Everything You Need To Know This Week On New York's Art Scene

Ben Durham, Portraits, Maps, Texts

Ben Durham's second solo exhibition at the Nicole Klagsbrun Gallery opens April 12th, featuring a series of portraits, sculptures, and soundscapes which serve to embody the artist's alienation from his past. Continuing a portrait series begun in 2003, Durham recreates the mugshots of childhood friends and classmates in hyper-real drawings, consisting solely of hand-written words used to describe the person. The layering of words intensify both the shadows of the image and the shadows of nostalgia, as each piece is essentially the physical depiction of memory. On May 11, the gallery will host a collaborative sound performance by the artist and musician Robert Beatty, in which the words contained within the portraits will be recited and manipulated as pure sound. Dates: April 12-May 18 Where: Nicole Klagsbrun, 532 W 24th Sreet [Photo via]