gallery girl 001
hot spots, cold days
Welcome to Gallery Girl, a monthly walk through New York’s art scene with Emma of ART BREAK . We’re excited to wander with you.
Stay toasted, xx.
Friday, January 23, 2026
I work until 2pm and leave my apartment with a laundry list of shows to see and errands to run. I have everything chronologically listed in the notes app, starting with a cluster of galleries in the East Village. I find art mostly via Instagram and SeeSaw. I love Instagram because I follow every single gallery and can bookmark whatever catches my eye. I’ll then add the bookmarked shows to SeeSaw so that I have everything in a handy pushpinned map.
I start by popping into Half Gallery to see Emily Ferguson’s show. While each of Ferguson’s larger than life paintings is a thing of beauty on its own, they might be more interesting viewed like this–in concert together, hung close in strings like sentences. The method to the madness is anyone’s guess, but the effect sure is cool. Black and white paintings of city streets and rocket ships are made more compelling vis-a-vis their proximity to color paintings of a mostly nude woman wearing winged eyeliner and a flesh-colored bird zooming across a canvas. In the center of the show is a foldout book that incorporates imagery from the paintings on the walls. I like the sense that this is an artist interested in building her own lexicon, unafraid of repetition. When an idea is good, I think the possibility for iteration is virtually endless.
Next up is Karma at 188 East 2nd Street to see Bill Bollinger’s show, I Am Gravity. I am surprised by how much I enjoy it. Minimalism is not always my thing. Although this is a rather earthy, dusty, messy-feeling “postminimalism” that is, above all, incredibly tactile. A floor thickly dusted with loose powdered graphite, allowed to explode up the paper white gallery walls, is a thrillingly naughty intervention. Somehow the spray paint and acrylic on paper works avoid the dead abstract art feeling I often have–they are very much alive, records of original ideas and confident, inspired mark-making.
I pop into RUBY/DAKOTA to see the highly Instagrammable (said with no malice) “Feet Pics” group show, organized around the theme of, well, feet pics. This show is squeamish and sweet in equal measure. It will make you think about feet! Sexy feet. Scared feet. Damaged feet. Happy feet. Bare feet. Sock feet. Etcetera. A rather tender reminder to appreciate our appendages.
I’ve been making my way downtown, walking fast, so I can drop off a pair of vintage Levi’s at Stanton Street Tailor. If you’ve blown out the crotch or ass of a pair of jeans, he’ll patch it for you, although he recommends bringing them in before they are hole-y. I love this guy.
So now I’m in the Lower East Side! I head over to Ludlow Street so I can see the Seth Cameron show at Entrance, a consistently great little gallery. Someone should buy one (or all) of these. Named The Stranger (Chrysanthemums), a nod to the novella written by French philosopher Albert Camus, these Sumi ink dye on linen works are, in essence, floral paintings. I thought they would have more of an abstract, washed out, Helen Frankenthaler look based on photos, but they are vibrant and distinct, appearing more like photographic prints or cyanotypes–crisp, saturated. That Cameron is painting the shadows of the chrysanthemums, a flower historically associated with mourning across cultures, produces a haunting sense of absence–what is sort of something but not the thing, a shadow or a specter.
Further downtown (mind you I am doing all of this in sub-freezing temperatures, for the love of the game!), I run my second errand: picking up a vial of the sold-out-online SC103 fragrance from their new shop on Henry Street. Their Links Tote is on the shoulder of many a cool art person and I love the homemade, scrappy quality of the ready-to-wear. Relic blends notes of patchouli (which, being from a hippy dippy Appalachian town, I am partial to), oud, amber, and vetiver. Sexy!
Down the street is 56 Henry, for a show that comes close to the awe one feels when completely immersed in nature. Sareh Imani’s When the wind dies down, and the rain grows gentle is a collection of pastel pencil on paper drawings of various arrangements of foraged… I can’t call them “objects”. They are sticks and twigs, pods and seeds, leaves and nettles. Precious gifts from the woods, beautifully rendered and kept for us to enjoy.
Last stop: acupuncture in Chinatown. I am trying to incorporate more TCM into my life in the most respectful way possible. I believe in ancient wisdom and I really enjoy my acupuncturist who, when I remind him I am there to treat anxiety, says “I will make you happy!”
Style Notes
What Emma wore to the galleries.
We hope you enjoyed the first edition of Gallery Girl. Check back next month for more art worth seeing around New York.
Last week we toured Paris with Cléo. This week, we’re checking into the Park Hyatt Tokyo with ScarJo. Watch Lost in Translation with Melodrama Film Club.
Join the book club!
This month we’re reading:
Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man by Marshall McLuhan
The Critic as Artist by Oscar Wilde
Slow Days, Fast Company by Eve Babitz
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This was amazing!! Love that we get all the outfit links too!
love this format! goes down like champagne