Week of June 16
Midtown is sexy, YBDG is dripping and other happenings 🎷
Have a hot night in Midtown at Leo’s Famous with jazz curated by Matt Nelson on Wednesday. Have a slick night at Pioneer Works in Red Hook with Young Boy Dancing Group presented with the Dripping Festival on Friday. Have a revelatory night on the Bowery at our beloved Giorno Poetry Systems with Colin Self and Agosto Machado on Saturday.
This week is giving generously!!
Meanwhile: we’re excited to finally see Taylor Mac’s Prosperous Fools this week at the Theatre for a New Audience—the press is glowing, Mac is a genius, and you can still get tickets here (shows run through June 29).
🆓 = costs $0, 🎨 = art, 🎼 = music, 🎬 = film, 📚= books, 🌳 = nature, 🎭 = performance, 🧠 = extra smart people, 🍸 = drinks available, 🗽= extra New Yorky
🔑 Click the venue link for full event details.
Monday, June 16
Bloomsday Marathon Reading at 192 Books
It’s Bloomsday. James Joyce-heads like Wallace Shawn, Wayne Koestenbaum, Natasha Stagg and a handful of other great New Yorkers and writers will gather at 192 Books to read aloud the last episode of Ulysses, the great book that takes place on a June 16. Tea, scones, and Irish whiskey will be served.
192 Books, Chelsea
Mon from 4-7p 🆓 📚 🗽
Other Monday events, briefly noted:
Catherine Lacey presents The Möbius Book in conversation with Leslie Jamison at McNally Jackson (South Street Seaport), 6:30p 📚🍸
Tuesday, June 17
IFC Center: 20th Anniversary Celebration throughout the day at IFC Center (West Village), various times 🎬
Punchdrunk’s Viola’s Room opens for performances at The Shed (Hudson Yards), runs through Oct 19 🎭
Artist Sam Moyer and Curator Scout Hutchinson in conversation on the show Woman with Holes at the great Hill Art Foundation (Chelsea), 6p 🆓 (RSVP Required) 🎨
Books at Ethical presents Manvir Singh on Shamanism: The Timeless Religion at The Society for Ethical Culture (Upper West Side), 6:30-7:30p 🆓 📚
Opening the Archives: Finding LGBTQ+ History in the CBH Collections at the Center for Brooklyn History (Brooklyn Heights), 6:30-8p 🆓 📚🗽
Daniel Johnston: A Book Launch and Celebration with Adam Green, Lee Foster, and Gibby Haynes at Pioneer Works (Red Hook), 7p doors, 7:30p event 📚 🎨
Network screens at The Paris (Midtown), 7p 🎬
Dream Baby Press presents James Frey's book launch for Next to Heaven at Harper’s (Chelsea), 7-9p 🆓 📚
The second launch and first Manhattan event for Lynne Tillman and Taylor Lewandowski's THE MYSTERY OF PERCEPTION at Village Works (East Village), 7p 📚 🗽
“Black Apocalypse”: Afrofuturism at the End of the World—a conversation and book launch with Tavia Nyong’o and Jonathan González at Performance Space (East Village), 7p 🆓 📚 🎨 🧠
Jess Walter on So Far Gone with Amor Towles at The Center for Fiction (Fort Greene and online), 7-8:15p 📚
Catherine Lacey about talks her new book The Möbius Book with the NYT’s Molly Young followed by a wine reception at Greenlight Books (Fort Greene), 7:30-8:30p 📚 🍷
Wednesday, June 18
Vermeer’s Love Letters opens at The Frick
As the summer shouts DO MORE!, we like a blockbuster show that’s small and quiet—just three A+ Vermeers featuring women with letters across sumptuous canvases.
The show “pairs the Frick’s Mistress and Maid with special loans of the Rijksmuseum’s Love Letter and the National Gallery of Ireland’s Woman Writing a Letter with Her Maid.” Advanced tickets are recommended.
The Frick, Upper East Side
Wed at 1p 🎨
June Jazz Series curated by the great Matt Nelson at Leo’s Famous
Every Wednesday in June, the great musician (and Rad Wine co-founder) Matt Nelson curates the town’s most exciting jazz musicians to play at Leo’s Famous—the cute cocktail spot underneath Leonetta. Midtown can be sexy if you want it to be, and this is how you make it happen.
Leo’s Famous, Midtown
Wed from 9p-12:30a 🎼 🍸
Other Wednesday events, briefly noted:
Member Summer Evenings, every Wednesday through September 3 at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden (Crown Heights), 6-8:30p 🌳 🍸
Opening reception for On a Comfortable Sofa Dreamed (Guest-Curated by
Studio AHEAD) at Superhouse (Chinatown), 6-8p 🆓 🎨Book talk: Burning Down the House: Talking Heads and the New York Scene That Transformed Rock with author Jonathan Gould at the Museum of the City of New York (Upper East Side), 6:30p 📚 🗽
Justin Vivian Bond kicks off performances of Well, Well, Well at Joe’s Pub (NoHo), 7p 🎭 🍸 runs through June 29
Molly Jong-Fast talks with Taffy Brodesser-Akner about How to Lose Your Mother at the 92nd Street Y (Upper East Side and online), 7:30p 📚
Thursday, June 19
Nordic Surrealism: 1930-1960 opens at Nagas (Nomad), 12-6p 🆓 🎨
Jacob Muilenburg: 𝘞𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘵 𝘗𝘳𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘵𝘺 opens wherever U-Haul Gallery drives (Manhattan TBD, follow U-Haul on IG for locations), runs through Sunday 🆓 🎨
Queer|Art and The Poetry Project co-present MARSHA!, an intimate evening with artist, filmmaker, author and Multi-Year QAM Mentor Tourmaline in celebration of her newest book MARSHA: The Joy and Defiance of Marsha P. Johnson at The Poetry Project at St. Mark’s Church (East Village), 7:30p 📚 🎭 🗽
Friday, June 20
Solstice Sunrise and Sunset performances at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden
It’s the easiest day of the year to wake up at the crack of dawn and stay up late. If you’re into either or both, head to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden for a sunrise performance, featuring a guided musical meditation with saxophonist/composer Matthew Evan Taylor and the Metropolis Ensemble’s chamber orchestra performing a world premier of new music from Taylor’s series, Afropneuma.
For sunset, you get a double treat: Matthew Evan Taylor’s back to play more from Afropneuma, followed by a reimagining of Steve Reich’s great minimalist classic, Music for 18 Musicians.
The Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Crown Heights
Sunrise performance from 5:15-6a 🌳 🎼
Sunset performance from 8:30-10p 🌳 🎼
Dripping: Sun Ra Arkestra with Marshall Allen, Young Boy Dancing Group, and more
It’s a good day to hear saxophones in Brooklyn. Tonight at Pioneer Works, catch 101-year-old Marshall Allen as he leads the visionary Sun Ra Arkestra. (Allen’s latest solo album New Dawn from earlier this year is a force in case you missed it.)
In addition to Allen, you get Young Boy Dancing Group—our most admired weirdo performance art collective whose dance/theater is made divinely beautiful by flirting with grotesquery. (Their show at Performance Space last year changed how we think about dance, also we’ve never seen so much lube in one place.)
The lineup is rounded out with other solid performers: Colin Self (also performing at Giorno Poetry Systems tomorrow!), Cel Genesis, and DJ sets from Relaxer and Baby Leo.
Pioneer Works, Red Hook
Fri at 6p doors, 7p show 🎭 🎼 🎨
Saturday, June 21
Last day to see Pierre Huyghe’ In Imaginal at Marian Goodman
Our least original thought is that this is the best show in New York right now. Catch the presentation across two floors at the gallery. Camata, the film on the 2nd floor, is the piece de resistance.
Marian Goodman, Tribeca
Sat from 10a-6p 🆓 🎨
Colin Self performs with Agosto Machado at Giorno Poetry Systems
The official title of the performance is COLIN SELF IS INSPIRED BY THE SHRINES OF AGOSTO MACHADO. RSVP here to experience it.
From GPS: “This new theatrical performance, conceived by both artists, is a celebration of Agosto’s legacy as a crucial figure in New York’s countercultural theater and drag scenes, and an homage to the countless named and unnamed deceased figures Agosto and Colin make art in reverence to.” As Self’s latest album plays, the two artists will respond to each other.
Longtime readers know that Giorno Poetry Systems is the best culture institution in New York, and you will be a better person for visiting and engaging with their programming which is as spiritually punk and New Yorky as it gets.
Giorno Poetry Systems, Bowery
Sat 6:30p doors, 7p performance 🆓 (with RSVP) 🎨 🎭 🗽
Other Saturday events, briefly noted:
American Ballet Theater presents Giselle at the Metropolitan Opera House (Lincoln Square), performances run through June 28 🎭
Book launch and author talk: Lauren O’Neill-Butler on The War of Art: A History of Artists’ Protest In America in conversation with Annie Ochmanek at MoMA PS1’s ArtBook (Long Island City and online), 4p 🆓 📚 🎨
Opening reception for Left Unsaid group show featuring Sabrina Bockler, Allie Gattor, Thérèse Mulgrew, Angela Fang Zirbes, Jesse Zuo and more at Hashimoto Contemporary (Lower East Side), 6-8p 🆓 🎨
Musicians for Justice: Juneteenth Jazz Jubilee at The Society for Ethical Culture (Upper West Side), 7-9p 🎼
Last call for these art shows closing Saturday:
A Rose Is group show at Flag Art Foundation (Chelsea), 10a-6p 🆓 🎨
Raphael Griswold’s LOADING DOCK at Chozick Family Art Gallery (Tribeca), 10a-6p 🆓 🎨
Randy Wray’s Prehistory across Karma’s galleries on East 2nd St (East Village), 11a-6p 🆓 🎨
Lena Henke’s The City Transformed at Bortolami at 55 Walker (Tribeca), 11a-6p 🆓 🎨🗽
Jovencio de la Paz’s el lugar de los milagros / the place of miracles at PPOW (Tribeca), 11a-6p 🆓 🎨
Museum Manu’s Women’s History Museum at Company Gallery (Nolita), 12-6p 🆓 🎨
Cajsa von Zeipel’s DASH at Company Gallery (Nolita), 12-6p 🆓 🎨
Sunday, June 22
Last day to see Real Clothes, Real Lives: 200 Years of What Women Wore, the Smith College Historic Clothing Collection at the New York Historical Society (Upper West Side), 11a-5p 🎨 🗽
Last day to see Lighting Up: How Smoking Broke Gender Barriers at the New York Historical Society (Upper West Side), 11a-5p 🗽 🚬
Last day to see Jacob Muilenburg: 𝘞𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘵 𝘗𝘳𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘵𝘺 at U-Haul Gallery drives (they’ll be at Fort Tilden all day - follow U-Haul on IG for location) 🆓 🎨
Book event Jack Whitten: The Messenger featuring Acclaimed artist Dawoud Bey, book designer Joseph Logan, and Michelle Kuo, MoMA’s Chief Curator at Large and Publisher at MoMA PS1 (Long Island City), 4p 🆓 📚 🎨 🗽
Reverend Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir present La la la Liberate at the Quaker Meeting House (Gramercy Park and online), 6p 🆓 🎭🗽
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