I’ve always said I shed worse than any dog I’ve ever met.
Hundreds of my hairs gather on my bedroom floor in lightly tangled clumps at any given moment, apparently unmoved by my thrice-weekly dry-mop routine. Still, I’m no stranger to hair-related art, and Bengali-American artist Rina Banerjee does a remarkable job of transforming loose hairs into something beautiful in her interdisciplinary practice. She pulls strands of hair out of the realm of abjection and recasts them as a link between her hybrid humans and the natural world — clouds, waves, plant roots, and atmospheric energies.
To me, that’s just one of several familiar elements in Banerjee’s work, which examines immigration, colonization, labor, alienation, and Hindu spirituality through a feminist lens. Jennifer Samet’s August installment of Beer with a Painter offers a close look at Banerjee’s water-based paintings and assemblage in a wide-ranging interview with the Brooklyn-based artist.
Elsewhere in local news, Mayor Zohran Mamdani has teamed up with the NYC Department of Small Business Services to announce a multi-million-dollar investment in the city’s nonprofit and small business initiatives, including public art commissions and arts programming. How about a few more themed trash bins on street corners? Those were a riot. Staff reporter Anna Lee has the details.
Summer is fading, and while it’s been one for the history books, I’m not ready to give up late sunsets and outdoor adventures as we brace for next month’s rush of art world events. Maybe I can have the best of both worlds with the Medina Triennial, whose inaugural edition runs through Labor Day Weekend. Contributor Sara Reisman writes that, compared with her visit to the Venice Biennale, the free village-wide contemporary art exhibition along the Erie Canal felt like “one of relief, maybe even restoration.” I’m sold!
Also worth noting — I finally made it to the New Museum to see the renovation and the huge New Humans exhibition. I got lost twice and was frankly overwhelmed by the amount of loosely connected art packed into the show. The strangest part was that when I tried to leave, I accidentally went out through a fire escape and, naturally, the door locked behind me. I had to awkwardly descend into the back area of the museum’s new restaurant Oberon, where I encountered an employee folding napkins — his supervisor kindly escorted me to the front of the museum while I rambled about having the wayfinding skills of a housefly.
Too late to embed myself in the cultural fabric via CBGB, too existentially unsettled to make peace with the futurism of New Humans, but just in time for the New Museum’s upcoming exhibition on the history of the Bowery next month. I’ll be back!
