In a hectic season, an art break can offer a moment of tranquility and beauty, a diverting amusement or even a reminder of the human frailty and hope that the times signify. Some might even find a present or two among the offerings at local galleries, although there's nothing in the stocking-stuffer range among the following shows. Enjoy. Weinstein Gallery If a Parisian holiday is not an option, the next best thing is a stroll through Weinstein's elegant exhibit of behind-the-scenes photos of Versailles by Robert Polidori and French fashion shows by Alec Soth. With more than 20 large-format images, the show is expansively luxurious.
Weinstein has shown some of the Polidori images before, but they're always welcome and the additions are riveting, especially a picture of rows of marble and plaster busts of French dignitaries -- writers, mayors, philosophers, aristocrats -- in a low-vaulted Versailles storage room that looks like a converted wine cellar. Mysterious blue light lends the scene a slightly surreal glow, as if the assembly were a gathering of spirits sitting in judgment or waiting for cocktails. By focusing on atmospheric effects and strange details-- smoky lighting, sawhorses and ladders, a gilded bed in an empty salon -- Polidori reveals Versailles as a palace of intimate dreams and unfulfilled longing.
Soth was a fashion novice in 2007 when the Paris photo agency Magnum commissioned him to create a "Fashion Magazine" featuring his own photos, text and ads. With unfettered access to high-end shows, model-prep sessions, designers' studios and homes, Soth revealed the industry's calculated excesses, bizarre characters and extravagant beauty. Featured photos include some that do not appear in "Magazine," as well as "Moujik IV," a classic image of Yves Saint Laurent's bulldog squatting on a green brocade chair under the watchful eye of his bodyguard who is, incongruously, a dead ringer for Todd Palin, Alaska's former "First Dude." It alone is worth the trip.
Three smoked glass sculptures by Nicholas Africano of his exquisitely beautiful wife/muse are breathtaking additions to the display. Prices upon request.
Ends Feb. 6. Free. Weinstein Gallery, 908 W. 46th St., Mpls. 612-822-1722 or www.weinstein-gallery.com.
Franklin Art Works Judging from this fun show, Christopher Baker, a recent University of Minnesota art school grad, must be a whiz with all things electronic. He's wired 20 tiny credit-card scanners to very slowly print out emotive tweets plucked from cyberspace; rigged-up a cascade of 250 or more cell phones that softly whine, throb, moan and oink; illustrated his e-mail exchanges as if they were an airline route map; and -- best yet -- created a huge video projection of people blogging about themselves. Called "Hello World! or How I Learned to Stop Listening and Love the Noise," the projection consists of 1,780 postcard-sized videos arranged in a quilt-like grid that's 45 feet long and 12 feet high. The bloggers natter on endlessly, chattering about their days and hobbies, brushing their teeth or hair, dancing, trying on weird hats (Santa, cowboy, feed cap), and sharing more than anyone -- even Mom -- could ever want to know about their quotidian lives. Absurd, loopy and absolutely engrossing. Priceless.
Ends Jan. 9. Free. Franklin Art Works, 1021 E. Franklin Av., Mpls. Artist's talk, 6:30 p.m., Jan. 9, free. 612-872-7494 or www.franklinartworks.org.
Thomas Barry Fine Arts Minneapolis photographer Lynn Geesaman also shares a French fling in "Sites: Paris," which features 16 color images of parks and formal gardens, including Parc de Sceaux, Versailles and Chateau d'Esclimont. As always, she emphasizes the geometric precision of French landscapes but seasons these with saturated autumnal hues of pumpkin, amber and olive. Geesaman's soft focus and computer-aided colors augment the decorative charm of these pretty pictures. Prices start at $2,100.
Ends Jan. 16. Free. Thomas Barry Fine Arts, 530 N. 3rd St., Mpls. 612-338-3656 or www.thomasbarry.com.
Form + Content "Survival: When Truth and Fiction Intersect" documents an unusual pilgrimage that Twin Cities artist Robyn Stoller Awend made in May to the former Jewish ghetto in Vilna, Lithuania. Since 95 percent of the city's 65,000 Jews were murdered during the Holocaust, not much remains of the ghetto beyond some fading Hebrew shop signs on crumbling buildings. Awend photographs them and other relics of the once thriving community -- a synagogue, a memorial plaque, remnants of a famous Judaic publishing house. Besides the photos, the show features some half-broken trays of Hebraic type and crude bullets that, legend says, ghetto residents made by melting down lead type in a futile effort to fight off the Nazis. That tragic tale is recounted in a heart-rending poem by Abraham Sutzkever, one of the ghetto's few survivors. The poem is displayed on handprinted broadsheets. Eloquent in its simplicity, "Survival" testifies to the unbroken spirits that sustain hope in the darkest of days. Prices start at $125.
Ends Jan. 9, free. Form + Content, 210 N. 2nd St., Mpls. 612-436-1151 or www.formandcontent.org.
Mary Abbe • 612-673-4431
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