling chair; and industrial furniture pioneer Móveis Cimo. There are rattan chairs, green leather, striking carved wooden pieces (some in native hardwood jacaranda), blue velvet, chrome, glass, and, of course, no shortage of strong lines and fine woods. Closes August 25.
Ledoux Shelving Unit by Piscina.
Photo: Seth Caplan
Geometric wood assemblages have become something of a specialty for Natalie Shook, the designer behind Brooklyn design studio and gallery Piscina, and her latest ‘Ledoux Shelving Unit’ is as playful as it is complex, with layered, jigsawed shapes and concealed compartments. The hand-carved work was a custom commission for Brooklyn-based JAM architects, and future iterations can be customized for any height or shelf combination. Inside her Red Hook gallery, also called Piscina, she shows her work alongside others, many of them workshop neighbors. They include Luke Malaney, whose chair and wall sconce of industrial copper and salvaged wood are hammered, painted, and carved into unrecognizable textures, and a wooden chair that is nothing but curves from Studio POA. Visit Piscina on Saturday and Sunday 12 PM – 5 PM or by appointment.
From left: Jason Middlebrook’s Sunset Cliffs. Photo: Courtesy Jason Middlebrook/Eric Firestone GalleryBruce Sherman’s Eye-con. Photo: Courtesy Bruce Sherman/Eric Firestone Gallery
From top: Jason Middlebrook’s Sunset Cliffs. Photo: Courtesy Jason Middlebrook/Eric Firestone GalleryBruce Sherman’s Eye-con. Photo: Courtesy Bruce Sh…
From top: Jason Middlebrook’s Sunset Cliffs. Photo: Courtesy Jason Middlebrook/Eric Firestone GalleryBruce Sherman’s Eye-con. Photo: Courtesy Bruce Sherman/Eric Firestone Gallery
In East Hampton, Eric Firestone Gallery opens a sprawling show of bold and elaborate works by 22 artists. Loosely themed around optimism, “Alright Alright Alright” is a showcase of pattern, material, and color that feels high-energy and offers a little jolt in the slowest part of summer. Kelsey Brookes’s kaleidoscopic sewn Indian tapestries and the pristine lines of automotive paint on maple wood by Jason Middlebrook are intricate and hypnotic. Among the more geometric, abstract works, notably the engrossing Ellsworth Ausby, there are some irreverent and intriguing characters, one-eyed with bubble-flip hair or with no face at all, the work of New York–based Bruce M. Sherman, who makes pieces out of ceramic, metal, and rock. Closes September 22.
