I forgot to mention a couple of other items in my earlier post on our trip to Chinatown and the Lower East Side to see art. There is a cool show of almost photo-realistic oil on plastic paintings by Dan Colen at Rivington Arms -- the gallery that disdains the idea of a website. I once asked whether they were going to get one, and they said, "that's not really the audience we're aiming for." This comes from people who were chatting with trucker-hatted visitors who were explaining that one simply cannot live comfortably in NYC with an apartment worth less than $1 million.
The other thing: there was a street fair on lower Crosby that was a real one -- not one of those awful fried dough and sausage cart things that pass for most street fairs. There were quite a few artists who also do work with clothing there. I bought a scarf made by Emily Noelle Lambert.
I haven't seen Dan Colen's oil on plastic paintings, but they sound like they're pretty different from what I've seen here. I've read a lot of feedback about his mixed media sculptures, some good, some bad. The good usually consisted of "it's a somber reflection of urban America," while the bad just said it was the worst piece of art at the exhibition.