by Rachel Fershleiser

Ylva Ogland self portrait (detail) Paintings and prints by Jon Langford at Aidan Savoy

verybody out of the pool—it’s time to go back to school. For Lower East Side Arts lovers, it’s time to look back on wonderful outdoor theatre and forward to the reopening of your favorite galleries. Stanton Street newcomer Smith- Stewart presents New York newcomer Ylva Ogland in her first American exhibition. “Venus at Her Mirror,” a three-part show, displays childhood toys alongside drug paraphernalia, paintings of genitalia, and nude portraits of the artist at eleven years old. While you may not want to bring your eleven-year-old along, curator Amy Smith-Stewart is confident adults will find Ogland’s world thought provoking. “I was attracted to the work for its visual beauty and its conceptual rigor,” she said. “It speaks to her own life experiences with a strong feminist sentiment. In this body of work, she addresses aspects of her childhood— both tender and distressing—to form a portrait with multiple vantage points.”

53 Stanton Street, Opens 9/6

Everything Old Is New Again

eginning on Saturday, September 8, artist Mike Nelson offers a new way to glimpse the past and future simultaneously — a site-specific installation called “A Psychic Vacuum” at the old, unused Essex Street Market building. Closed to the public for thirteen years, this once-bustling space is now filled with reconstructed rooms and passageways inspired by the neighborhood’s history. A tour through the space offers a rare opportunity to explore, but be careful what you believe— Nelson seamlessly blends the preexisting with the fictionally re-imagined.

117 Delancey, 9/8 – 10/28, Friday– Sunday, 12-6 pm

Howdy, Rockstar

nother old(ish) favorite, Aidan Savoy Gallery, is offering a nice change of pace in the form of new paintings and prints by Jon Langford. Best known as a Welsh-born musician in bands like the Mekons and The Three Johns, Langford moved to the U.S. in 1992 and developed a fascination with the Country & Western music and culture of the American South. His 2004 concept album All The Fame of Lofty Deeds, about a fictional country star, has inspired a multi-media stage show (which will go up in Chicago in early ’08) and a poignant set of paintings, which New Yorkers get to see first.

175 Stanton Street, 9/13 – 10/7