7 Museums – Seven Deadly Sins

7 Museums – Seven Deadly Sins: Calling all sinners! Give in to temptation and enjoy a provocative series of exhibits focusing on the Seven Deadly Sins. A clever collaboration of the seven museums of the Fairfield/Westchester Museum Alliance, the exhibits run all summer, with each participating institution presenting its own particular transgression: the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum (sloth); Bruce Museum (pride); Hudson River Museum (lust); Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art (lust); Katonah Museum of Art (gluttony); Neuberger Museum of Art (greed) and Wave Hill (wrath). Artists use allegory, humor and irony to prompt visitors to consider what it means to be human in an imperfect world. So don’t commit the Eighth Deadly Sin: missing this wickedly engaging series.

Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum, 258 Main St., Ridgefield, CT • 50th Anniversary: Circumstance: The Seven Deadly Sins: Sloth: Artist Mats Bigert and Cabinet magazine editor-in-chief Sina Najafi utilize the Adrich’s first floor and porch to depict sloth not by portraying but by inhabiting the sin. It’s the ultimate in laziness: Using the latest Western technologies—including Bob-O-Pedic recliners, video, television monitors, gin, ice and tonic—the exhibit invites visitors to put up their feet, chill out and armchair travel to six other local museums to check out their presentations of the other Deadly Sins. Why drive to see them if you don’t have to? Mon, Wed–Sat: 10am–5pm. Sun: 12-5pm. 7/19-10/18. www.aldrichart.org

Bruce Museum, 1 Museum Drive, Greenwich, CT • The Seven Deadly Sins: Pride: Mankind’s hubris and vanity are explored through objects of art and culture from the Renaissance to the present. This study of exquisite master prints, drawings, paintings, rare books and a video installation demonstrates the breadth and endurance of this mother of all sins. Shown here is Gabriel Schachinger’s Sweet Reflections, 1886. Tues-Sun: 10am-5pm. 6/27-10/18. www.brucemuseum.org

Hudson River Museum, 511 Warburton Ave., Yonkers • The Seven Deadly Sins: Envy: Adrien Broom, a multimedia artist with a penchant for the bizarre and beautiful, interprets “the green-eyed monster” in a three-part installation. In the entangling filaments of Web of Envy, visitors catch glimpses of objects that stimulate envious desire—beauty, youth and gold. Gallery of Fairy Tales features famous characters from age-old stories who covet what others have and are ruined by their envy. Colors, the barometers of our feelings, make up the Colors of Life photography series, which shows us the green of envy as well as colors that signal light, curiosity and transformation. Wed-Sun: 12-5pm. 6/6-9/26. www.hrm.org

Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art, 1701 Main St., Peekskill • Seven Deadly Sins: LUST: An exhibition of artworks that visually explore raw eroticism in many forms. Catherine Opie’s Pieta borders on religious ecstasy, while Larry Clark’s Tulsa Series documents a playground of sex within a drug-ridden culture of lost youth. No one under 18 admitted. Fri: 11am-5pm. Sat & Sun: 12-6pm. Through 7/26. www.hvcca.org

Katonah Museum of Art, 134 Jay St., Katonah • GLUTTONY:Emilie Clark: The Delicacy of Decomposition: As part of the larger collaboration exploring the Seven Deadly Sins, this special installation by artist Emilie Clark focuses on gluttony: excessive self-indulgence and overconsumption. Using her family’s preserved food waste–including egg shells, desiccated tangerines and fish heads in a jar–Clark explores the complex interconnectivity of consumption, waste, decay and regeneration. Belying their waste-based content, Clark’s installations hold a quality of Old World still-life paintings. Tues-Sat: 10am-5pm & Sun: 12-5pm. 7/12-9/6. www.katonahmuseum.org

Neuberger Museum, Purchase College, 735 Anderson Hill Rd., Purchase • Seven Deadly Sins: GREED: The Neuberger’s Greed Exhibit, GOLD, features works by 22 well-known contemporary artists who have used gold to reinforce or challenge notions of transformation, beauty, spirituality and values. Several artists use gold to elevate everyday objects, such as Sylvie Fleury’s 2004, Yes To All, a gold-plated trashcan (pictured). Others, such as James Lee Byars, explore the ritualistic use of gold to imbue objects with spiritual and eternal significance. Tues-Sun: 12-5pm. 7/12-10/11. www.neuberger.org

Wave Hill, W. 249th St. and Independence Ave., Bronx • Seven Deadly Sins: Wrath–Force of Nature:  An exploration of wrath as it relates to environmental uncertainty, with paintings and sculptures by contemporary artists who focus on depicting the cataclysmic and uncontrollable forces of nature, including tsunamis, hurricanes, floods, droughts and forest fires. Pictured here is Brian Adam Douglas’s The Center Cannot Hold, 2011.Tues-Sun: 10am-4:30pm. 6/7-9/7. www.wavehill.org

By Elena Serocki

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